RR: Steele Canyon Secret Ride

Billy sent out an email earlier this week inviting me and several others to a "secret ride" on an undisclosed trail in Rancho San Diego today. I knew the general area he was planning on taking us and am always interested in exploring, so I signed up to go.

I was sick for the first time in years on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, but by Friday I was feeling significantly better and was pretty much 100% when I woke up Saturday morning, which was awesome. I was still a little worried about doing a large group ride in uncharted territory in light of my recent illness and below-average conditioning, but decided to suck it up and go.

The group met up at the Starbucks in RSD, and there were several familiar faces. Billy and Nate were there, as was Kevin L. and another rider from the Rock MTB group. I also recognized one guy, Steve, who rides with the World Cycles group quite a bit and who I saw at the Sweetwater ride in June and the Cuyamaca Poker Ride back in October. There were a few other faces I didn't recognize but everyone looked fast, increasing my anxiety somewhat. Still, I knew that Billy wouldn't let me get dropped, and I resolved to just have fun and try to keep up.

The route we took is a secret, which limits the amount of information that I am able to post here. The trails were all legal, and in fact after the ride I did some online reasearch and saw that they are popular with hikers due to the unique flora found in this particular area. The trails are relatively unknown to bikers at the moment, however, and all of us who came along today were asked to not publish directions or routes in order to keep them "underground" as long as possible. I promised to respect those wishes, and will do so. Those who would like to ride this trail and the others nearby are welcome to contact me through the blog and I'd be happy to lead a ride out there for a small group. Without giving away too much, the area we were in included portions of the McGinty Mountain ecological preserve and the trails were largely doubletrack with some singletrack.

In any event, generally speaking the ride began with about two miles of paved road riding, followed by a moderate but sustained fire road climb that began literally across the street from my old employer's home which was ironic.

We took a break in the middle of the fire road climb to wait for Billy who had doubled back early in the ride to pump up his shock, so I was able to keep up.

At the top of the fire road climb we had another regroup which was nice, and then began a series of singletrack climbs that were a little rough.

One of the guys I didn't know had a flat on the way up the singletrack climb, allowing for another break/regroup. This was to my benefit. He fixed it quickly and we were back under way. The climbing continued for another mile or so, and we eventually made it to a plateau that served as a georgeous viewpoint. Someone had built a teeter totter there, and a couple of guys took turns riding it. With the way it was positioned near the edge of the viewpoint, as you rode up the front side it looked like you were riding off the end of the earth. I didn't try it, but would like to some day.

The views were sweeping and impressive. I could easily see the ocean to the west, along with Mt. Helix, Cowles Mountain, and even Black Mountain off in the distance. After a short time at the viewpoint we continued along a rolling section of trail that soon gave way to our first sustained descent. The recent rains had made the descent extremely rutted, and several people in the group ended up walking down significant sections. One guy from the Rock cleaned almost the whole thing, and Nate did pretty well too. Steve and I weren't far behind, and I actually cleaned about 90% of the entire descent, including several gnarly rutted sections that were not easy. It wasn't as fun as it would have been if the trail was in good shape, but I really enjoyed it nonetheless.

We regrouped at the bottom and waited for the rest of the riders to make it down. There were some techy spots at the bottom that some cleaned and some didn't.

After everyone else caught up, we started climbing again. And then we continued to climb. And climb. Our route gradually began taking us farther and farther east, back into what felt like wilderness. That aspect of this ride was my favorite; it didn't feel like we were riding local trails, it felt like we were riding in the mountains. There were enough regroups to make me not feel like I was getting left behind, but I was in the back of the pack for the most part.

The scenery and weather were stunning, and while I would have enjoyed myself more if I wasn't huffing and puffing so much, the views and surroundings were too beautiful to no enjoy myself. Eventually the sum total of climbing caught up with me, and I had to do some HAB because of the steepening grade and fatigue. I don't know whether it was out of necessity or pity, but Billy joined me in my HAB for the last section of singletrack climbing which wound its way though a georgeous section of trail. I should have stopped for a picture, but was too tired and wanted to catch up with the group. I did stop near the top for a shot of the views back in the direction we had come from:

We eventually caught up with the rest of the group, and had reached a decision point. The consensus was that we should do a fun descent down the mountain at that point and then ride the road back to the shopping center, rather than re-trace our steps and have to HAB up that rutted descent that we had come down earlier in the ride.


The final descent was a lot of fun, though I did get stuck behind a couple of slower descenders and didn't get to open things up as much as I wanted. We eventually found ourselves at the bottom of the mountain on a dirt road, which we followed to a local street and began the 6 mile road ride back to the Starbucks.

While the description may not have sounded like it, this ride was actually a lot of fun. The backcountry feel and exploration aspects were awesome, and captured probably my favorite thing about mountain biking. The route itself we rode was a little underwhelming, with sustained climbs followed by short, steep, rutted downhills that weren't really worth the effort. There were dozens of other singletrack trails up there however that I can't wait to get back and explore, and I'm sure that with a little effort a fun loop can be developed.

Here are the stats:

Total Distance: 17.93miles
Total Time: 2:41:01
Ascent: 1969 feet
Average Speed: 6.7 mph
Top Speed: 25.7 mph
Bike: Intense Spider XVP
Map:
[Undisclosed for Now]