Jap Little

Friendly Friday

It was another kind of high-mileage, low-impact week for me. On Thursday I sort of instigated a move from the 6 am NOMA ride to a 6:15 am (I'm flexible on that start time) levee ride - returning to the traditional Pipes to Ormond route now that the levee work has finally been completed and we can do that whole ride without risking four miles on River Road. I didn't know what to expect when I got there since I hadn't really made much of an effort to get the word out, but I think we ended up with about six with some turning back at Williams Blvd. as usual and the rest continuing on to Ormond. It was a nice even pace out and back, mostly around 22-23 mph until the last of them turned off around Harahan/River Ridge, and I arrived back home around 8:10 despite soft-pedaling the last eight or nine miles. I guess I was still feeling a bit of WeMoRi in my legs.

On Friday we finally got Charles' rear brake working again by installing a new caliper. The pistons on the old one just did not want to fully retract, and it was just easier to replace the caliper than rebuild the existing one under the circumstances, although I'd still like to take a shot at it if we can somehow extract the pistons without an air compressor. Some time Friday afternoon I got a text from Chris that he and VJ were planning on doing the 6:15 am SaMoRi instead of the 7 am Giro, and since they are two of the people I can usually count on, I figured I'd better do the same. A lot of the usual suspects were planning on riding the Southern Magnolia the next day, for which plans of trying to break 4 hours for the 100-mile route were afoot. Todd did show up for 7:00 and found nobody there for the Giro. He rode out solo and eventually found the early group, though. So I headed out a little early, already missing my Saturday morning coffee, meeting the group on Lakeshore Drive. Most of the Giro has essentially moved to this earlier ride, so it wasn't really much different. The wind-up after coming down from the overpass onto the street formerly known as Hayne Blvd. was a lot milder, and although the speeds were generally comparable, there were a number of lulls and ineffective solo surges. Since I was planning on doing an 85 mile ride on the northshore with the Tulane riders on Sunday, I was keeping my efforts as easy as I could, so it worked out nicely. Later in the day I pulled off my rear tire, a Conti 5000 with well over 6,000 miles on it. I had three pieces of duct tape on the inside where there were significant cuts in the tread, but it was actually holding up just fine, and I'm pretty sure I could have gotten another thousand miles out of it. Still, I knew that rolling down the north Georgia mountains on it would probably haunt me next weekend, so I'd gotten a new tire and a new TPU tube for the wheel. It just took a few minutes to make the swap. That's one less thing to worry about, leaving just my neck, back, legs, lungs, heart, and generally declining level of risk tolerance.

Nice group for the Sunday Long Ride on the northshore

Sunday was a very early wake-up since we were meeting up at HQ for 4:45 and planning on hitting the road for 5:00, which of course ended up being closer to 5:30. The ride was starting way up at Isabel, so that was a bit longer of a drive than Abita Springs. Since this ride was specifically designed for those planning on doing Six Gap or Three Gap next weekend, Ben had created a route that included three or four circuits of Jap Little and Sie Jenkins. Jap Little was repaved a year or so ago and since we were doing it from the Plainview direction it included a quick fast downhill with a fairly sharp left curve - the one where Jorge P crashed and broke a collarbone many years ago. This was to give the newer riders some sense for making a turn like that at a reasonably high speed. Then, coming back around on Sie Jenkins there's that little wall that hits 10-12%, however briefly, again providing some reason to at least experiment with the small chainring. Charles dropped his chain there. We may try to figure out why that keeps happening when he shifts chainrings because he's planning on doing Six Gap next weekend. He had similar problems when we were up in NC a few weeks ago. After doing some loops of Jap Little and Sie Jenkins, the B group split off and around six of us continued on the longer loop. Toward the end we added a little out-and-back on House Creek Road, again as some small sampling of the kinds of gradients we'll see in north Georgia. Everyone seemed to survive the 85 miles in pretty good shape since the pace in general was pretty easy. Although that was the plan, it probably helped that Ben and Liam had done a long Spillway ride with a couple of long intervals the day before, and then Ben had ridden about twenty miles on Sunday before we arrived. I ended the ride feeling fine despite it being my third 300+ mile week in a row.

So it looks like the front group at Southern Magnolia was fast, as expected, with Connor and Grayson finishing just ahead of what was left of it, but narrowly missing the sub-4 hour goal by just about four minutes. As far as I could tell from Strava Flyby, there was some kind of attack somewhere around ten to go that split the group with Chris M staying with Connor and Grayson until the last mile or so.

This week the Tulane Six Gappers are supposed to be in taper mode with today being a recovery day off the bike. The group is scheduled to depart on Friday morning for the drive up to GA, which will allow for a little warmup ride on Saturday. I don't think all of the driving and van arrangements have yet been finalized, but hopefully it will all work out before Friday. I can't drive students as part of this official club event, so hopefully they will have enough approved drivers. Plan B would be for me to drive bikes rather than people so more people could be put into fewer vans. 

Mellow Monday

This morning I went out to Mellow Monday with the intention of keeping it as mellow as possible, at least for me. Of course it got fast in the usual places, but I think I was successful in not doing more harm than good. I plan to ease up a bit on the intensity, if not the volume, this week. Friday will be a travel day. I'll just be sucking wheels more than usual, if that's even possible, this week.

More Miles

If there is such a thing as an average week for me, it would be measured in miles, typically 250 to 275. Last week worked out to 365, though, thanks to a Labor Day Giro Ride at the start and a long levee ride with the Tulane riders at the end. Overall intensity, however, wasn't any higher than normal. 

On Tuesday, I did the usual lakefront lap with the 6 am NOMA group, followed by an out and back on the lake trail. As I've been doing lately, I went out to Williams Blvd. on the trail with one or two others, and then turned back until I saw the Metairie group coming. Then I turned around again and rode with that group out to The Wall and back to Bucktown. I did essentially the same thing yesterday.  

Thursday morning was rainy, so I waited until it looked like I had an opening and hit the levee around 9:30 for a ride out to Ormond and back. The weather was a little sketchy, and I was able to stay dry for most of it, but I did get rained on a bit on my way back. Fortunately it wasn't a torrential downpour or anything, so that was good.

Friendly Friday was more fast than friendly, which was no surprise really, but as usual the fast bits were relatively short. A few of us continued uptown to the levee to meet the Tulane coffee ride, followed by, you guessed it, coffee at Junk Drawer. It was funny sock day. Turned out I actually found some funny socks in the sock drawer.

Charles brought his Bianchi over early in the week to replace the headset bearings, which were rapidly becoming unidentifiable lumps of rusty metal. Of course, since the bike has fully integrated cables, what would otherwise be a ten minute headset job is now going on four days. We had to cut the brake hoses in order to get them through the handlebar and headset bearing, and of course that made the front hose too short, so we had to get and run a new front brake hose, thread it through the headset, and integrated handlebar (which took quite a long time). Then there were the usual two attempts to bleed the brake well enough to get all of the air out of the line. That would have been quick except that Charles' older SRAM brake bleed kit didn't have the correct "bleeding edge" adapter for the caliper. That involved a trip to the shop and another day's delay. Turned out that was the easy part. Next was the rear brake. Fortunately we didn't need to run a new hose since there was just barely enough left to work with. We still had to get it through the bearing and headset, which was again a bit of a chore. Since the rear brake pads were worn down to the limit, we had some new ones to install. Problem was, we couldn't (still can't) get the pistons to retract all the way back into the caliper, making it impossible to install the new brake pads with enough to clear the rotor. He went ahead and just ordered a new caliper rather than try to rebuild the existing one, which is probably not much more than a year old. Hopefully once that comes in on Friday we'll be able to put it all back together and bleed the system. We might have gotten new pistons and seals, but who knows what other problems we'd encounter in that process, and disc brake calipers are surprisingly inexpensive, relatively speaking.

Saturday's Giro was the usual smallish group, but nonetheless a pretty solid workout. On Sunday there was a Tulane long ride out to the lakefront then over to the river levee, out to five miles past the Spillway, and back to HQ. That came out to around 88 miles for me. This was a prep ride for those planning on doing Six Gap a couple of weeks from now. It wasn't fast, but was the longest ever ride for some riders. I think we had around nine riders for this one, so that was nice, and of course we stopped a couple of times along the way. My neck was killing me by the time we finished. 

Back at HQ we had a pre-Six Gap meeting to go over plans for the ride and logistics for transportation and housing. Dylan put together a nice presentation with details on each of the major climbs, so at least everyone know what they're getting themselves into. We were actually there for quite a long time and I don't think I was back home until mid-afternoon.

So by the end of Sunday I'd logged a lot of miles and was kind of feeling all of them. There's another long ride planned for next Sunday, this one starting all the way up at Isabel and including a number of significant climbs in order to give some of the newer riders some experience with gearing and such. Should be interesting. I think there are around 16 Tulane riders signed up for Six Gap this year, similar to last year. We'll be going up on Friday, doing a little warmup ride on Saturday, and the coming back Sunday after the ride. As usual, some are doing Six Gap and some are doing Three Gap. 

Tomorrow I'll finally be back to the levee ride. I think we'll try starting these Thursday rides at 6:15 am for the ride out to Ormond and back. I might stick with the NOMA group on Tuesdays for the time being. We'll see. Kind of depends on what other people want to do, but for me it would be nice to avoid the commute back from the lakefront in school traffic.

Cumulus

Sunday Tulane Long Ride

I started last week with an aborted morning ride of less than a mile. It's happened before. The minute I walk out the door I feel a few little droplets of rain. I head out anyway, hoping it will pass. It doesn't. Instead the sky opens up and despite having been outdoors for less than five minutes I arrive back home soaked to the skin. Fortunately things improved and I headed out again a bit before 8 am, heading for the levee. That went nicely until I was about ten miles the end of a 40 mile ride. Yeah, I got rained on again. Getting rained on at the end of a ride would turn out to be a pattern for the week.

There's a rainbow in there somewhere - Monday on the levee

Tuesday morning it was only Mike (in town again from WA) and me for the lake trail stretch. We saw the Metairie group going the other way, so when we turned around at Williams Blvd. we rode easy for a couple of miles and then turned around with them for their regular route out to "the wall" and back. That adds just 5 miles or so, but it's nice to have a bit of a group.

On Wednesday I once again got out to the lakefront early and headed east waiting for the group to catch me. It turned out to be a pretty fast one, averaging just under 25 mph, and more to the point 145 BPM, which constitutes a significant effort for me. Coffee at The Bean Gallery again with the Tulane riders afterwards.

Thursday would have been a repeat of Tuesday except that I flatted somewhere along the lake, so I sent the rest ahead and changed it, meeting back up with them on the way back. It was the second mysterious flat I'd had that week. By "mysterious" I mean that I didn't find anything in the tire that might have caused the flat. Turns out that not finding something doesn't necessarily mean something isn't there. Anyway, in the process I managed to lose the thin little M20 x 12 x 0.2 washer that goes on the thru-axle. I knew I'd lose one of those one day. It is there just to protect the carbon dropout, which isn't really a dropout nowadays.

That tiny wire caused 3 flats

Then on Friday I went out to meet the 6 am group at City Park and arrived just in time to see everyone heading back home because the weather radar looked especially grim. Once again I didn't make it all the way back home before I got drenched. A few hours later the weather improved and I was able to put in 40 miles on the levee. Later that day I discovered my rear tire was flat again. By then I knew it had to be a piece of metal wire. After completely removing the tire I eventually found the 2 mm long culprit barely protruding into the inside of the tire, and completely undetectable from the outside. I had to go get Candy's tweezers to pull it out. That Continental GP 5000 tire currently has over 6,000 miles on it, and has numerous cuts in the tread, some of which are fortified with duct tape on the inside, so I bit the bullet and ordered a replacement. I just registered for Six Gap at the end of this month, and figured it might be a good idea to do that with some relatively fresh rubber.

Friday eagles out by Destrehan

On Saturday we had a very small group heading out at 7 am, and by the time we were halfway down Hayne Blvd (aka Lincoln Beach Blvd.) we knew we'd be turning around when we saw the SaMoRi group. Behind us the sky was quickly getting darker and darker. So it was a shorter ride than usual, and of course we got completely soaked once again on the way back. All the rain was along the lake, so back at home the streets were completely dry.

On Sunday there was a Tulane long ride out of Abita Springs. We had 9 at the start, and then two turned back at Isabel to do a shorter route, as planned. This was very much a steady Zone 2 kind of ride since it would be one rider's longest ever ride. The plan was to start the 74 mile ride at 7 am, but we didn't actually get rolling until 7:30. With the easy pace and a couple of store stops, it was about noon by the time we got back. Everyone was hungry so most stayed for lunch at the Brewpub, which by that time was packed. That meant a wait of around half an hour before we got a table, so basically it was a much longer day than planned, but that's just how it goes sometimes. For some reason my neck was killing me the whole ride.

Today is Labor Day, so we stacked a holiday Giro on top of the usual Mellow Monday ride. I met the 6 am group but turned back at the lake so I could have a cup of coffee at Starbucks before the Giro. Being a "holiday" Giro, the pace was brisk but not super fast or anything. It was a smaller group than I would have expected, but still big enough to provide some shelter when needed. We almost made it back to the lakefront before getting rained on, then by the time I was halfway home the streets were dry, then as I got to the house it started raining again. At least it wasn't quite enough rain to fill up my shoes this time. At Starbucks I mentioned to VJ how I couldn't find exactly the right shim washer for the Cervelo thru axle. It's supposed to be 0.2 mm thick with an OD of 21.5 mm and an ID of 12.5 mm. The best I could find had an ID of 12 mm and OD of 18, and of course shipping was twice as much as the washers. VJ said he might have something, and indeed he had some of the latter ones. The thru axle diameter is supposed to be 12 mm, so I wasn't sure if the washer would slide on, but it did so easily. Hopefully the slightly smaller outside diameter won't be a problem. It was also new chain day, so after fitting the new shim washer I went ahead and changed out the chain for another new KMC wax SL12. The old one was at about 3,200 miles and although I could probably have gotten another thousand miles out of it before it, I just feel better keeping my chains as new as I can to help preserve the cassette and chainrings.

I went ahead and registered for Six Gap again today. It's up to around $132 with the processing fee, and today was the last day before the price goes up another ten dollars. Sometimes I kind of can't believe I actually pay money to do this to myself. It definitely gets a little harder every year.

With the levee path finally fully paved now, I'd like to see if we can move our Tuesday/Thursday rides back there soon. Of course, change is hard so it may take another week or so. We'll see.

Collegiate Shenanigans

Skilz

Last Wednesday's WeMoRi had a particularly large turnout, which made the weekly sunrise race simulation a bit more fun than usual. As usually happens when there's a big group, there were slightly fewer "Oh shit I'm about to get dropped" moments than normal. It wasn't a super-fast one, averaging just under 26 mph (for the part that I ride) and a maximum speed of only 32.5, so that probably played a part as well. We had a nice coffee stop on the way home, and then a brief delay when one of the Tulane riders flatted just after we'd gotten going again. 

Thursday morning it was around 82° as I left home in the dark, which is pretty much how it's been for weeks. It seems like the sustained high temperatures have started getting to people, which has resulted in group ride speeds that are just a tad lower than usual. On this day there were still three of us for the extended ride out to Williams Blvd., and although we were by no means soft-pedaling, we weren't really pushing it too much either. That part was mostly in the 22-23 mph range, which for me means a heart rate of 100-110 when I'm in the draft, ramping briefly up into the upper 130s when I'm on the front. In other words, barely Zone 2. Still, it was a good ride that maybe left a little bit in reserve for Friendly Friday's expected efforts.

As it turned out, though, Friendly Friday kind of lived up to its name this time and in comparison with those of the past few weeks, it was quite civilized. Go figure. Of course I guess the starting temperature of 82° and relative humidity of 87% may have had something to do with that. Friday was the day that the Tulane Cycling & Triathlon club was putting on its "Tulane Rides Hard" event on campus, starting at 9 am, so I rushed over to campus right after I got home to help out. We were using my laptop to run MyWoosh and display it on the big Jumbotron. Getting that to actually happen turned out to be a bit of a problem that had the tech guy scratching his head for the better part of an hour, but eventually we go it to work. The laptop was connected to one of the Wattbikes so we could have a competition where random students could see how high they could get their average 5 minute power. Obviously the big guys had an advantage here, but it was still surprising to see how many would start out hitting like 900 watts, only to fade down to like 240 by the end. Also surprising how many were doing it wearing flopflops or, in a few cases, barefoot. Of course, by late afternoon a big thunderstorm rolled in, complete with hail, so we had a big scramble to secure things and had to end about an hour earlier than planned. I think around 90 people put their names and email IDs on the contact list, so hopefully a number of those will end up actually joining the club and participating. When the rain started blowing in underneath the tent, I quickly threw my laptop and phone into my messenger bag for safekeeping. When I got home the laptop was hot as a firecracker. I think water got into one of the USB-C ports and drained the battery in a rather dangerous way. Fortunately it recovered once I dried it off and charged it up again. Then, when I got back from riding on Saturday my phone was completely discharged and when I plugged it into the charger I got a message that there was moisture in the charging port and that I should immediately disconnect it.  Fortunately a couple of hours in front of a fan dried everything out and I was able to get it charged up later in the day.

Saturday's Giro had a small but lively turnout, so despite the heat it was a good workout. Again, after the ride I rushed over to HQ to help out. After the storms Saturday evening that dragged on into the night (see below), I headed out to Starbucks for the Sunday morning Giro only to find that only three other people were there. I guess the rain scared some people away, but the streets were dry by then. Anyway, everyone but me turned back before getting off of Lakeshore Drive, so I just rode out Lincoln Beach Blvd to the Interstate and turned back there. I was solo, so couldn't quite summon up enough motivation to put in much of an effort.

So Saturday and Sunday we had prospective Tulane riders coming over to HQ in waves to put them on bikes for a bit, do a minimal amount of skill practice - like stopping, cornering, and negotiating a row of traffic cones. That kept us busy from like 10 am until 2 pm both days. By then the LAMBRA tent we'd used the day before had dried out, and I was able to take it and the other borrowed stuff  home - traffic cones, ice chests, extension cord, etc. There are already 24 people who have paid the $300 annual dues, so I guess that's good. Now we have to sort out who gets the newer team Specialized bikes and who gets the older bikes, deal with pedal needs, bike sizing, etc. That will probably take another couple of weeks.

This morning we had a smallish group for the 6 am ride, and when Dave peeled off at Causeway I was left to my own devices again for the ride out to Williams Blvd. I saw the Metairie group go by just before I got to Causeway, so after riding out to Williams and turning back I turned around again when I saw them coming so I could tag along all the way out to The Wall and back. It was just a bit cooler this morning - like by two degrees - so it felt relatively cool on the way out to City Park.

On the good news front, it appears that the river levee is fully rideable again, so perhaps some of us will switch back to that on Tuesdays and Thursdays soon.

Yesterday I went over to Ochsner for an echocardiogram to see if my somewhat disappointing performances in recent years were due to something heart related or just from being 72 years old. Looks like the latter, which is I guess the better of the two options. It wasn't a big surprise, really, but I figured it was worth checking out at this point since the last echo I'd had was back in the 70s when I'd been having some minor arrhythmia and the diagnosis was mitral valve prolapse and dilated left ventricle, neither of which showed up on this one. With apologies to the Rolling Stones, "what a drag it is getting old."

Crashy Weekend

Friday Coffee Ride

It took quite a few days to come down from the workout I got up in North Carolina, but I nonetheless eventually settled into my usual dull routine of Zone 2 rides occasionally interspersed with beyond category efforts to keep from being dropped. Fortunately, the university riders finally started to filter back into the picture, which is always a good thing.

Last Wednesday's WeMoRi was a good workout despite my getting dropped due mostly to a moment or two of hesitation hoping the riding in front of me, who was clearly losing the draft and showing little hope of regaining it. Of course I sat on his wheel a little too long hoping for some kind of miracle. Branden came around us on City Park Avenue in an attempt to bridge me up to the group, but even that was too little too late. Apparently there had been another attack in the front group while we were trying to make the bridge, so that kind of explains it. There's often a little lull after the sprint on City Park Avenue, but no such luck that day. Naturally I later made a u-turn on Lakeshore Drive so I could enjoy the usual final surge to Marconi. There were a number of Tulane riders on hand, all in their new jerseys, and we had a nice long coffee stop on the way home at The Bean Gallery on Carrollton. On Friday there was the usual super-fast "Friendly" Friday ride, followed by the easy Tulane coffee ride and a stop at Junk Drawer Coffee on Broadway, right around the corner from home.

The weather for the past few days, including last weekend, has featured extreme heat advisories. Although the early SaMoRi group has ballooned in size with people trying to avoid a little bit of the sunshine, we still had a solid group for the Giro. Aided by a light tailwind, the speed rarely dropped below 28 mph the whole way out, making it a pretty fair workout even without spending much time in the wind. Much of the return trip was more in the 24-25 mph range as the mild headwind and increasing heat began to take a toll. Still, thing were rolling along nicely as we made our way down Hayne Blvd (apparently recently renamed Lincoln Beach Blvd.). 

At one point the whole group swung out into the left lane. I later learned that it was because whoever was at the front thought we were about to hit a section of broken up road. As it turned out, that section was just a little bit farther down the road, and when we got to it we were back in the right lane going 25 mph. Someone near the front saw it at the last minute and apparently hit the brakes, resulting in a big pile-up. The earlier group had plowed right across the broken concrete, which had resulted in multiple flat tires. We weren't quite so lucky and four riders hit the ground, with TJ getting the worst of it. I rode back in with TJ and Eddie D as a large hematoma grew on TJ's left elbow and his right brake lever dangled from the handlebar. We were going slowly and I was wondering why Nico and Chris didn't catch us. It turned out Nico had flatted. Despite the crash and everything it was still a pretty hard and hot training ride, and I was feeling lucky I'd been able to stop in time. Chris, who had been right in front of me, went down, but fortunately landed mostly in the grass. When I got home I reported the broken up concrete, accompanied by a photo, to NOLA311. From what I heard later, it had been temporarily patched in time for the Sunday Giro.

So on Sunday there was a 50 mile Tulane ride from Abita Springs that included a couple of new riders. Considering that they wanted to meet at 5:30 am for the drive across the lake, I was impressed that everyone who said they were coming actually showed up. I rode over with Jack and three bikes. Charles met us over there, along with a couple others, so we ended up with a good sized group of eleven. It was probably the longest ride ever for a couple of the people in the group. This was initially organized by Tessa (Pirm is in Germany) and was scheduled to be a fairly easy Zone 2 ride, which it definitely was. We made three store stops along the way, one at Isabel, another at Enon, and the last at Barker's Corner. That was a good thing because it was getting pretty hot toward the end, two or three people fell over trying to unclip, and there was one minor crash when a couple of riders bumped each other on Lee Road. Fortunately we were never going quite fast enough for any of that to have done a lot of damage, and everyone had a nice lunch at Abita Brewpub before heading back to town.

With such an easy ride on Sunday I kind of felt like I was in uncharted waters as I rode out to meet the Monday morning 6 am ride. For that one we had a pretty good turnout, and the pace didn't stay in the "Mellow Monday" range for very long. It was in fact quite a bit afield from anything you might call mellow. Later that morning I went over to Ochsner for my annual checkup, which is mostly a bloodletting for lab work, all of which turned out to be more or less normal. BP was 112/72, so no worries there. I'm scheduled for a cardiac echo next week since the last time I had one the results were printed out on heat sensitive paper. I was diagnosed with mitral valve prolapse back in the late 70s or early 80s when I had some arrythmia going on, so probably a good thing to check. I'd expect a dialated left ventricle at least by now, and perhaps a good excuse for getting dropped to keep in my pocket. At this age you never really know if something's wrong or if that's just the way it is now.

No Place for Sprinters - Up in Asheville

I pretty much knew what I was getting myself into from the get-go. Nonetheless, it was virtually impossible to resist a trip up to Big Rich's hideout in the Blue Ridge mountains with Charles and Jeff. So throwing caution to the wind, I loaded my bike and bag into Jeff's BMW early on a Sunday morning for the long drive to Asheville NC for four days of verticality. If there's anything that over a decade of riding the annual Six Gap Century has taught me, it's that I am not what you would ever call a "climber." Fortunately, whatever cycling ego I once had is now greatly diminished, which is probably nature's way of keeping me from having a self-induced heart attack on a 10% grade. The drive up to NC was pretty uneventful unless you count the usual traffic jams going through Atlanta, and so we arrived at Rich's place well before dark. Charles and Jeff were stationed in "the treehouse," a separate guest house next to the main residence perched on a steeply sloping lot overlooking the forest, complete with deer and bears.

On tap for Monday's ride was an out-and-back up to the Craggy Gardens Visitor Center. This 43 mile ride featured over 4,400 feet of arduous climbing with grades ranging from 4 to 10%. Barry came by to join us for the ride, and we all trudged up the long gravel driveway that is too steep and loose to ride on a road bike. 

After going immediately into the red before we even started the main climb I quickly decided to do focus on my heartrate, keeping it in the general vicinity of 140-144 bpm. My lungs were clearly not happy with something, so any sustained efforts above that made me sound asthmatic. Interestingly, Strava awarded me with my "biggest climb" for the continuous 17 or 18 miles at the blazing average speed of 9.2 mph and an average heart rate of 140 bpm. My legs felt fine, my breathing not so much. Of course at my age one wonders if it's impending heart failure, or pneumonia, or just the way it is now. It was definitely a challenge, and I was definitely the last one to arrive at the visitor center. 

After a brief regrouping at the top, we headed back down the way we'd come. 

The three flatlanders were being especially cautious with the speed since we were on unfamiliar roads and the road was, as it probably always is, a bit damp. That kept my top speed down to 43 mph, while confirming that the 140 mm front rotor was, at least for me, sufficient. Strava accurately tagged the ride as "Massive Relative Effort." On the plus side, I barely drank any water since the temperature was somewhere in the 60s the entire time. Although the Garmin's ClimbPro feature of course kicked in immediately, it would have been better to have had the route loaded on the computer, so Rich sent us the gpx files for each of the other three rides we'd be doing.

Later that day we took a walk down to the edge of the property at a stream where there are the remnants of a very old mill.

Tuesday's ride was a bit shorter at 36 miles, but with over 4,000 feet of climbing. Rich's friend and neighbor, Jim, joined us for this one. This one was mostly a loop, so there were two long climbs followed by two long descents, neither a long as those on Monday. When the grades got above 6% or so, I'd just say goodbye to the others and climb at my own pace, mostly in the 36 x 30. The two climbs were about six miles each, and the downhills were fun even though we were taking them rather cautiously.

Wednesday was our longest ride at around 46 miles. With only 3,700 feet of climbing broken into two climbs, this was what passes for a flat easy ride up there. It was by no means easy, but it was perhaps easier.  As far as I could tell, there aren't more than ten feet of flat ground anywhere around Asheville.

Our plan was to make the drive back to New Orleans on Thursday, but fortunately we had enough time to get in one last ride in the morning. This one was only 26 miles, up the Rose Hill climb. I think this route probably had the steepest grades of the four we rode. Despite being relatively short, the average grade up the Rose Hill climb was over 8% with some short spots in the 10-16% range. For reference, my average speed on that climb was 8.2 mph. Earlier this year Lisa had averaged 12.5, and the fastest Strava segment speed is apparently 18 mph.

So is was a great challenging weekend with friends, and a welcome break from the 80-90° New Orleans temperatures. Although the weather forecast had initially been calling for a lot of rain, we never got any during our rides, and although the roads were usually damp enough to keep me from letting the bike go on the downhills, the only problems they caused were strictly psychological. As slowly as I was climbing, I don't really think I could have gone much faster without doing more damage than I'd like. As it was, my lungs felt kind of raw much of the time I was there.

The drive back was fine despite a short detour caused by an accident up ahead of us, and we arrived back home at a reasonable hour.

Back to Tuscaloosa

I hadn't been planning on doing a century ride in July, but when Pirm mentioned that he and Tessa were signed up for the Hot Hundred up in Tuscaloosa I naturally went to check it out. Despite it being the event's 24th year, it had never been on my radar, mainly because we had bike races going on in the summer, and so I never paid much attention to charity rides, centuries or not. It looked like a fairly low-key fundraising event that didn't keep track of finish times or anything, with the obvious priority being on rest stops and iced towels and cold drinks and such. Still, I had no plans to go until Ben, who had already registered but now had a conflict, offered to transfer his registration, and Donata, who had planned to accompany him, wanted someone to travel with. So I took him up on the offer. I mean, why not? It had been a long time since I'd ridden in Tuscaloosa. There used to be the Tour de Tuscaloosa stage race, and I'd ridden it in 2009, and then again in 2012, the latter time with some of the riders from the newly formed Tulane Cycling club. As it turned out, the staging area for the Hot Hundred was in the same area as the criterium had been.

Although making the 4.5 hour drive up to Tuscaloosa the "day of" might be feasible, the century ride was scheduled to begin at 7 am. I met Donata at the Slidell Starbucks around noon on Friday and we headed north with the bikes on the roof, arriving in plenty of time to check in and then go over to The Sanctuary to pick up packets. I didn't know if I'd run into problems with that because the event's BikeReg site still had Ben listed and I hadn't received a request to sign the release. I think I got an email from the promoter some time on Friday acknowledging the transfer, but didn't see it until much later since I was driving. Anyway, since the place where they were doing Friday evening packet pickup was a restaurant with a big bar and outdoor seating, I sat down with a pint of Stout since we were planning on meeting Pirm and Tessa at 6:30 for dinner.  They organizer had just swapped my name for Ben's on their registration list at the last minute. They gave us these kind of stiff plastic numbers that were customized with our names, so of course mine said "Ben" and also at some point during the ride someone called me Ben. Note to event promoters:  I never signed a waiver for this event, electronic or otherwise. Anyway, a bit later as I was sipping my drink, they both showed up to pick up their own packets, so we all headed off to the Nami Supreme Buffet for dinner. I can't believe how much Pirm can eat.

Saturday morning we got to the event around, I guess, 6:15 or so, after a quick breakfast at the hotel (very bad coffee and half a cup of raisin bran for me), Although the parking lot I was aiming for was already full (it was the same one I'd parked in back in 2012) we found a nice spot about a block away. After the usual sponsor acknowledgements and national anthem, we rolled out pretty much on time behind a police escort. I'd lined up around the middle of the 150 or so riders, and soon found myself navigating through a sea of rear view mirrors and multi-colored club cut Primal jerseys in order to get up closer to the front where it seemed safer. Pirm was already on the front, and I never saw him or the small front group again. In fact, I never saw when the escort ended or when the group split at all, not that I had any intention of riding the 102 miles like it was a race anyway. Pretty soon a fairly big second group formed and I got into the rotation. The first 15 miles out of town were pretty much dead flat, so we were rolling along a steady 23-24 mph, which was nice, with maybe seven or eight of us taking pulls and some unknown number sitting in behind. Evan from New Orleans was also in our group sharing pulls. 

A little bit after crossing the Black Warrior River we turned right and soon hit a short but significant climb of around 7% I guess. I didn't have my heart rate to guide me since I had apparently not pushed the button long enough and it didn't start up and pair with the computer. No worries, though. I probably didn't want to see my heart rate anyway. Much of the rest of the course was a series of short but sometimes steep little uphills, many of with touched 7-9%. I had the course loaded onto the Garmin, so I just left it in Map mode where it shows the climbs and grades. If I'd been in race mode and race fit, I think they would mostly been manageable in the big ring since they were all pretty short, but as it was I found myself making ample use of the 36 ring now and then. I never had to resort to the lowest gears on the bike, though, and was generally feeling OK with the pace and effort.

I'd started with a big Tulane water bottle with Skratch, plus a regular bottle with plain water, and was carrying a flask of Hammergel plus a couple of Gu packets for emergencies, but I was pretty sure that I wouldn't need them, considering how many well-stocked rest stops they had set up along the route. The temperature never got really extreme or anything, so I probably could have gotten by with just that if necessary, which it wasn't. The group I was in was slowly shedding riders out the back, sometimes at the earlier rest stops at which the rest of us didn't stop, so when we all finally pulled into a Fire Station rest stop at around 60 miles our number was down to maybe ten or so, I guess. I took the opportunity to top off my bottles, but looking at what they had on offer I probably could have stopped for a full lunch. We later came to another rest stop where everyone except me stopped. I still had lots of water and gel left, so I decided to just soft-pedal for a few miles until the group caught me. It was a nice little break, actually, and I really hate stopping mid-ride on a hot day anyway. When the group caught me a few miles down the road, I was surprised how big it was. I think that a part of our original group that had stopped at an early rest stop had caught back up because I recognized most of them. Unfortunately, Evan hadn't seen everybody leaving until it was too late and was never able to get back in the group. Anyway, by the time we were 75 or 80 miles in, it was getting hot and our number was dwindling rapidly. The effort was starting to get to me around that time so I pulled out my Age Card and started hanging out more at the back. By then we were down to maybe five or six riders. Shortly after we turned onto the last 15 mile flat section it was just me and one other rider who was obviously in better shape than I, and in retrospect may have been intent on finishing in under five hours. I traded pulls with him most of the way until we made a left turn at an intersection and he accelerated. I glanced down at the computer, which was showing something like 97 miles and thought to myself "close enough" and eased up. A couple of other riders came up from behind and I tagged along with them for a bit, but I guess they were also determined to hit a specific goal that I wasn't interested in, so I just cruised in the last few miles. Just after dropping back, I took a wrong turn in the city and had to take a few minutes to turn around and navigate back to the course, but by then I was right at 100 miles, so practically finished anyway.

The ride seemed a bit harder than I'd expected, probably due to a combination of all of the little climbs and the increasing temperature. I'd consumed the equivalent of only about four gel packets, so I guess I was running a little low on calories and probably should have been more attentive to that. At the finish they had lots of ice cold drinks and a lot of food like hamburgers (I had no desire to eat a hot hamburger at that point). We hung around for a while under a tent eating and drinking and such. Pirm had actually been the first rider to finish with a 4:24 riding time, far ahead of my own 5:03. As I was loading up the bikes and stuff, Tessa gave me an iced latte that really hit the spot. I normally avoid coffee with milk in it, but fortunately my gut bacteria didn't really seem to notice very much. The drive back was going along nicely until I saw a police car go flying past us at a high rate of speed. Up ahead there had been some kind of serious accident and they had just closed the interstate, forcing us off at an exit. Luckily it was pretty easy to navigate around to the next exit, so we were back on the Interstate within half an hour or so. If we'd been ten minutes earlier we would have been past the exit and trapped between it and the crash, so luck was on our side. I got home around 5 or 6, I think, so that was nice.

Sunday morning I went ahead and did the Giro, for which we had only a handful of riders. My legs were definitely still feeling the prior day's ride, so I wasn't doing any more work than absolutely necessary, and when we got to the bridges on the way back I eased off with VJ rather than contesting the bridge to bridge drag race. I was still feeling the ride in my legs this morning.