Friday is the levee ride group's "Spin 'n Grin" day. There are usually only six or seven riders on Fridays, and we usually ride about 25 miles in more or less of a double paceline at an easy pace ranging from 17 to 22 mph. We usually get some of the riders who tend to skip the harder rides on Tuesday and Thursday. That includes a couple of the women who don't race very often, and often Joe and Bob. Joe is around my father's age and is one of those guys who started in athletics in high school and just never quit. Bob was one of the club's original members. He took that old club photo from 1972. (Can you guess which one is me?) He was the USCF state representative when I got my first racing license back around 1972. In fact, I still have that license somewhere. I remember he filled it in on a typewriter (remember those?) during a club meeting and signed it at the bottom. Back then, I had a 3-digit USCF number - I think it was 0402, in fact. For some reason it got changed back when the USCF brought in NORBA.
This morning's training ride talk kept coming back to hurricaine Francis, which is about to plow into Eastern Florida. A few people had been planning to go to the Destin area over the long Labor day weekend, but most of them have cancelled their plans and will be staying home. My brother and his family live in Orlando, and they are all heading our way for a little visit until this thing blows over. A few weeks ago they were without power for the better part of a week because of another hurricaine, and they're not too keen on doing that twice in the same month. So far, we've had normal summer weather around here, although it sounds like we may get a little bit of a cool front coming through which will protect us from Francis, and give us a day or so of dryer air.
Well, as I predicted, my mileage is down a bit this week and I'm already feeling kind of fat and sluggish. Damn, I wish I had those neuroendocrine hormones I had when I was 20! Things are pretty quiet here racing-wise.
I still need to get that blasted race permit form for Rocktoberfest off to the USCF and update the website. Talked with Robin a bit this morning - he's in the process of getting final approval for the course. The idiots at the Levee Board, the political entity that controls that road, always tell us we can close off only one side of the road, and then the police always insist on closing both sides. This has been going on for years, and not just for our events, but for numerous other footraces, triathlons, etc. Go figure. I guess that's what you get when you create a board composed entirely of political appointees. There is an interesting race in East Texas coming up, and I just got a flyer for a Time Trial in Cuba, Alabama (Cuba??) with a big prizelist and a bonus for anyone going under an hour on the hilly 26 mile course. And then, of course, there's always Six Gap, which I've never done, but always wish I had. That "ride" has a 1,500 field limit and over 10,000 vertical feet of climbing. Of course for the faster group it turns into a race. Some of our local guys finished up in the top 10 a few years ago, proving my theory that you don't have to live in the mountains to be a good climber.
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