Vertical Feet of Climbing

This past Thursday's night ride went very well. Went hard. No pictures, no video, no extra water bottle. I really felt "on" and pushed fairly hard. Sure, that is a relative term nowadays, and I'm not sure I can use the word "hammer" anymore, but for now I went hard and fast for me. Same 30 miles that I have been riding lately.

Saturday, I caught the warmest part of the day, maybe close to 65 degrees. Sun shining, birds singing. I rode the same 30 to start, then rather than descending Spruce St. coming out of Tilden Park, I turned left on Grizzly Peak to add another 5 miles and few hundred feet of climbing.



Which brings us to the recurring discussion of route elevation.
KLIMB shows 2,900 feet of vertical climbing.
Mapmyride http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/28209968 shows 2,650 and my barometric pressure altimeter watch shows 3,200.

Fundamentally, I think the differences arrive from the number of measurements. My watch takes a reading every 20 seconds, the other systems I cannot say for sure but are using elevation recordings for the area. I have been in many discussions about which is correct and I have to come down on the side of whichever you want. Rather than comparing varying elevation gains across different systems, I use one system or the other and compare different routes to determine hilly, from very hilly. Then I just round up a few thousand feet and swagger around the juice bar bragging about my greatness.
http://contour.com/stories/descending-pinehurst-road-into-canyon-ca
http://contour.com/stories/claremont-2-12-11