Low-Key Hillclimb #1 in the bag: 8 more to go

Low-Key Hillclimb #1, Montebello Road, went exceptionally smoothly yesterday. It's always a huge relief to get #1 out of the way.

finish line
at the finish line with volunteers; Han Wen photo

Low-Key runs on a volunteer coordinator model. However, I always take the first climb. That's not because I'm the best coordinator (I'm not) but because I want to establish that I'm willing to do my share. This year I'm also coordinating week 2, Sierra Road. Week 3, Page Mill, is still open. I hope to get a volunteer for that so I can ride it myself, not losing too much fitness this month...

There's always a few issues. This time I tried a new, for me, timing method which is to use the Ultrachron app for the Android iPhone as our back-up timing. Primary is Howard Kveck on his manual stop-watch.

Problem is while in principle the Ultrachron app does what you need, the touch screen gets in the way, and too often I'd accidentally kick it into timer mode, losing lap times. But fortunately Howard was on top of his game, and we got a great set of results.

Another issue is not everyone crossing the finish line is in the Low-Key Hillclimb. The roads are open to anyone, cars or bikes, and Montebello Road is a popular target. So while the Low-Keyers all had stickers on their forks, when things got crowded, this still created confusion.

But still, results went relatively quickly, the weather was great, car traffic was very light, and everyone seemed to have a good time.

Next in the series in Sierra Road. Hopefully the rains forecast for this week blow through in time for clean and dry roads by next Saturday.

Then Page Mill.... as I noted, no volunteers yet for Page. Every other week has a very capable volunteer coordinator lined up. So if anyone's interested in Page Mill, please let me know!

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