Weekend “Wet” Ride Report – Whiting Ranch to the STT/Luge

This is a little bit late but why not… this past Saturday a group of my friends and I met at Whiting Ranch at 7:00am to go on our weekly Saturday ride. The weather in So Cal for the past few days has been fairly wet in the mornings with lingering low clouds until the afternoon. Well Saturday was a little bit more than just lingering clouds – we actually had light rain/drizzle. Needless to say arriving at the parking lot, it was WET.

Some of the guys contemplating whether they should ride or not.

There were a total of us twelve of us who met at the parking lot. We stood around for about half an hour chatting, hoping that the light rain would pass. No such luck while we were at the parking lot, but we knew it would eventually taper off.

By the time we decided to roll, half of the guys backed out because they thought it would be too muddy (dubbed as Team NO Go) . The other half mounted our bikes and headed into the park. Whiting Ranch is covered with a lot of trees therefore the ground wasn’t muddy at all. As a matter of fact, it was perfect! All of the sandy sections were nice and tacky.

Bottom of Mustard before our climb.

Reaching the bottom of Mustard Rd, the trail was dry. This was the first segment of our long ascent. At the top of Mustard was Four Corners where we took our first break. This is where we will break off from Whiting Ranch and make our way to Santiago Truck Trail (STT) for more climbing.

Resting at Four Corners

There was a moment there where a few of us contemplated on continuing to STT. Luckily the rest of the guys convinced us to keep on going. From here we crossed the road and towards another trail. We had steep climbed on the road known as Modjeska Rd, it literally was a grind to the STT trailhead. From here we took a short break and then continued our ascent to the flag.

At the start of Santiago Truck Trail.

Several miles later we were at the peak of our ride… we made it to the flag where we would start our fun descent down the Luge – what a blast!!! This ride down never fails to disappoint.

Team GO! … six that braved the little rain we had.

Reaching the bottom we had to make our way back to Whiting. From here it was an easier grind up the road. We hooked back up into Whiting and finished off our ride by hitting the single track out till we exited the park. What a ride! A total of 15 miles of on and off drizzle as we climbed and descended. This turned out to be an epic ride!

Below is a video of our run down the Luge. I have video from Whiting however the video will be too long. Enjoy!