Bad Boy

The long levee ride was characterized by grey skies and strong winds today. After an early-morning ethnic-engineering session involving aluminum foil and a piece of metal cut from a Look cleat mount, I got my tail light working again and rushed out to meet the levee ride group. The turnout was low today, and about half turned back after the airport, leaving only four of us. I was really needing a good workout today since I hadn't had a really decent ride since Sunday. To make matters worse, the upcoming trip to Iowa City was going to leave me with three days of zero mileage, so I was pushing the pace just a little bit.

It must be armadillo season, because we spotted two of them up on the levee this morning, but today's real excitement came when we were surprised by a dump truck coming up the road across the levee. John was in front and although he was looking for trucks at that crossing, this one came up the levee so fast that he didn't see it until it was practically on top of us. I was on his wheel escheloned over to the left, so I couldn't see a thing in that direction. I heard him holler and simultaneously swerve to the left and didn't really know what was going on until we were past the intersection. I ended up on the edge of the asphalt, and when I looked back I saw Jenn way off in the grass. I'm sure a few riders ended up in the grass on that one, but luckily nobody went down. Anyway, we got going again and all was well except that Richard was pissed that John hadn't warned about the truck earlier.

On the way back, Carey and I split off from The Donald and Jeff (I think that was Jeff!) for a while, but eventually Carey, who was recovering from the Flu, dropped back. I figured I'd just do a little time-trial effort since the others weren't really into it today, so I got down, and I mean WAY DOWN on the drops and rolled on at about 80% effort. It was hard to hold 22 mph most of the time with the relentless crosswind. Just after Williams Blvd., I came upon a whole grammar school class walking along the bike path. I slowed way down, of course. It was like trying to ride through a herd of cats. The kids were everywhere and the teachers sounded worried as they warned them of the "bikers." I hate that term, BTW. After that we all came back together and eventually The Donald rode up to me to complain that I was surging when I would come to the front. I wasn't really conscious of that, since we're talking about 22 mph rather than, say, 27 mph. But anyway, I guess I was a Bad Boy today in the paceline.