Look at that ridiculous ratio of climbing to distance! This is my first time doing the singletrack at Briones and only my second time at the park. I heard they had some new flow trails and I'd been wanting to check them out since the holidays. I didn't know they were temporary trails that are part of a pilot program though. The parks dept. has cleverly named them B1, B2, B3, and B4. Informally(?), they're named Curl the Burl, Hank and Frank, Isaac's DH, and Radio Towers, respectively. I thought I designed the route well with more gradual climbing than descending (based on the original route profile - I made some on the fly modifications during the ride). What I didn’t realize was all the grades skewed around 5-10% higher than average/expected. Instead of mildly steep climbing and steep descending, it was steep to very steep climbing and even steeper descending. There were several fire roads that were sustained at 23-24%!!! Towards the end, I was really starting to not like it there. It feels like you’re spending more time climbing than descending. Skeggs has a similar ratio but it doesn’t feel as bad. It’s broken up more and the descending feels longer. The climb initially was okay but once I got to Curl and Burl, it was a super steep climb to get to it with a confusing sign saying it was a downhill only trail. I was wondering, “Am I going the wrong way right now?” but I don’t think I was. By the time I got to the start of the descending, I was a bit gassed and it the trail doesn’t really build, it’s just “on” from the start with jumps, albeit small ones, built into the trail without bailouts. The drops also felt quite big (without bailouts) since i didn’t know the trail. They were probably fine if I did it again. Just as I was thinking I need a bit of warm up to get into the flow, I came upon a super steep, technical section. I walked it. Then around the corner from it was an even steeper part. I just wasn’t ready for something so full-on. The climb up Spengler was steep and quite loose over hard on the steepest sections. I ended up doing the left most version of Hank and Frank which I found out later from a local, Tim, is the longest version. I enjoyed it more than Curl. Maybe I was more warmed up, maybe it’s just better. 🤷🏻‍♂️ Next was riding Old Briones Trail to get to Isaac’s DH. The views were beautiful and the hillsides were covered in wildflowers. While not super bloom level, it was nice because the different flowers were growing together so there was a mix of orange, purple and white. Isaac’s starts and ends in a field. I didn’t mention this before but all the singletrack was pretty bumpy. Braking bumps everywhere, not just before corners. That also took away from the flow. More fire road climbing to get to the last DH singletrack, Radio Towers. when I got to Tabletop fire road, there was a blue trail right across. Looking at the map, I saw I could loop back up after Radio Towers to try it. Radio Towers had more rock garden tech than the other trails but it was similar to the others. The fire road to get back to that blue trail was one of the 23% monstrosities. I assumed with the blue trail next to it, the fire road wouldn’t be so steep. Boy was I wrong. And the blue trail wasn’t crazy steep. Parts of it were nice and flowy but I question whether it was worth doing. I don’t really remember the lower part of Radio Towers after the blue, honestly. All I remember was the 23-24% climbing to get back out! This section was really beat up from cows. On one of the downhill sections I splashed through a wet cowpie without realizing. The trail ahead all looked the same. This wasn’t part of the plan but my legs still felt good so I climbed back up to do Hank and Frank again. That’s when I met Tim and had a nice chat about the trails and got info about which version of Hank and Frank to do. He recommended the middle trail which I wasn’t even aware of. There’s a fork at the top to do Left or right, then later there’s the option to do left-left or left-middle. Tim didn’t think the right trail was worth doing. I let him go first thinking I’d follow him down left-middle, only there was ZERO dust from him. I had no idea where he went. And to make it even more confusing, there are two right turns next to each other and only the second right takes you to left-middle. 🤦🏻‍♂️ Since I wasn’t sure, I just did left-left again and having trail knowledge made it flowier and more fun but the bumpiness still took away from being able to full send it. I would like to come back with an eMTB. Before riding, I had lunch at Do Sit Thai Cuisine and after, I had dinner at Mona’s Burgers. Both in the Palo Verdes Mall. Do Sit was really good. Really good ingredients, preparation, and flavors. If you’re in Walnut Creek, I recommend them. Mona’s Hawaiian burger was okay. I think there was room for improvement. There Potato Flat fries were great. Thinly sliced steak fries perfectly cooked. I also timed it this way to avoid traffic and it worked out perfectly.