Training at Lake Del Valle

It's no secret that my next challenge after riding Gran Fondo in the past years was a sprint triathlon. Thanks to advices from my friend and this blog post (with pictures and routes), I've finally trained in open water.

Swim:
When I entered the Del Valle Park in Livermore, I just followed the sign for swimming. Turned out that's the West beach, which has a roped area watched by lifeguards yet deep enough that I wouldn't touch the ground. I swam for ~50 min there (basically did end-to-end 2 times. Not sure that's enough for the 0.5 mile that I'm preparing for) BTW, I bought a pair of TYR Special Ops Polarized goggles to replace the cheapo Speedo (which I bought for $10 at Sports Authority and used ~ a dozen time. The rim started to fall off after 5 times. Even before that it's leaking like crazy and fogged up in no time. The new goggle had no such problem)

Bike:
I visited this park before and always interested in riding that kinda-steep road in and out of the park (Mines Rd, Del Valle Rd, a Cat-3 and a Cat-4 climb out-and-back) I rode my 9-speed folder with some non-working gears (rather not leave my better bike unattended) from the West beach parking lot. It's tough as expected as I didn't have the largest gear available but I wasn't in a rush. It's fun to watch the folks flying their RC gliders near the summit. After the downhill and exit to the Mines Rd, I watched my GPS and realized I could turn back ~1 mile more so I did that and rode back up the hill again to go back to the parking lot to complete the 12 miles. I guess I'm prepared if the real route has climbs like this.

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Run:
My run started at the "pier" next to the West beach. First, I ran up "north" onto one of the trail along the lake shore. It was rough and steep but I figured I should go harder during training. This round-trip ate up ~1.2 mile and I went "south" from the pier, on paved road this time all the way to the campgrounds at the south tip of the lake and back to make up 3.11 miles. I was 30% slower than running on my usual flat route. Still, it's good training.

This was a really nice environment. I will definitely come back if I race again in the future. Maybe try out the East beach next time.

North Portland (Mt. Tabor, 205, Columbia River, Portland airport)

Portland is the No.1 biking city in USA (according to the Bicycling magazine.) There's no reason NOT to ride! It turned out our Hotel (Rose) offers complimentary bicycle to hotel guests so I took full advantage of it (also included a lock and a helmet!) There was only 1 minor challenge: I have never ridden a beach cruiser with coaster brake only. All of my bikes have hand brakes. I almost rented one like this at Vancouver but decided not to take unnecessary risk when riding with kids. I ended up doing alright with this bike by riding slower and with extra caution. I also brake way in advance, which coincidentally was the advice my son gave me after the ride. He had a lot of experiences with coaster brakes :)

The yellow beach cruiser and the view from the top of Mt. Tabor

Junction of the I-205 bike path and Marine Dr at the bank of Columbia River

Lan Su Garden at Portland Chinatown

As far as finding a good route to ride, I trusted good old MapMyRide: simply searched for routes over 30 mile and pick one from the result. I figured it would be interesting to loop (square) around the city (the Northeast quadrant of it) For those not familiar with the area, there is a river dividing the city to an East side and a West side. Our hotel was on the West side along with the Pioneer Courthouse Square (and the upscale Pioneer Place Mall) There are many bridges connecting the two sides. First, I crossed the Hawthorne bridge and rode along Hawthorne st then Lincoln st which lead to the Mt. Tabor park. Once I was in the park, I took one of the Tabor Drive loop to reach the Summit (it was not that high but it felt like Mt. Diablo on a beach cruiser :P) I exited the park from SE East Tabor Dr to Yamhill St (it was not continuous but have a few breaks instead but not that hard to follow) which eventually led to a T-junction that intersect with the I-205 multi-use path. Turned left there and I basically rode along side the northbound freeway I-205 on a bike path separated from traffic. Again, it is not completely continuous but the signs were clear enough. Eventually I reached the Columbia River (another T-junction that I turned left) I saw many bikes at the junction and realized there was a race going on! I pedaled towards the airport and left the crowd (there was a bike path closer to the river but I rode on the road instead by accident. No car on the road anyway) This was one long and straight stretch with a great view of the river (even saw a few dragon boats practicing!) After passing the Portland airport (PDX) I got back on the road, Marine Dr and then Bridgeton Rd, which has a dead end and one must turn left to get back on the Marine Dr towards the West for a little bit before crossing the freeway (99E) Followed the sign for MLK Blvd (which was the freeway I saw) but it's OK to ride. Turned to N Vancouver Ave and got on the Broadway Bridge and I was back on the West side and ended my ride.
Note: I originally planned to cross another bridge, the Steel Bridge, but I was detoured by a parade. The Steel Bridge seems to have easier access to the Waterbank Park trail on the West side. And instead of riding back to the hotel directly, I stopped at the Portland Saturday Market before I reached the hotel. Good food and good art there.
It's easy to see why the Bicycling magazine picked Portland as No.1. with many bike path separated from traffic. And when you have to ride on the roads, they are actually quite bike friendly. And the signs are pretty good at helping cyclists to find their ways.

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Vancouver (Stanley Park, Canada Place, Lion's Gate bridge, Yaletown)

We saw a lot of cyclist while we drove through Stanley Park in Vancouver the first time so we decided to give it a try the next day. We found out there are many bike rentals near the park on Denman St:

• Spokes Bicycle
• Bayshore Bicycles

We ended up renting from the first one as they seem to have the better bikes: my daughter got a Giant mountain bike while I got a Sedona 24-speed "Comfort" bike

Underneath Granville Bridge

View of Vancouver from Stanley Park

Lions' Gate bridge

Middle of the bridge

I have studied the maps and googled quite a bit the night before but I couldn't find much good info on routes for biking over Lion's Gate bridge. So hopefully this post will be helpful to those interested in riding it. Since we biked for 12-miles in Monterey just one week before and we have more time available this time so we decided to do a 18-mile route, which means in addition to looping around Stanley Park + crossing the Lion's Gate, we tagged on more: to and from Canada place and the bottom of Granville bridge.

Note that the Stanley Park bike path is one-way (counterclockwise) So, once we realized that we missed the "exit" to the Pipeline Rd/Stanley Park Drive (which lead to the entrance to Lion's Gate) there's no turning back. We ended up going all the way to the Second Beach and "exit" to the Bridle Path (unpaved gravel road), which ran across the park, to the Lake Trail. Finally we got back on the Pipeline Rd! Bicycles and cars use the same entrance to the Lion's Gate bridge but bicycles ride on the same sidewalk as pedestrian. Once we reached the end of the bridge, there's an underpass to crossover to the way back. After exiting to the park, we got on the Prospect Point Trail (opposite direction from the Prospect Point), then Bridle Path, Rawlings Trail, and Bridle Path once more to exit to the Second Beach. Then got on the Seaside/Seawall path and rode to underneath the Granville bridge. Then we turned back and exit to the Chilco Street and Alberni Street and got back to the bike rental. To celebrate the ride (and regained the calories burnt), we went to the nearby Dairy Queen :P

Some final notes:

• the signs for the trails inside Stanley Park are quite inadequate. We ran into quite a few junctions with no sign whatsoever and we had to guess. 
• it turned out it was a good thing that we missed the Pipeline Rd exit the first time or else we would not have been able to complete the loop around the park!

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