Nice ride with Bob Pringle in the hills north of Firenze.

I had a nice ride this morning with Bob Pringle, a fellow alum of CC who found my business through the CC Bulletin, their alumni magazine.  We met at the apartment, got the bike set up for Bob, and set out for a 3 hour ride.  (A 3 hour tour - sounds like Gilligan's Island)  I changed my mind on course at the last minute as Bob had done a tour with Ciclismo Classics in the vineyards around Chianti.  I decided we would ride in the Mugello, and expand or contract the ride for the desired 3 hours as we went.  Bob is a very strong rider, and basically kept up to what was a little slower than my normal pace.  We ended up doing a fair amount of climbing and riding, although it was a little slow due to the rain that started around 1/2 way through the ride.

We rode out through Le Cure then San Domenico, the turned off to descend through Maiano before the climb through Vincigliata.  We hooked up with the road above Fiesole there, and climbed to the crossroads around L'Olmo.  We rode over toward Bivigliano, and the rain started around 1/2 way there.  The prediction was for showers after 4, but we both had shells so we were fine.  Bob is from the Seattle area, so he was totally fine with continuing in the rain.  It was not too cold, so it turned out to be pretty pleasant riding.  Just before Bivigliano, we turned to cut over to Pratolino through Viliani and Caselline.  We cut off toward Monte Morello at Pratolino, but cut back over to Via Bolognese and descended to San Bartolo.  We cut over through Cercina, to the church above the town, then took descent option #3, which is my favorite.

We returned to town with a couple of cut offs to avoid traffic which involves a little additional climbing.  Bob was happy to do the extra climbing and remarked many times that he loved the little roads we were riding on.  Good day and thanks for the business, Bob.  32.5 miles in 3:01 for an average speed of 10.8 mph (we took it slow on the wet descents) with 3510 vertical feet of climbing at an average temperature of 59.  Ciao.

Great client ride in the hills to the North by ridingwithcosimo at Garmin Connect - Details

Bob riding up the climb through Vincigliata.  The weather 

was cooperating at this point.  

Here is Bob just after putting on the rain shell.  It is a

good thing we stopped, because the rain came and stayed with us.

This is on the road to Bivigliano, one of my favorites.