Pedal Queens extend kingdom to the Atomic City

The fabulous Pedal Queens, THE all-diva cycling club from Santa Fe, recently featured in the Mountain Flyer magazine, treked up to LA for a day of riding, chowing, and regalling. The early start time was delayed as some of the women took note on Floyd Landis’ time trialling position (as Floyd administered enough of a whuping to claim the final yellow jersey in thie year’s Tour de France!!!).

Once his over-all victory was assured, the women hit the trails. Four Queens, one Princess, and seven ladies of the court, majestically riding the trails along West Jemez Road (gabriella, dickless, s-site, water canyon, reverse traverse). Stories, prompted by sipping hopped beverages, told of a great day of riding, marred by an irreparable flat tire (obviously her personal mechanic’s fault), a broken rear deraileur hanger (again, needs a better personal mechanic), a few crashes and an endless supply of smiles…

After the Queens left for their ride, the Queen’s Wrenches (whom don’t qualify to ride with them) finished watching the morning stage, and then went for a ride of their own. The first group to return was assigned the task of cooking, so the Wrenches decided to climb Quemazon, Pipeline and descend Guaje Ridge. Quemazon trail is an abandoned logging road connecting the Pajarito Plateau (town) to the valles. Once a heavily wooded trail, it was decimated by the Cerro Grande fire, and is now a rock-step filled ascent through a hillside populated by burned-out hulls of trees, some still standing precariously until the next gust of wind, others having already succumbed to the frequent winds of LA

A brutal way to start any ride, 3 miles, 1400 feet of climbing, maybe 300 yards of flat trail, and 50 feet of descending, and today’s ride occurred in the brutal NM heat, without any hope of shade, a teasing hint of cloud cover, and nare a breeze to be felt. But the Wrenches, Preston, Mark and Scott (all of BTI) and I were off to a great start, not deterred by the heat, a flat tire, or a mal-adjusted saddle. Preston found wings as he delighted in the rocky challenge, while Mark looked wistfully at the downhill potential of the trail, and Scott just kept pedalling..

For many cyclists, the top of Quemazon is frequently the pinnacle of a ride, but for this group, the objective was Guaje Ridge, whose trail head lies 2 miles further and 1000 feet higher up Pipeline Road, a constant climb with very steep and loose sections, separated by steep and loose sections. On this day, however, the recent rains had improved the trail conditions so that they weren’t as loose as normal. They didn’t help the steepness though. At the intersection of Quemazon and Pipeline, we ran into Hugh and Warren, two super-strong Los Alamos cyclists, out reconnoitering the Pajarito Punishment race course.

Scott and Mark reach the Guaje Ridge trailhead with tired smiles on their faces.

Now, it was time for the reward, all of the invested climbing pays back with the descent around Guaje Ridge to the north side of town. Descriptors of this trail include: rugged, primitive, off-camber, loose, exposed, etc.etc.etc. The trail quickly descends through a lush section, lined with young aspen, whipping at your arms as you barrel through. Then, down into the burn zone, making a challenging trail with sweeping views of Los Alamos, Santa Fe, the Sangre de Christos to the south (and east), and Caballo, Guaje Canyon, Tschicoma, the Trampas and Taos are to the north.

Mark always looks for something to launch

After bombing the top section at high speed (these guys relished the downhills), the group quickly realized that this trail demanded respect. It started when Preston lost it after a short compression hit and landed 15 feet below the trail, and then Mark nicked a log with his rear wheel in a turn, and landed on a pile of logs with his bike pinning him down, followed quickly by Scott missing a turn in the middle of undulating section, remaining upright but stopping with wide-eyes in the downfall along the trail (I must’ve went down 4 or 5 times, all in various turns, and once very nearly during a steep, rocky descent). Following all these mishaps and near-mishaps, we all dialed in the reckless abandon. It makes me shudder when I think of the possible carnage that may occur in the Punishment. Despite the crashes, you couldn’t pry the smiles from our faces, nor could you convince Preston that his Voodoo 29er would work better with both wheels on the ground. He really needs a unicycle.

Low water, and the lateness of the time (we didn’t want the Queens to drink all the beer and eat all the burgers), dictated that we drop Guaje Road back into town. Another sketchy descent in the upcoming race. Our descent was only marred by the breakage of my brand-new, first-ride, SRAM chain. and then one more flat tire, and back to the party we were.

Bruises and exhaustion were forgotten about as we rehydrated with beer, and refueled with burgers, brats, and cold fruits, particularly watermelon. After sufficient grubbage, Preston even found the energy to hop on trampoline..