The Life and Times of KJ: November 2008

Sunday, 23 November 2008

Road Ride to Onyx Summit

Onyx summit is the highest road in Southern California. Its over 8400ft high and Derek and I decided to try and tackle it as a training ride and a challenge.

Anyway I writing this after trying to get liquids back into me and after a mean feed at Bravo Burger a feel tired but very satisfied.

I have not been this stuffed for a long time. The legs really had everything wringed out of them. Its great going with Derek cause we are very similar speeds and training together will help us try and complete 3 centuries in Southern California next April/May. Two of these centuries have 12000ft (4000m) of climbing. Man thats punishment. One of them called the "Breathless Agony" starts in redlands and heads up to Onyx Summit vie Oak Glen to add on another huge climb to bring thr total to 12000ft.

Anyway today all up we did +8500ft/2700m of climbing and 80miles/129km in a time faster than I expected so that was great. We were stuffed. This is the biggest road ride I have ever done and the most amount of climbing on a road bike I have ever done.

A Hike Up San Bernardino Peak

After 6 weeks of physio trying to sort out my knee which can no longer handle hiking down hills I had to go test it out. Unfortunately it was no better so its back to the drawing Board. It is never simple and has everyone rubbing their heads somewhat. I guess the only consolation is that I can still ride. Riding does not bother it luckily.

Anyway here are a bunch of pics I took in the snow on the way up to the 3400m peak.

AirNZ Cranial Billboards

Well I imagine a few of you guys have heard of this promotion which I believe was run in NZ earlier this year. To cut a long story short I applied to have my hair shaven off on the 26th of October down in Melrose near Hollywood. I was one of the 30 people selected and on stage I had my head shaved and then a henna tattoo applied to the back of my head. I needed to have this redone after 5 days and had to wear this around work and anything I did for 10 days. For doing this I got free return flights to Auckland from LA which I can use anytime up will Oct 31 2009.

It was quite the experience and really being shaven for the first time was somewhat scary but in the end not too bad. having the tattoo on the back of my head was something else. Very odd looks and stares and going out to a concert in San Diego had 5 people that night taking a picture of the back of my head. So just over 3 weeks later the tattoo is long gone and the hair is coming back surprisingly fast.