How I got ready for the Mount Diablo Challenge 2007

Way back in 1979, when Jimmy Carter was U.S. President, I used to bicycle a lot, on a sturdy Grand Auto 10-speed.  One summer day,with a handful of friends, we started up Mount Diablo. I ended up making it to the base of "The Wall", about 600 feet from the summit proper, up a very steep 18% incline.  It would be another 28 years before I returned for a second shot at the summit.

In the last few days of 2006, my doctor explained that my cholesterol levels were borderline and that I really needed to do something about it.  He suggested diet changes, exercise, weight loss and prescribed a mild dose of cholesterol medication.  I must have been ready, because I implemented those changes starting that day.  At the time, I was around 245 pounds and basically sedentary, other than 3-4 mile hikes a couple of times a month to go geocaching.  I started walking daily, hiking more on the weekends, and bought a mountain bike.  In late May, I was down to 185 pounds and didn't need the cholesterol meds any longer (frankly, I think my doctor figured that I would be like every other patient and perhaps lose 5 pounds; he was pretty surprised when I came back 6 weeks later, 26  pounds lighter).

Still, I didn't do a lot of cycling, until my old friend Bob said "Hey, I'll be in town next week, let's go for a nice, easy ride up Mount Diablo".  The morning of June 3, 2007, Bob very patiently led me up to the summit that I'd failed to reach 28 years earlier.  It took me something like 2 hours and 45 minutes on that tank-like mountain bike, but the hook was in my cheek.  On the way up, Bob mentioned the annual Mount Diablo Challenge race to the summit, and how much he enjoyed it, enough to drive up from Los Angeles to do it.  He suggested I should enter this year, but the idea was pure fancy as far as I could tell.  Surely, no one took nearly three hours to make the climb from The Athenian School like I did.

A few weeks later, I had to ride back up that mountain, I just knew I could do better; I'd started riding 8 miles most every day around my house.  This time, I had a very pleasant 2 hour, 25 minute ride to the summit.  A couple of weeks later, I made the same ride in 1h 59 minutes.  I'd upgraded the mountain bike to street tires and SPD pedals, but it was clearly time to start shopping for a road bike (and, since I weighed 175 pounds now, I wasn't worried about breaking spokes any longer).

Ultimately, I selected a 2007 Cannondale Synapse 1 Triple, at a very reasonable clearance-sale price at REI (I know, I know, it's a triple, I'm such a recreational cyclist...).  I rode the new bike up Mount Diablo for the first time on September 1 - measuring 1 hour, 42 minutes, but I sure had to work harder this time - I'd become reliant on those really low granny gears on the mountain bike.  At this point, the Mount Diablo Challenge didn't sound like such a flight of fancy, so I signed-up.

I spent the next week doing daily sessions of repeated runs up a local hill, shifting up gears until I had to stand in the saddle, and I returned to Mount Diablo at the end of the week - and did the climb in 1 hour, 32 minutes. On September 30th, feeling a little tired, I made it up Mount Diablo in 1 hour, 26 minutes.  The next ride up would be with 1000 other cyclists on October 7.