Fash Wednesday

King and Queen as the cannon signals the start

Yesterday was Mardi Gras here in New Orleans. Elsewhere it was mostly just Tuesday. I didn't have a game plan this year, so it was a pretty quiet one for me. I went out early, skipping the sparcely attended holiday Giro, for a short easy ride on the levee before making my annual stop at the 7:00 am Royal Run. Although it was overcast, the temperature was comfortably in the 60s and the wind light as I rolled up to the crowd of people at the Magazine Street entrance to Audubon Park. 

Dylan and Josiah flagged me down as I got there, and shortly afterward Will and a couple other Tulane folks showed up. I wandered off to get an official Rex 2026 T-shirt, and waited for Rex and the Queen to arrive in their long black limousines. 

First to arrive though, was a black van from which emerged a black Lab wearing a tutu. This year, both the King and Queen lined up for the official start, signified as always by an insanely loud brass cannon over in the grass. Some years the day's royalty don't actually participate, but I can verify that both of them at least started the run. I have no idea if they did the whole lap around the park, though. Anyway, I cruised back home, arriving just as the first of the truck floats were starting to line up on S. Claiborne, right outside the window. The truck floats don't even start moving until maybe noon, and likely later than that, but I can verify that the loud cacaphony of music begins by 8:00 am.

With the Rex parade scheduled to roll from S. Claiborne and Napoleon at 10:30, we decided to walk down to the end of the streetcar line at Carrollton to take the streetcar down to Napoleon where it stops on parade days. Since we both qualify for the senior discount, a full-day "Jazzy Pass" for the streetcar costs all of 80 cents each. 

Of course we arrived a good hour before the parade even started, so we walked around a bit and then headed up Napoleon to near Freret where the Rex reviewing stands were set up this year. The front row was lined with women wearing big fancy hats like you'd expect to see for the Easter horse races. 

The parade was spot on time, and we watched I guess twenty of the thirty floats go by before starting our walk back to St. Charles for the return trip on the streetcar. I had kind of flexible plan to then ride down to the French Quarter after we got home, but I was convinced instead to go out to Oak Street to find something for a late lunch. The only place that seemed to be open on Mardi Gras day was a fairly new pizza type place in the first block off of Carrollton. We had the dog with us, and they have three tables out on the street, which was otherwise pretty deserted, so we sat down and ordered. Then, two other couples showed up, each with a dog in tow, taking the tables on either side of us. Of course Charley wasn't too comfortable with that and barked at them, so we ended up taking lunch home in boxes. The pizza was pretty good, though. By then it was nearly 3 pm and the last of the truck floats were roing by, followed by the army of street sweepers and trash trucks, so it really wouldn't have been worth going down to the Quarter, at least for me. Also, I was starting to feel some scratchiness in my throat and figured being in the MGD crows wouldn't be such a good idea anyway.

So this morning it was even a bit warmer as I headed out in the dark for the WeMoRi. The group was a little smaller than you'd expect for such nice weather, but about exactly what you'd expect the morning after Mardi Gras. I soon found myself nearer the front than usual, which confirms that the pace must have been at least a little subdued. As we came to the light, which had just turned red, at Harrison, someone went around the stopped car on the left, so I squeezed by on the right, but I think everyone else stopped for a bit and so it didn't come back together until after the overpass. Then there was a split as we approached the City Park Avenue sprint that wasn't stitched back together until the Marconi underpass. I found myself on Lisa's wheel and pretty much stayed there the rest of the ride. Things settled down for a while as Steve seemed content to tow the whole group, with an occasional assist from Joe Paul. At one point Steve dropped his water bottle and I hit it. Fortunately it was at the moment oriented perpendicular to the road, and apparently not full, because I slammed right over it without incident. As we came to the Bayou St. John bridge I saw Lisa move her hands to the drops and knew what was about to happen. I stuck to her wheel like glue when she kind of attacked the overpass and continued to push the pace, fully expecting to get streamed by the rest of the group before Marconi, which for some reason didn't happen. So there were definitely some fast segments to the WeMoRi this morning, but nothing too severe. It looks like we'll have a few days of unseasonably warm weather now until the next front arrives for the weekend and the temperature plummets down into the upper 30s or, more likely, low 40s. Typical February weather.

Another February

View from the ferry

Today is February 11.  It's currently 75 F outside. I'm not complaining, you understand. I'll take 75 degrees over 45 every day of the week. Even better, I'm not seeing anything below 52 for the next ten days. Of course, the early part of the month, and most of January, was the usual roller-coaster of freezing cold and tolerably mild, most of which felt cold and miserable to me. This is always the hardest time to be training, outdoors, in the dark.

Last weekend Charles coaxed me into a last-minute decision to join a little group for a long ride up the river on the westbank to Gramercy, returning on the east bank bike levee bike path. It would be a bit over 100 miles with a small group, but all at a moderate pace. As it turned out, though, Charles had to back out early that morning. I headed out in the dark for the Canal Street Ferry where I would meet up with Joe Paul, Alison, Mary Beth, and Jason (and wonder where the heck Charles was) for the 6:15 am crossing. The weather was looking pretty favorable, except for the expected east wind that would be increasing all day. It had been quite a long time since I'd ridden much of the westbank levee bike path. Unlike its counterpart on the east bank, this one takes a rather torturous route from Algiers to Avondale, sending you back onto the street here and there where industrial operations or the canal bridge superceded bike path priorities. 

A nice quiet River Road paceline

By the time we got started the sun was almost up, so at least visibility wasn't a problem. Once past Avondale we got back onto the levee, and I was surprised how far the bike path now goes upriver. We were nearly 40 miles into the ride before we dropped down onto River Road for the last time, stopping briefly for a store stop there. I'd been worried that the next 20 miles on River Road would be sketchy, but other than a few miles of dump trucks due to some work at one of the plants, we mostly had the road to ourselves.

Toward the end of that stretch we picked up a nice little tailwind, my enjoyment of which was somewhat moderated by the knowledge that we'd soon be riding in the opposite direction for 50 miles.

I knew that crossing the Mississippi via the Gramercy bridge wasn't going to be as much fun as I'd have liked. Although there is a reasonable shoulder to the road, traffic is generally moving at Interstate speeds, and I'd been forewarned about the infamous interlocking finger-like expansion joints. Indeed, a couple of them were almost entirely disconnected, and most of them would be dangerous to ride over at any significant speed. I ended up coming almost to a stop for each of them and putting a foot down as I crossed. A few of our group just walked most of the way, so when I got to the bottom, I looked back and didn't see anyone!  I was afraid someone had flatted or something, but eventually they appeared.

As expected, the return trip on the east bank, which was mostly on the bike path except for that 2-mile stretch where they've been working on the levee around St. Road, featured a lot of headwind. Fortunately Joe Paul spent a lot of time on the front of the group with me on his wheel. Nobody was pushing the pace, so it wasn't really all that bad, and of course we had another long rest stop along the way. So I ended up with 107 miles of Zone 2 with a total of 400 feet of elevation.  Yeah, 400 feet in 107 miles. In the end I was glad I'd gone, but it was of course a long time in the saddle that took me a couple of days from which to feel fully recovered.

Friendly Friday

This morning's WeMoRi was, as one might expect given the unseasonably warm temperature, very well-attended. As usual, I met up with the group on Marconi, slotting in easily near the back. Although the pace was pretty fast, it's still amazing how much easier it feels when you have a big group like we had today. Earlier rides this year all seemed to suffer because of the weather, and to me it feels infinitely more difficult to do a WeMoRi wearing full winter kit with a small group at 23 mph than when wearing summer kit with a big group going 28. We had four Tulane riders for this one, and I think they all survived. We stopped for coffee at French Truck afterward, which took just enough time to ensure that we got rained on just before getting home. Fortunately, it wasn't cold this morning.

Since my somewhat unplanned retirement the first week of January, I've been navigating my way through Medicare and TIAA and LTRS and supplemental health insurance, most of which is still not quite fully settled, but at least moving in the right direction. Unfortunately, that has distracted my attention from cycling related things, such as the NOBC, LAMBRA, and the Tour de La. Some of that is going to be a little late this year, I guess. USAC finally killed off the legacy system around the end of last year after ten years of trying, and changed up the membership and racing license systems completely, again. Registration and results for any races we put on this year are going to have to be handled quite differently, I suspect. As far as I can tell, I can't download the rider data, for example. At any rate, we need to get some fresh blood into both NOBC and LAMBRA and see if we can reinvent bike racing around here. Hopefully I can get set up as a volunteer coach for Tulane Cycling and Triathlon. I feel like we will be pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps, so will need to be thinking "outside the box" as they say. We'll see.

End of Summester

Christmas parade awaiting Santa's helicopter arrival

In typical fashion, the cold fronts have been coming through in close succession lately, bringing with them some wild swings from spectacular weather to miserable weather and back again. 

A week ago on Sunday, the 7th, it had again been rainy in the morning, so I headed out in the afternoon for a long solo ride out to the end of the levee bike path, which makes for a 90 mile ride with essentially zero elevation. I'd gone out to the levee the day before when the road was still wet from rain, and managed to puncture twice, which is actually not that surprising. There's something in the asphalt up there that always causes flats when it's wet. Anyway, by the time I headed out the next day the temperature was in the 60s and there was a moderate east wind, so it felt fast and easy heading out and not so much so heading back. Along the way I had to pick my way through the crowds gathered for the Norco Christmas Parade at which Santa arrives via helicopter. The police almost stopped me because the helicopter was approaching, but I made it through just as it was circling overhead. 

Upriver from the Spillway there were multiple groups working on their Christmas bonfires. The bike path drops down to street level in a few places there, and was designed that was specifically to allow for the annual bonfires. It was a nice steady LSD type of ride.

Last week was the usual roller-coaster weather. Wednesday morning started out in the low 40s with a small WeMoRi group. I jumped in as usual, but some big gaps opened ahead of me on the Wisner overpass, leaving just Rich and me to fend for ourselves. We backed off pretty quickly. Then, on the way home, two cars nearly killed me by cutting in front of me. One at the start of the Norman Francis overpass, and the other along Vendome. For the latter, I had to lock up the rear wheel to keep from hitting the idiot. Thursday was a bit warmer but also quite a bit windier. I was left to my own devices heading west along the lake with a nice little tailwind. I turned back a little early since I knew the headwind in the opposite direction would take its toll, but was lucky to have a little group come along just after that, which made it much nicer. Friendly Friday turned out to be pretty nice, and it was looking like Saturday's weather would be ideal for the Tulane "end of the semester" ride. 

I'd been fighting my handlebars for a week or so because of an inexplicably pitted headset bearing. Perhaps I'd over-tightened it at some point, or maybe just slammed into a bump somewhere. The Cervelo has only around 2,600 miles on it thus far. I had gotten replacement bearings plus a bleed kit, olives, barbs (as they are called), mineral oil, and isopropyl alcohol since the brake hoses go through the headset bearings. The weather for Sunday was looking like rain in the morning, so I penciled in a few hours of bike maintenance for then.

On Saturday I met up with some of the Tulane riders for a nice 67 mile ride out of Abita Springs. Earlier that day I'd gone out to Starbucks to meet the Giro riders, but turned back at the end of Lakeshore Drive. The northshore ride didn't start until 1:30 or so. By then it was a beautiful day with light winds and a temperature in the low 70s. We had a nice little group of six, so it was a good steady ride for the most part. We had to stop on Dummyline to fix a flat at which point some woman drove by, stopped, rolled down the window, and asked Ben, "Y'all aren't from around here, are you?" to which he responded "Yes m'am, I am." We were planning on dinner and a bonfire at his house in Abita Springs after the ride. Regardless, she felt compelled to tell us that we should know better than to stop at the top of the hill there (where we had a clear line of sight for about a mile in both directions, making it arguably the absolute best place to stop). Go figure. We were probably 20 miles from the end when Pirman kind of launched with Josiah on his wheel, at which point one of the guys dropped his chain as we started to chase, so the rest of us stopped. That was the last we saw of Pirm until Abita Springs, but he did manage to drop Josiah, so we regrouped after Isabel Swamp Road for a nice quick ride back, followed by gumbo and beer and stuff. I left pretty early since I'm old and it was already past my bedtime. I later noticed that I'd ended up with 99.7 miles for the day. If i'd known I would definitely have ridden another 0.3 miles just to round it out!

Silly disc brakes

Sunday morning was once again wet and a little rainy as predicted, so after breakfast I worked on the bike for a couple of hours. Since I had to pull the fork to replace the bearings, that meant I also had to disconnect both brake hoses, then reconnect them and bleed them. I cheated and didn't cut the ends to install new olives and barbs, and it looks like that worked without causing any leaks, but I'll be checking on it for a while to be on the safe side. Since I had the fork out I went ahead and cut it down by about a centimeter so I could eliminate the spacer I had on top of the stem, and also took the opportunity to swap the short bearing cap for the tall one, eliminating another couple of spacers, and adding the plug that they'd neglected to install earlier. Of course, the morning rain had been the next cold front coming through, so by the time things dried up and I went out for a short ride on the levee there was a 20+ mph north wind blowing. On the plus side, the headset felt good and the brakes worked, and most of the levee runs more east-west than north-south. Meanwhile, the temperature was starting to drop rapidly.

This morning it was around 34° at the house with a 25 mph wind at the lakefront. I piled on a bunch of bulky clothes that I hadn't worn since last winter and met up with Charles at NOMA for a low-gear Mellow Monday. We did not see any other riders, but it wasn't super cold at the lakefront, and once we turned back toward the west, it was not bad at all. Still, we did cut it a little short since there were just the two of us and we were mostly going barely 15 mph. It's looking like the morning temperatures will be mostly in the low to mid-50s through the holidays, so that should make for some decent riding. This will be my last week at work until January since the daughter is coming in on the 23rd.

Wind, Weather, and Winter

Well, it looks like winter, such as it is in New Orleans, is here to stay for a while. The 10-day forecast isn't offering any morning temperatures above 54°, and for me that crosses the line from Fall to Winter. At the moment I'm looking out my office window at a gloomy, dark, and rainly Thursday, and feeling lucky to have gotten in an hour or so this morning on the levee, on the 'cross bike, before the rain moved in. At least it looks like there's a chance of rideable weather tomorrow morning if you consider 51°, wet streets, and a 10+ mph north wind rideable. It's going to be one of those mornings when you look out the window and then look at the radar and then look out the window again while contemplating the level of misery you are willing to tolerate that day.

Nice try, Mother Nature

This morning the forecast was pretty bad. It had been raining overnight, and at 5:30 am the radar was showing a huge line of heavy rain stretched, as it typical this time of year, from southwest to northeast, moving slowly in our direction. I figured I might get in an hour or so before the rain started again, so I intentionally overdressed, stuck the ass-saver under the saddle, and rolled out in the dark on the cyclocross bike that hasn't seen any cyclocross in over a year. The heavy gravel tires that I have on it right now at least minimize the chance of flatting on the wet levee bike path, though, and in general the bike keeps my speed down enough to limit the wind chill while still requiring enough effort to make it worthwhile. I managed get in 26 miles without getting wet, so I guess that will just have to do for today. On the plus side, that ride put me just over 12,000 miles for the year. On the minus side, that's almost 1,000 miles fewer than recent years thanks to that unfortunate crash back in the spring.

The weather, and in particular the wind, has definitely been having an effect on the local rides lately, and I'm seeing more and more Zwift and Rouvy rides showing up on Strava as people resign themselves to the realities of December. Tuesday's weather was just as bad, and I was lucky to get in 20 miles on the levee, again on the cyclocross bike, on soaking wet roads. It was slightly miserable, as you'd expect. The following day I went out to meet the WeMoRi with the temperature hovering around 40° and found only the dregs of what had been a small group to begin with. I saw Steven zoom by as I was on Lakeshore Drive but didn't really have a chance to go with him, which was unfortunate there were only three riders behind him and they were clearly not chasing. I made my usual U-turn and headed down Marconi, but by the time I was caught, only Charles was left, the other two having gone straight back toward West End for unknown reasons. We did a lap around City Park and called it a day.

At least last weekend wasn't too bad, and I was able to make both Giro Rides. Sunday's Giro was going along nicely until we got to Lake Forest on the way back. As we started to get up to speed after turning onto the road, JC somehow managed to snag his rear derailleur on a spoke and ripped it off, shearing off one of the spokes in the process. A few of us stopped to assess the situation and since someone had a multitool with a chain tool, we decided to shorten the chain to see if we could make it rideable again as a single speed. After much effort we finally got him going again, but then the chain decided it would rather be one cog higher, which made it so tight you could barely pedal. We stopped again and set it up on the small chainring, which meant shortening the chain again. That seemed to be working great, and we got about halfway down Hayne Blvd. before the chain broke. 11-speed chains aren't made so you can push the pins back in like you could in the old days, so it wasn't too surprising. Anyway, we just went ahead and pushed him the rest of the way, except for the bridge which he had to walk, and got him back to his car at Elysian Fields. 

MacGyver would have been proud.

Meanwhile, I have noticed that the headset on the new Cervelo has somehow become slightly pitted. I may have overtightened it at some point, or maybe just hit a pothole somewhere, but I wasn't expecting that with only around 2,200 miles on the bike. Of course, thanks to disc brakes, that means I will have to disconnect the front brake hose to replace the lower bearing. I was hoping to avoid having to deal with the hydraulics quite so soon. So I ordered new headset bearings, plus a bleed kit, plus the compression fitting (aka "olive"). The headset isn't bad enough to make much of a difference at the moment, although it's somewhat noticeable when riding with hands off the bars. It'll probably be next week before I have everything I need and summon up the motivation to take everything apart. Hopefully there will still be enough tubing so I don't have to replace that as well. We'll see.

Ride Your Age

Apryl's Birthday Ride, My Almost Birthday Ride #1

An old cycling tradition, one that, as most do, challenges reality, is to ride your age in miles, or kilometers, or centimeters on your birthday. Of course the idea of increasing the mileage as you age eventually becomes problematic for obvious reasons. Complicating the situation is whether or not you actually have the time to do that on the appointed day. As I was contemplating this conundrum a couple of weeks ago I noticed that the GCBC was planning a 73-mile President's Birthday Ride out of Waveland, conveniently scheduled for the Saturday before my birthday, and featuring just about the perfect mileage. So, throwing caution to the wind, I signed up. A week later, Dustin and some of the Tulane riders started planning on a 72 mile ride out of Abita Springs for the Sunday before my birthday. So Plan B, I guess.

Thursday morning on the lakefront

As is typical this time of year, last week's rides were impacted a bit by the weather. In this case, it wasn't the temperature, which was mostly unseasonably warm, it was the fog, which was seasonably thick. Although I had severe fog alerts on my phone for three consecutive mornings, the only really significant fog was on Thursday, and even that wasn't very bad, just requiring me to stash my fogged-up glasses in my pocket for the first hour. Then on Friday it rained early, so assuming that nobody would show up for Friendly Friday (which turned out to have been a bad assumption), I instead went out a little later to the levee and met up with the Tulane coffee ride. The forecast for the weekend was looking pretty great, so with two 70+ mile rides on my dance card, I welcomed the easier ride that day.

I headed out solo to Waveland Saturday morning at the conviently late hour of 6:30 to make the 8:00 am ride start at Buccaneer State Park. I arrived pretty early anyway, and was immediately greeted by a hourde of midges, aka "No Seeums."  I'm still itching from at least fifty little bites on my arms and legs despite having sprayed Off on them soon after arriving. Otherwise, though, the weather was practically perfect, and there was a surprisingly nice turnout out of the New Orleans area. I didn't know what to expect of this ride. The route covered a lot of the same roads we often ride out of Bay St. Louis. I was glad I'd loaded the route onto my computer because there were at least thirty turns along the way. With GCBC President Apryl leading the way, we headed down the beach to the bridge over the bay, where I thought things might get fast, but as it turned out almost all of the ride was done at a nice moderate pace that kept most of the main group together. As we got to within 15 miles or so of the end, the terrain flattened out and I started to sense some, shall I say impatience, at the front. The speed started creeping up, and soon the whole group was strung out going 30 mph with Connor on the front. Soon enough gaps started opening up and some riders started going backwards, and just as I was debating with myself whether I wanted to make the effort to close yet another gap, Branden came to the rescue and stitched it back together. Next thing I knew, it was just Connor, Joe Paul, Branden, and me, separated from the front group by a fairly small gap. Then Connor lit the afterburner, putting the remaining three of us into chase mode. We got the the Bay St. Louis bridge with Connor about a minute off the front, and Branden took one last pull before dropping back, leaving just Joe and me. By then we weren't really chasing any more, just trying to hold the pace and keep Connor's flashing tail light in sight. Back along the beach road I was surprised a couple of times when Joe pulled past me before I was ready to pull off from the front. As it turned out, he had been looking behind and realized that the group was in full chase mode and closing in on us! I  hadn't looked back, myself. We made it back to the finish with maybe fifteen or twenty seconds to spare. Anyway, it was a really fun ride, and I particularly enjoyed those last fifteen miles.  That evening I went over to the WeMoRi/Bayou Bicycles party for a couple of hours. It's always a little weird to see all of your regular riding friends wearing civilian clothes.

Sunday on the northshore

On Sunday I met up with a few of the Tulane riders for 6 am. It was the start of Thanksgiving break, so we had just Dylan and Sawyer for the drive over, but there were a number of riders, including Dustin, Jason, Steve M, Charles, Nick, and Evan already there when we arrived - mainly because I absolutely had to stop at Starbucks at Lakeside before heading across the Causeway. Again, the weather was great. As usual it was a bit colder on the northshore, so I had my arm-warmers on, but they weren't strictly necessary, especially after the first hour. Again, I had no idea how this ride would play out, and although my legs were feeling none the worse for wear after the prior day's 73 miles, I was hoping it wouldn't turn into a hammerfest too early. It didn't. In fact, the pace was generally quite confortable the whole time. The route included a little out-and-back on House Creek Road, and rather than risk blowing up my legs on the one or two little steep sections there that I knew would turn into a race, I turned around about a mile early so I could ride back up to Hwy 40 at a more civilized pace. A couple of people were waiting up there, having skipped that segment entirely. Anyway, it was a nice ride, and as we were coming back down the Tammany Trace toward the end at Abita Springs I noticed my computer was about to hit exactly 72 miles, so I miraculously hit the Stop button at precisely the right time to have Strava show exactly 72.00 miles. Afterward, Dylan headed out to make his flight home for the holiday, and Dustin, Sawyer, and I had lunch at the Brewpub. So although it was a couple of days early, I rode my age twice over the weekend. Meanwhile, my left ring finger is still swollen at the knuckle from that little fall about three weeks ago. I guess I must have done more damage than I'd thought. I finally broke down on Monday and cut my wedding ring so I could get it off, on the assumption that having what amounted to a tourniquet on the finger wasn't helping things. We'll see. 

Abita Brewpub

Early this morning, about an hour before the 5:20 am alarm went off, I could hear it raining outside. It was still very wet at 5:30, so I bailed on the Tuesday morning ride and waited until just after 6 am to take the 'cross bike out for a spin on the levee. I had grabbed the wrong Garmin this morning by mistake. It's the one that I had disconnected from my phone and on which I had disabled the heart rate and speed sensors because I'd lent it to someone a couple of weeks ago for one of the group rides so they'd have the route and map. I didn't know what would happen if there were two computers connecting to my phone and sensors on the same ride at the same time, but I figured it couldn't be good. I was halfway through the ride before I realized it. I did manage to reconnect my heart rate monitor while I was riding (the 'cross bike doesn't have speed or cadence sensors), but couldn't get it to pair with my phone. I tried again after I got home and it still wouldn't pair, which wasn't too surprising because that is always a problem with this setup.

Things at work are super quiet ahead of Thanksgiving, and I wouldn't be surprised if I am the only one on the entire floor right now. Unless something comes  up, which seems extremely unlikely, I'll probably head back home around mid-afternoon since we're planning to get together with a few people for a birthday dinner at Maple Street Cafe' this evening.

Tour de Jeff - Warmer Weekend

After a rather cold start to the week, a gradual warmup had begun by Wednesday. I was not complaining. While some obviously delusional people like to claim that 60°F is ideal cycling weather, I don't slap that label onto anything very far south of 70°, and even that is a bit of a stretch. Thursday morning started in the mid-upper 50s with barely any wind, and after most of the group turned off for home at Canal Blvd., Matt, Jess, and I continued out to the lake trail for the usual out-and-back with Matt doing much of the work. On this practically windless day, the 23-24 mph pace felt easy. When we got back to the east end of the bike path, Jess turned around to log even more miles while Matt headed home, leaving me to fend for myself in the morning commuter traffic. Jess seems to be on a high-mileage kick lately, and would end the week with well over 400 miles, while I would feel quite satisfied with my own relatively meager 278. 

Friday's Friendly Friday ride was, as usual, brisk but not brutal, and afterward I cautiously made my way down Carrollton Avenue to meet up with the Tulane coffee ride. I had noted that only three riders had indicated on Discord that they would be going, but with the nice warmer weather I thought perhaps a few more might show up. As it turned out, though, they had all bailed. I wandered up and down the levee for a while trying to find them, but finally gave up and went home to make my own coffee. Perhaps they were resting up for Sunday's Tour de Jefferson. Perhaps they were just using that as an excuse to sleep late. Who knows?

So on Saturday I went out as usual to Starbucks for the Saturday Giro Ride. It was around 60° with just a slight east wind, but we ended up with only maybe six. A small group like that is actually ideal for a steady paceline, and indeed that defined much of the ride. I guess a lot of people were saving their legs for the Tour de Jeff? 

This year Bill B had arranged to have $2,000 in prizes, 5-deep for men and women, for the Tour de Jefferson, which was held under USAC permit as a Gran Fondo. The idea was that the finish line, at least for prize purposes, would be shortly before the turn into the park where the big banner and stage were set up. I got there pretty early, and picked up my number (plate style) chip timing thing that, as usual, I had to modify to fit onto my handlebar underneath the computer mount. No roadies like those things, but fortunately, I've dealt with them a few times before. Still, everyone much preferred the flappy seat post style timing chips/numbers that were used last year, and I saw every possible alternative mounting configuration you could imagine - wrapped around the seatpost, wrapped around the handlebar, mounted lengthwise under the computer mount, wrapped around the head tube, etc. Turnout was defintely a bit better than last year. Bill made the usual announcements about safety and such to the group at the start, but I was still a little confused about exactly how he was going to manage the placings since I had seen neither a finish line nor a timing mat out on the road when I was warming up. On the other hand, I was quite certain it would not matter one bit for me. I was hoping that a 5-person break would go off the front early. I have always had a hard time riding like it's a race when it, technically, isn't. I just never feel comfortable taking the kinds of risks that come up with this kind of competitive free-for-all and riders who may or may not have the requisite experience.

As usual we started out at a controlled speed for the fist mile or so behind Bill's car. After the right turn onto the road leading to the first of numerous U-turns, Bill hit the gas and so did the front of the group. Immediately we were up into the 28-30 mph range. I was trying to stay reasonably close to the front, and over to the left, anticipating the usual chaos at the upcoming left-hand U-turn, and as we approached it I thought I was in a good enough spot somehwere in the front 25 or so. But then riders started making U-turns all over the place in front of me. I don't know if there was a traffic cone or something that we were supposed to go around, but if there was, I never saw it and had to start the U-turn early since everyone in front of me was turning into my path. That turned out to be a minor disaster for me when someone bumped me mid-turn and I had to unclip and put a foot down to remain upright. Then, it took me a couple of attempts to clip in as riders went streaming past. By the time I finally got up to speed the front of the group was already fading into the distance at 30+ mph and I was desperately looking for a wheel that might perhaps pull me across. Up ahead, there were nothing but gaps everywhere, and as I sat on someone's wheel hoping for a miracle, I saw Christian sprint past. I should have made the effort to go with him, but didn't. Big mistake. I think he was one of the last to make it up to what became the big front group. The riders around me didn't seem committed to any sort of organized chase, and so we all eventually came together to form a second group of about twenty. Meanwhile, a small break had gone off the front of the first group that eventually because six as two riders bridged up from the big front group. On the plus side, a few of the Tulane riders, including Jess, Dylan, Josiah, and Chris, were in that front group, and Pirmin was in the break, so a good showing there. Lisa was the first woman, and Sam the first man.

So once I kind of recovered from the initial disaster, and although the main group hovered within a minute of us for quite a while, I knew we were on our own. There were just a few in my group who seemed interested in working, and although I was already resigned to my fate, I did end up doing more work than usual, just for the exercise. It was still a nice ride and a decent enough workout, but we would ultimately finish five minutes behind the main group. At the start I had throught I'd started up navigation of the course that I'd loaded onto my computer, but it didn't seem to be working. I had really wanted to be able to see how far it was to the next U-turn, since this course featured no fewer than six of them. So once things settled down a little bit I started trying to load the course again while riding and not surprisingly managed to stop and save the ride altogether. So then I had to start the ride again from wherever I was at the time, and yet still couldn't seem to get the course navigation to work. Go figure. As it turned out, though, this group was never aggressive enough that it mattered much if I went around the U-turns at the front or at the back.

Surprisingly the break never put much more than a minute on the large lead group, and by the end even the break was a bit slower than the main group was last year, finishing in around 1:59 (we'd finished at 1:58 the year before). As we got close to the end I was expecting to see a timing mat or finish line of some sort, but never did. I think maybe the top-5 placings were determined via a regular video or something, while the times were determined by the timing mat inside the park that was well after the finish line that was used for the placings. I don't even know if there was anyone there with a phone/camera when our group came by. That led to some controversy for Jess, who apparently was pretty sure she was the third woman at the sprint point (wherever that was) but was awarded 4th based, I guess, on the chip timing. Jess went on to ride another couple of hours that day, logging over 140 miles. For me, I was a little disappointed at having missed being in the front group where I'm sure I would have been fine, but that's how it goes sometimes. On the plus side, the weather was pretty perfect allowing everyone to ride in just summer kit. You can't complain about that for an event in the middle of November. 

Thanks to my group's relatively moderate 24 mph pace, and the fact that nobody crashed on one of the thousand traffic cones, I ended the ride none the worse for wear, heading home just in time to say goodbye to Jay who had been at the house over the weekend to deliver and recover his daughter from the airport, and for a Saturday brunch to celebrate mu sister Patty's birthday at Vessel NOLA.

Mellow Monday had a nice turnout, again thanks to the nice weather, and this morning's ride was likewise done in summer kit. It was just Rich and me for the out-and-back to Williams Blvd., taking long pulls on an almost windless morning. Meanwhile, the ring finger on my left hand is still swollen from that fall on the railroad tracks about three weeks ago, and I'm seriously considering ordering a ring-cutter at this point. 

Out the Door

Big combined Saturday group

On days like this it's really hard just to get out the door in the morning. After some reasonably seasonable weather during the week, things kind of started going downhill around mid-day on Sunday, and this morning was the coldest we've had thus far this Fall. Not to worry, of course. It won't stay for long since it's not even Thanksgiving yet.

Wednesday morning's WeMoRi featured minimal wind and a comfortable temperature in the mid-upper 50s, but for reasons unknown seemed to have a lower turnout than usual. I slipped into the still-intact group along Marconi, shifting immediately from Zone 2 to Zone 1,000 as usual, but fortunately there wasn't a huge acceleration onto Wisner. I got my breathing back under control just in time for the sprint up the overpass, at which point Steve and Rob opened a huge gap as the rest of the group momentarily looked around at each other to see who would take the bait. Someone eventually did, but it wasn't until almost Marconi that it all came back together. The pace settled down a bit and despite having to respond to a surge or two on the way back from Elysian Fields, I was still feeling good enough to stay with the two or three wheels at the front for the sprint at Marconi. Charles was apparently out sick, and although he tried to make an early comeback on Thursday, he's still out for the count almost a week later, no thanks to the cold snap that hit us a couple of days ago.

On Friday I did the regular Friendly Friday ride, which was nice, and then rode down to the river for a little cool-down and coffee stop with the Tulane group. The weather was still pretty nice, but by then the forecast for Sunday was starting to look ominous.

Saturday's Giro had a decent enough turnout, and with a light tailwind the group sailed out to Venetian Isles at a steady 27-30 mph pace. As we approached the shade tree where everybody likes to stop we found the entire early SaMoRi waiting there. They had apparently had at least two flats that took a while to fix. So with both groups now merged into one we had a fun ride back. I guess there were 30-40 riders most of the way.

By Sunday morning it was clear that a cold front would be coming through right around ride time, and with the predicted wind speeds in the 20+ mph range, I was pretty sure there wasn't going to be much of a Giro, if any. The Tulane group had planned a ride out to around Hopedale, starting at 6:30, so I set my sights on that. I told them I'd meet them at the end of Nashville so I wouldn't have to negotiate Broadway, which is still torn up in places. When they arrived I wasn't too surprised to see only three. They had already formulated Plan B, which was to ditch the Hopedale route and instead do a lap of Lakeshore Drive and then a loop out to The Wall and then down to the river bike path. The wind was already blowing out of the WNW and would eventually climb into the 20-24 mph range as the ride progressed. Strategically, we would be riding into it earlier rather than later. This ride was strictly Zone 2 level, which was fine with me. For some reason Josiah spent about 90% of the time on the front - also fine with me. Anyway, it was a nice ride considering the wind. Of course, the wind was just the opening act of the cold front, and by Monday morning the temperature had dropped from the 60s to the 40s.

So when I rolled out of the house on Monday morning the temperature was around 42° and there was a steady north wind at, still, around 20 mph. Charles had already texted me that he was still sick and wouldn't be there, and I was pretty sure I'd be riding solo that morning, which is exactly what happened. In fact, I don't think I saw anybody else the entire ride. It was the first day I'd pulled on the long winter tights, long-sleeve jersey, and long-sleeve base layer. I was still cold.

This morning wasn't much better, and unsurprisingly it was just Wes and I at the start. It seemed even colder that the day before despite all the winter kit I'd piled on. As I headed out to the park I fumbled with the computer to switch to the screen that shows me the time of day, and noticed that it wasn't registering heart rate. I thought I had pressed the button on my optical HRM, but since it was under two layers of clothes I hadn't confirmed that it had started. Of course it hadn't. Oh well, my heart rate is just for my own curiosity anyway. So as we are starting the ride through City Park I'm kind of hoping that Maurizio won't show up. There's something about riding in the cold that just seems to sap the motivation out of me, and for the record, it takes a bit of motivation just to stick on Maurizio's wheel. Of course a moment later I saw Maurizio turn around to join us. Atypically, however, there weren't any other riders, so I guess the regular Tuesday morning group hadn't materialized because of the cold and wind, which by the way was now blowing strongly out of the east. So Maurizio led us out to the Armory into the wind with me glued to his wheel, but when he stood up to go up the rise at the loop there I just didn't have the motivation to accelerate again. Wes eventually came around me and Maurizio slowed down so we could catch. After they turned off I continued onto the lake trail, enjoying the tailwind and dreading the long slog I knew I'd have to endure on the way back. On the plus side, I was all alone so there was nobody there to see how slowly I was going.

It looks like the weather will now be warming back up to what passes for normal this time of year with low temperatures in the upper 50s to mid-60s for the forseeable future. The Tour de Jefferson ride is this coming Sunday and I'm just a bit apprehensive about it because there will be some prizes on the line this year. If I'm lucky, a 5-person group will split off the front early and things in the second group will quickly settle down to normal, which for this ride is usually still a little bit sketchy. Anyway, I won't be going for any podium places for sure. Later this month the GCBC is doing a little 72 mile ride out of Waveland that happens to fall the weekend before my birthday, so I went ahead and signed up for it since it's a chance to do a 72 mile ride on, almost, my 72nd birthday, which of course one has to do. It's a rule.