A golden evening

No apologies for the cheesy title: just look at this!

I went out cycling on Tuesday evening with a few of the guys from work, over the Golden Gate bridge and into the Marin Headlands to a place called Hawk Point. We all met up at my house, which is near to the seafront (Embarcadero) and close to the bridge.

The scene was set after about 3 minutes when we got into Fort Mason park. There's a short, sharp climb from the front up into the park. It features as a segment on Strava, called "The Fort Mason Climb" - see what they did there? its 0.1 miles and rises 73 feet at 9%. Not much, but at 46 seconds my time is down at 1576 in the rankings! It's not easy to be so beaten in such a short time. Anyway, so every cyclist - or runner for that matter - hits it hard, every time. Oscar, naturally blasted off while I tried to do a more controlled effort with some consistent power. Sure enough, Oscar began to slow and I caught him about halfway up. "That all you've got bigshot?" probably was a bit cocky on my part, as Oscar dug into the red and blew me away. I tried to force him wide using a convenient pedestrian, but it made no difference. Victory was his, and we had a good laugh at the childishness of it all. It wouldn't be the last bit of childishness that evening!

The climb up from the bridge was tough, and we all fell into our own rhythm. We reached the viewpoint from where that beautiful picture was taken, and regrouped. Chloe came in a little bit back, but given that she's on the equivalent of a butcher's bike, wearing trainers on flat pedals and was carrying a rucksack that's probably allowable! The ride continued like this, with stunning views, great swooping hills and a lot of laughs. When we got back across the bridge onto the long flat straight Oscar wanted to do something that sounded like "punt and grunt" or "rasp and gasp" I can't remember what, but he essentially meant: "Let's race up here" I had to take him on but he just strongarmed me out of the way. The rest of us were in his wake and he loved it. We finished off the evening with another race up the hill outside my house, Oscar wobbling all over the road like Mark Cavendish in a Tour de France finish. His crank came loose with the effort, and Chris cruised up past him to take a hollow victory. Hollow maybe, but it was all that was on offer with "the beast" on such form. We all giggled like schoolkids, but what a terrific ride out, and I was home in time for tea! Special.