Almaden Cycle Touring Club lists ride pace as part of the description for each ride listing. These are average speeds, assuming the ride is all on flat ground with no wind.

Q: How can I find out my own pace level?
A: This is easy, with the new Ride Pace Calculator. There is a link to it from the Stats page. It is at http://www.actc.org/ridestats/pace/pace-calc.php). Let’s say you are doing a hilly ride and average 13.5 mph.  Because of the climbing you can not use the simple definition to estimate your pace.  However with this new calculator, you can use the amount of climbing to estimate your pace.

Here’s how :

• Just ride your bike, and keep track of the total miles, average riding speed, and a good guess at the total feet of climbing for that ride.
• Using this calculator, enter the distance, climbing and speed.  In the above example, it would be a 30 mile ride, with 1,500 feet of climbing and an average of 13.5 mph.  That would mean a “M” pace.
• If you also enter your total time, then this calculator can also calculate the riding factor.
• Go to this webpage, then the 1st page is these instructions and a 2nd page is a graph and table for keeping track of your own rides.
• After entering a few rides, then it should become very clear what pace you are riding.

Introduction

Welcome to the Russian River country. The river is named for the Russians who settled the area in 1812 as traders and sea otter hunters. They decimated the otters and withdrew in 1841. During the next 60 years the river and terrain kept the area isolated. The stage coach road, Fort Ross Road, from Healdsburg to Fort Ross, was routinely washed out by 120″ rains during the winter, and the Russian River flooded regularly. It still does despite modern dams.

At the turn of the century, the redwoods brought railroads. The railroads in turn brought tourists. By the mid 1920′s, San Francisco’s resort of choice was the Russian River area. After the depression, wealthier San Franciscans went to Tahoe, and by the mid 1970s, the Russian River was in a deep depression. Most resorts were dilapidated. the 1980′s the gay population of San Francisco found the Russian River area and revitalized it. This brought challenges and changes to the area. In the 90′s, diverse accommodations at a variety of prices and varied segments of the population are the norm. Cycling enthusiasts should be able to find everything they want here.

Weather

The Pacific Ocean dominates the climate of the Russian River area, and it is easy to pick the weather you want by moving up and down the river. Generally, the coast is foggy and cool in the mornings and late afternoon. Healdsburg, a major inland city, is usually fog free and 20 degrees warmer. If you want to sunbathe at 10AM, you need to head inland towards Healdsburg. If you’d like to swim at 4 PM, it may be a little too cool at Duncan Mills, but 5 miles to the east, in Guerneville, you can still get a sunburn. The coast also affects the winds. In the morning, the winds come in from the coast. By l0AM they’ve usually died down. By 2PM they have started up again. Plan your riding around the wind. Winds are the strongest in the afternoon where the sun is still strong with no fog. They’re less powerful after the fog has rolled in. So, if you’re pooped, stop and shop in a little town and wait for the wisps of fog, and then start riding. You’ll encounter less wind.

Camping

Because camping space is limited, you need to be on the confirmed list of members to camp in the ACTC camping area.  The campsites available this year for camping are 109,109B and 110. This is only for use with tents.  If you have a RV you need to make your own arrangements for a site.  If there is not enough room in these areas, any overflow will need to camp in the overflow area behind the store. These are different sites than last year, click this link for the campground map Campground Map or please see map at www.casiniranch.com. One thing we ask in regards to camping is that; No one parks their car in the middle of the campsites. This will leave more area for tent set up. The new management of Casini Family Ranch requires that each car check in at the gate and provide names of all people in the party and the vehicle license number. Once checked in you will receive a parking pass that must be displayed in the vehicle while parked at the campsite. This will prevent cars from being towed.

Camping for ACTC will be available on Friday at 12 noon. Anyone planning on arriving before this time must make his or her own camping arrangements. You need to be out of the camping area by noon on Sunday.

Cell phone coverage is very limited in the campground.  For some carriers you will not get coverage.  There is free WiFi in some areas of the campground but may not be where ACTC is camping.

Food

Many people will arrive on Friday evening. This year we will be having a group dinner.   However, we encourage you to bring a cooler with your beverages of choice, an appetizer for before the dinner and any other snacks and drinks you will need for the weekend. ACTC coolers will not be available for personal use.

Saturday morning a continental breakfast will be served. There will be items if you wish to pack a lunch to carry on your ride. Saturday night we have a potluck BBQ in camp. Please bring meat to grill, and a nice dish to share with all. Charcoal will be provided by ACTC.

Sunday morning, everyone is on their own for breakfast. Many people ride into Occidental or Duncan Mills before packing up to go home. The campsites need to be cleared by noon.

We ask that all campers be prepared to lend a hand with the housekeeping and cooking as needed. It means a lot to have everyone pitch in!

Rides

The Russian River area offers a mixed bag of terrain. The area to the south generally has rolling coast ranges. Higher ridges are shaded with redwoods while the lower ones are grasslands. To the north, redwoods dominate and the hills are steeper. To the east, a large valley stretches from Healdsburg to Santa Rosa. There you will find rolling hills, apple orchards, and vineyards.

You can do your own ride, or join others for a ride, or choose to not ride at all. For 2009, John Blaine has posted a ride that leaves each day at 8:00 am after breakfast. If you do your own ride, please turn your statistics into Brian Chun, the event chair.

This link is to a file of all the routes created by Don Axtel: RRR-routes . Please print out which routes you might be interested in and bring to the rally. To see the individual routes click here.  For a list of the current ACTC billy goats in the area, click here.

Some club members will be riding to and from the Russian River Rally. Please contact them directly if you are interested in joining.

The Story of the Rally

Howard and Bev Saling founded the rally in 1978. The first site was at a campground near the Korbel Winery. The following year it moved to Monte Rio. The year after that, it moved to Duncan Mills. The campground eventually became private, and the rally was moved to Casini Ranch until 1998 when it moved to the Faerie Ring Campground, and returned to Casini Ranch in 1999, its current home. In 1985, the first ACTC tour book was produced. Now days we put the information on the website instead of printing a tour book.

I have been mapping all the new billy goats in a program called MapMyRide.  If you go to the billy goat list on the ACTC website and click on one of the billy goats, it will take you to the map.  For the new ones (and some of the old ones I have converted over from Bikley.com) you will go to the MapMyRide website.

To select to view the elevation profile, look in the upper right corner for “Route Info”.  Click the box there that says “Show Elevation”.  You will not only get the typical elevation profile, but a color coded percent grade.  The image below is a screen shot of what you would see if you select to see the map for the Aborn billy goat.  So how accurate is the grades shown?  I would appreciate any feedback as club members try this tool.

Click this image to view it full size.

The November Black and Blue Bottom is now online.

Franz Kelsch
ACTC Webmaster

Franz Kelsch
ACTC Webmaster

This is not a race but an opportunity to set a personal target to improve your hill climbing speed.  No documentation or independent judging is needed.  Whatever members submit, we trust it is accurate.

If you wish to submit your time for one of the listed Billy Goats, send the following information to the ACTC Webmaster :

• Your Name
• The Age Group When you Made the Climb
• Time
• Date of Climb

RUN SPEED TEST

To make a comparision, you can also test your speed at other web serves by clicking the button below.

If you get a slow speed at both the ACTC website and other websites then you will know the issue is with your connection to the internet and not the ACTC website.

Franz Kelsch
ACTC Webmaster

• The March Ride schedule has now been posted.
• A new mailing list has been added for mountain bike riders. So far 25 people have subscribed. Click here to subscribe (ACTC members only). See this page for information about all the ACTC email lists.
• Since we are approach the double century season, several articles have been added by Franz Kelsch to the training section of the website:
  • An article on training for your first double century
  • An article on nutrition during a double century
  • An article on tapering before a double century or other long distance event

I have been adding maps for all the new, and existing billygoats. You can find a link to the maps in the billygoat list. Click on the link and will see the mapped course for that particular billygoat. This is what the one for the new Chaboya bilygoat looks like (click to enlarge).

These maps have other features. You can zoom out to see the surrounding roads to help figure out where how to get to the start. If you click on the “show” menu you can see an elevation profile. You can also click on the “share” menu option and save as GPX file for a GPS unit or a KLM file you can bring into Google earth. This is what Google Earth looks like. You can see Quimby on the left and new billygoat Chaboya on the right (click to enlarge).

Here is what my favorite billygoat, Metcalf, looks like.

I hope that the new maps make it easier to find the billygoats. Have fun trying them out.