PenVelo meets about 20 minutes south of SF on Canada road

Saturday - 8:15am
"re-group" ride
This ride regroups at the Woodside Bakery after the warmup along Canada Road. After riding counter-clockwise around the Portola Valley loop, there's a final regroup at the Chevron station on Woodside Road, immediately after turning off Whiskey Hill Road.

Sunday - 8:00am
"no-wait" ride - very fast pace
Same route as the Saturday ride WITHOUT any regroups.

Tuesday and Thursday - 6:00pm
"no-wait" ride - VERY fast pace
These rides occur April through October, when daylight savings time is in effect. Note, this time span largely coincides with the Racing Season. These rides are very fast paced with a great deal of aggressive riding.

On Tuesday night, the ride turns east off Canada Road onto Woodside Road and continues around the Portola Valley loop in a clockwise direction. These rides differ from the weekend rides as they're routed directly along Alpine Road instead of along Foothill, Page Mill and Arastradero Road. On Thursday, the route is the same as the Tuesday ride except in the counter-clockwise direction, by turning west onto Woodside Road.


http://www.penvelo.org/secondary/calendar.html

Kus,

I think the ride you might have heard of is the "Roasters Ride". Named because the second part of the group meets at the Roastery in Fairfax @ 9. I believe the first wave meets up at the GG bridge @ 8 and spins through Marin to Fairfax. I've joined up with the Marin group tagging along with my Roadie training partner. Soon after Fairfax, the pace picks up with two relatively short climbs where the pack typically holds over 14 mph up a couple 7-9% grades.

I've been able to hold on for dear life on the first climb. Typically get dropped on the second one... working towards holding on for both :)

Mostly Cat 2 to 3 guys with some Cat 4's.

PM me if you have any questions. Pretty casual friendly group provided you're not crossing wheels or taking stupid risks.

Here's a description I found on another forum:

Roasters Ride
Day: Saturday
Time: 08:00 AM
Meet: Golden Gate Bridge

8:00am sharp at the south side of the Golden Gate Bridge with a second meeting point of 9:00am at Coffee Roasters, San Anselmo.
A very organic ride which has been going for a long time - people show up every sat at 8:00 unless its a hurricane - there are always riders there. A really competitive 45 mile ride with 17 miles of preamble and 17 of warm down riding out and back from the bridge - 80 miles in total.

Route: San Francisco - San Anselmo - Fairfax - Nicasio - Point Reyes Station - Olema - Samuel Taylor Park - Fairfax - San Francisco.

As a member of PenVelo, I would recommend the Tue/Thur ride. It is a shorter ride then the Swamis sat ride since it is after work, but the pace is pretty close. The Sat and Sun rides start out as fast rides, but a number of riders will peel off for longer rides.

Jeromy

Sent you an email. Call me w/dates. I can hook you up with a couple of Cat. 2 guys and my teammates. Are you here on the weekend? Lots of racing going on.....

c

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clm
Nashville, TN
https://twitter.com/ironclm | http://ironclm.typepad.com

those are some great suggestions, thanks all. I believe the roaster ride will be the one for saturday.

I second draught legal's reco. Saturday 8am ride (from south side gg bridge) is a good one. Mostly mellow until Java Hut in fairfax (about an hour north) then picks up on the climb just past fairfax, and stays fast, gets pretty strung out. As fast a group ride as i've ever been on, generally a nice group of people too. Pace stays high all the way back into fairfax, then mellow cruise back to SF. I think it ends up being a bit over 4 hrs round trip (from bridge).