After a nice 3-day weekend, it was back to the salt mine this morning, but not before squeezing in a ride up on the levee. It rained most of the night and the streets were wet when I awoke, but when I checked the weather radar it looked like we'd be in the clear for a couple of hours. There was a small group up on the levee for the Tuesday ride, but when we got out to Kenner I turned back because I needed to get to work a little bit earlier than usual today. My legs were kind of sore, although not from riding. I had spent much of Monday playing electrician and plumber around the house and by the time I was done I was sore in a lot of places. At least I was able to avoid electrocuting myself, burning down the house, or flooding the bathroom floor, although I did end up having to go back to the hardware store for more wire, since I was about two feet short with what I had after having to deal with an unanticipated situation. Of course I knew ahead of time that there would be some sort of unanticipated situation - there always is in an old house like this - so I guess it was more of an unknown, rather than unanticipated, situation.
The weather forecast is not looking too great for the next few days, which is just as well since I will be tied up with work and other things most of the time.
I got the results from last weekend's races in Monroe last night. I'm not quite sure what will happen about the Master 35+, Master 45+ breakdown. It seems there were two versions of the flyer floating around, only one of which had a Master 45+ class on it, but the official one on the sponsoring club's website did have the 45+ class, so that's good. I don't know if they were asking the 45+ riders whether they wanted to be scored as 35+ or 45+, however, and the Chief Referee just sent me results with all of the 35+ riders together. Anyway, for now the results just show all the masters as 35+. Whatever.
The Daughter's boyfriend is coming in tomorrow, and The Wife has responded to her lack of control over the situation by grocery shopping. The refrigerator and freezer are literally packed with food, which I definitely not what I need! They will be leaving later this week to drive up to Iowa City, which means that I will end up eating ad libitum until the food supply is back to normal.
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Monday, May 30, 2005
Road Trippin'
It's Friday afternoon around 3:45 and I'm in the office waiting to hear from Charlie. The phone rings. "Hey Randy. Where y'at?" Next thing I know I'm skipping out of work early and heading home. Not that skipping out of work early on a Friday in-between semesters ahead of a long holiday weekend is going to cause any raised eyebrows at a university. I'm meeting Charlie at his house to head up to Monroe, LA for a Road Race and (aughh) Time Trial. We finally set sail around 6, arriving at the Red Roof in West Monroe around 11 p.m. Jay had already made a reservation for us at a sweet $40 rate. Rick and Steve are already there and Amy and Branden are still on the road.
Saturday's 50-mile Master-35+ road race was on a nice 25-mile circuit with lots of rolling hills that included a couple of good steep ones. On the line the official or someone asks how many 45+ riders there are. I'm puzzled. After the race I discover that there are two versions of the race flyer floating around in cyberspace. The original, which I had seen, had a 35+ race and a 50+ race. It also showed a 20k Time Trial on Sunday. The newer one, which I had not seen, had a 35+ race and a 45+ race, with a 10k Time Trial. Seeing as how I maintain both the NOBC website and the LAMBRA-Racing e-mail list, and am also responsible for updating the LCCS points standings, I'm surprised that I could have missed a change like that.
Anyway, the turnout for the race was rather low, and our masters race field had maybe 15 riders, but that didn't seem to keep the speed down. Within the first five miles there had already been a couple of little attacks, a few initiated by Russ Walker. Russ has a long history of beating up on Cat. 1,2,3 fields, but for the last year or two has been training a bit less obsessively and racing more masters events. Pretty soon there was a group of about six dangling off the front. I looked around and saw that there was one rider from each team, and two from the NOBC. Excellent. With Jay and me in the group we might be able to do something. We were probably about half-way through the first lap, riding a fast paceline with the pack rather close behind when Russ suddenly eased up and dropped back. There was a moment of confusion in the break and Jay rolled up next to me and wondered what was going on. I said something like "he's probably dropping back to go get one of his teammates." Dropping out of a break and then pacing one of your teammates back up to it isn't something that most of us would routinely be capable of, but it was definitely something Russ could do. About the same time, the guy from Big Shark (St. Louis, MO) said something and I said "let's just keep it smooth." So we continued on, but when I went to drop back, I discovered the rest of the break was missing! I later learned that Jay had misunderstood me and thought I wanted him to drop back to the pack to get one of our teammates! I guess that between both Jay and Russ suddenly sitting up and the long climbs along this section, the break had splintered. A minute or two later, though, Russ was back with us and the pack was at least 30 seconds back. I have a bad habit of not looking behind me during races. If I had taken a good look I probably would have seen Jay and one other rider in no-mans-land, and might have been able slow things down long enough for them to catch. As it was, however, that was the last we would see of the pack.
The rest of the race was basically a three-man time trial, with Russ skipping a lot of pulls. Russ told us he wasn't going to sprint, and spent most of the last lap sitting on. With ten miles to go, my legs were not feeling too good, but luckily the other guy wasn't inclined to attack me. Still, when it came time to sprint I had nothing left and he came around me easily.
Back in the pack, my teammates made a few efforts to split things up, but ultimately most of the group arrived at the 1km sign together. Charlie was having problems with his saddle that turned out to be broken saddle rails. All of them! After the finish, he grabbed the saddle and it came off in his hand. All four fancy-dancy carbon-fiber saddle rails had broken. Steve was able to do a good sprint, taking 5th, I think. Basically it was a pretty good race and would have been a whole lot better with a bigger field.
I saw the finish of the women's race where Amy put in an impressive sprint to win handily. Brandon, on the other hand, was not having a good day at all in the Cat. 1,2,3 race. Their field was very small as was ours, and without the extra wheels he and a few other were dropped early in the first lap.
Sunday morning was the 10k time trial and the weather was not looking too good. It had stormed all Saturday night and when we got up on Sunday the skies looked dark and menacing. I wasn't too interested in the Time Trial anyway, and the prospect of rain wasn't doing anything for my lagging motivation. I registered early and because they were starting everyone in order of registration I ended up being the second rider on the start list. Just as well, I figured. I went out to warm up and a light rain started to fall. By the time I got back to the start, it had turned into a big thunderstorm. Horizontal rain, lightning, etc. The officials postponed the start for 15 minutes while I sought shelter under the registration tent. When the worst had passed, Charlie and I went out for a warmup and I arrived at the start about two minutes before my start time. Ordinarily, this would be about perfect, but today my legs were achy from Saturday's race and I wasn't looking forward to at wet TT at all.
I started well, shifting down to the 53 x 16 quickly and settling into the aerobars, but my breathing felt bad. My lungs were heavy and I felt like I was gasping for breath. My initial 27 mph pace slowed to 26, and then to 25. By mile 3, I was still struggling and not really enjoying life very much and I did something I rarely do. I eased up. I watched my speed drop to 23 as I rolled along and let my breathing catch up with my legs. So that was pretty much it for my TT. The Big Shark guy, who had started a minute behind me, blasted past with about a mile to go.
Charlie ended up doing a pretty good time, placing 4th in the masters, and Steve was pretty close behind him. Amy won the women's division.
On the drive home along I-20, we were caught in a solid hour of blinding thunderstorms. The kind where you see lots of cars pulled off on the shoulder and a few that have spun out stuck in the median. The weather didn't lighten up until we were past Jackson and heading South. It's 8:30 Monday morning right now and it's still raining. I'm hoping I will be able to get out on the bike some time today, since mileage-wise the weekend was pretty thin.
Saturday's 50-mile Master-35+ road race was on a nice 25-mile circuit with lots of rolling hills that included a couple of good steep ones. On the line the official or someone asks how many 45+ riders there are. I'm puzzled. After the race I discover that there are two versions of the race flyer floating around in cyberspace. The original, which I had seen, had a 35+ race and a 50+ race. It also showed a 20k Time Trial on Sunday. The newer one, which I had not seen, had a 35+ race and a 45+ race, with a 10k Time Trial. Seeing as how I maintain both the NOBC website and the LAMBRA-Racing e-mail list, and am also responsible for updating the LCCS points standings, I'm surprised that I could have missed a change like that.
Anyway, the turnout for the race was rather low, and our masters race field had maybe 15 riders, but that didn't seem to keep the speed down. Within the first five miles there had already been a couple of little attacks, a few initiated by Russ Walker. Russ has a long history of beating up on Cat. 1,2,3 fields, but for the last year or two has been training a bit less obsessively and racing more masters events. Pretty soon there was a group of about six dangling off the front. I looked around and saw that there was one rider from each team, and two from the NOBC. Excellent. With Jay and me in the group we might be able to do something. We were probably about half-way through the first lap, riding a fast paceline with the pack rather close behind when Russ suddenly eased up and dropped back. There was a moment of confusion in the break and Jay rolled up next to me and wondered what was going on. I said something like "he's probably dropping back to go get one of his teammates." Dropping out of a break and then pacing one of your teammates back up to it isn't something that most of us would routinely be capable of, but it was definitely something Russ could do. About the same time, the guy from Big Shark (St. Louis, MO) said something and I said "let's just keep it smooth." So we continued on, but when I went to drop back, I discovered the rest of the break was missing! I later learned that Jay had misunderstood me and thought I wanted him to drop back to the pack to get one of our teammates! I guess that between both Jay and Russ suddenly sitting up and the long climbs along this section, the break had splintered. A minute or two later, though, Russ was back with us and the pack was at least 30 seconds back. I have a bad habit of not looking behind me during races. If I had taken a good look I probably would have seen Jay and one other rider in no-mans-land, and might have been able slow things down long enough for them to catch. As it was, however, that was the last we would see of the pack.
The rest of the race was basically a three-man time trial, with Russ skipping a lot of pulls. Russ told us he wasn't going to sprint, and spent most of the last lap sitting on. With ten miles to go, my legs were not feeling too good, but luckily the other guy wasn't inclined to attack me. Still, when it came time to sprint I had nothing left and he came around me easily.
Back in the pack, my teammates made a few efforts to split things up, but ultimately most of the group arrived at the 1km sign together. Charlie was having problems with his saddle that turned out to be broken saddle rails. All of them! After the finish, he grabbed the saddle and it came off in his hand. All four fancy-dancy carbon-fiber saddle rails had broken. Steve was able to do a good sprint, taking 5th, I think. Basically it was a pretty good race and would have been a whole lot better with a bigger field.
I saw the finish of the women's race where Amy put in an impressive sprint to win handily. Brandon, on the other hand, was not having a good day at all in the Cat. 1,2,3 race. Their field was very small as was ours, and without the extra wheels he and a few other were dropped early in the first lap.
Sunday morning was the 10k time trial and the weather was not looking too good. It had stormed all Saturday night and when we got up on Sunday the skies looked dark and menacing. I wasn't too interested in the Time Trial anyway, and the prospect of rain wasn't doing anything for my lagging motivation. I registered early and because they were starting everyone in order of registration I ended up being the second rider on the start list. Just as well, I figured. I went out to warm up and a light rain started to fall. By the time I got back to the start, it had turned into a big thunderstorm. Horizontal rain, lightning, etc. The officials postponed the start for 15 minutes while I sought shelter under the registration tent. When the worst had passed, Charlie and I went out for a warmup and I arrived at the start about two minutes before my start time. Ordinarily, this would be about perfect, but today my legs were achy from Saturday's race and I wasn't looking forward to at wet TT at all.
I started well, shifting down to the 53 x 16 quickly and settling into the aerobars, but my breathing felt bad. My lungs were heavy and I felt like I was gasping for breath. My initial 27 mph pace slowed to 26, and then to 25. By mile 3, I was still struggling and not really enjoying life very much and I did something I rarely do. I eased up. I watched my speed drop to 23 as I rolled along and let my breathing catch up with my legs. So that was pretty much it for my TT. The Big Shark guy, who had started a minute behind me, blasted past with about a mile to go.
Charlie ended up doing a pretty good time, placing 4th in the masters, and Steve was pretty close behind him. Amy won the women's division.
On the drive home along I-20, we were caught in a solid hour of blinding thunderstorms. The kind where you see lots of cars pulled off on the shoulder and a few that have spun out stuck in the median. The weather didn't lighten up until we were past Jackson and heading South. It's 8:30 Monday morning right now and it's still raining. I'm hoping I will be able to get out on the bike some time today, since mileage-wise the weekend was pretty thin.
Friday, May 27, 2005
The Last Minute
We did a nice easy Friday training ride this morning - strictly conversational pace - although Robin was out on his TT bike getting psyched up for this weekend's Triathlon relay event. It seems that a number of local cyclists have been recruited to ride the bicycle legs of this thing, so it's going to be pretty competitive.
I ran into Kenny B. this morning. He's been AOL for quite a while so I asked him if he'd gotten thrown in jail or something. He said that he spent a couple of weeks in Destin FL at a friend's house, and has been otherwise training by himself. He was also out of communication for a while. Seems he answered a cell phone call while out training on Highway 98 in Florida and he fumbled the phone. It landed in the highway, got hit by a car and knocked into the other lane where two 18-wheelers in a row ran over it. Anyway, he's headed up to NJ later to day for one of the big Wachovia Pro Tour criteriums. He somehow talked his way onto one of the pro teams for the event since it's invitation-only.
I'm going to see if I can hitch a ride with somebody up to Monroe for the RR tomorrow. Naturally I've waited until the last possible minute. It's a pretty long drive, so it would just be a waste to have to drive up there alone, and if it comes to that I'll probably have to skip it, but some of the team is definitely going. I just need to get on the phone and see where I might be able to squeeze in. Charlie D's our team captain and he should know who's going when, so I'll check with him first. I suppose if absolutely necessary, I might have to stay over and do the Time Trial on Sunday, or maybe I could just whack my head against a brick wall instead! It should be a nice race on a challenging course. I just wish I felt like I was really in shape for it. Oh well, that's never stopped me from going before!
I just finished listening to the live audio from the Giro on Eurosport.com. It's pretty nice to have that available at work. They usually have a little video clip after each stage too, which is nice. If I have a little time, I can also check beelinetv.com later in the afternoon and see the tape-delayed video stream from the day's stage. Between cyclingnews, eurosport and beelinetv, I don't feel very deprived for not having digital cable at all, so a big thanks to those folks!
I ran into Kenny B. this morning. He's been AOL for quite a while so I asked him if he'd gotten thrown in jail or something. He said that he spent a couple of weeks in Destin FL at a friend's house, and has been otherwise training by himself. He was also out of communication for a while. Seems he answered a cell phone call while out training on Highway 98 in Florida and he fumbled the phone. It landed in the highway, got hit by a car and knocked into the other lane where two 18-wheelers in a row ran over it. Anyway, he's headed up to NJ later to day for one of the big Wachovia Pro Tour criteriums. He somehow talked his way onto one of the pro teams for the event since it's invitation-only.
I'm going to see if I can hitch a ride with somebody up to Monroe for the RR tomorrow. Naturally I've waited until the last possible minute. It's a pretty long drive, so it would just be a waste to have to drive up there alone, and if it comes to that I'll probably have to skip it, but some of the team is definitely going. I just need to get on the phone and see where I might be able to squeeze in. Charlie D's our team captain and he should know who's going when, so I'll check with him first. I suppose if absolutely necessary, I might have to stay over and do the Time Trial on Sunday, or maybe I could just whack my head against a brick wall instead! It should be a nice race on a challenging course. I just wish I felt like I was really in shape for it. Oh well, that's never stopped me from going before!
I just finished listening to the live audio from the Giro on Eurosport.com. It's pretty nice to have that available at work. They usually have a little video clip after each stage too, which is nice. If I have a little time, I can also check beelinetv.com later in the afternoon and see the tape-delayed video stream from the day's stage. Between cyclingnews, eurosport and beelinetv, I don't feel very deprived for not having digital cable at all, so a big thanks to those folks!
Thursday, May 26, 2005
Different Faces
Ahhh, it felt a bit cooler this morning, which was really nice for a change. I was up early again for some reason - well before the alarm went off - so I took my time riding out to the levee to meet up with the Thursday ride. There were a bunch of folks there who I wouldn't call "regulars" this morning. The speed was anything but steady most of the time, but we had a bit of a tailwind heading out and spent a lot of time in the upper 20s. I was watching them surge at the front and wondered if they really understood the whole headwind/tailwind thing. I knew it would be harder on the way back.
It was a pretty good ride anyway, although I was feeling kind of preoccupited or something - not really focused on the training ride. I spent most of the return trip hanging out near the back of the paceline, which was being short-circuited somewhere near the front. Eventually the rotation started making it all the way back to where I was and I started taking pulls again.
I think I'll take a little break this afternoon and see if I can get the little print server I ordered working on our complicated network so that we can all finally share a laser printer again. Should be fun!
It was a pretty good ride anyway, although I was feeling kind of preoccupited or something - not really focused on the training ride. I spent most of the return trip hanging out near the back of the paceline, which was being short-circuited somewhere near the front. Eventually the rotation started making it all the way back to where I was and I started taking pulls again.
I think I'll take a little break this afternoon and see if I can get the little print server I ordered working on our complicated network so that we can all finally share a laser printer again. Should be fun!
Wednesday, May 25, 2005
Muddy Water and Mudbugs
I awoke early this morning and so arrived at the levee well before anyone else. I decided to roll downriver a bit to meet whoever might be coming that way, and was surprised to find every one of the local TV stations camped out on top of the levee near Oak St. Some children had been swimming in the river the evening before and when one of them got in trouble, one of the others went in to help. As always seems to happen in these situations, the person who went to help didn't make it back. The Coast Guard was out in the river and also in the air swooping below the willow trees along the river. Of course you have to wonder what kind of parents let their 11 and 14 yearl old kids swim in the Mississippi River. This seems to happen every year or two around here. Anyway, we had a smooth and civilized ride this morning. I ended up having to rush to work, however, in order to make a meeting that I had almost forgotten about.
This evening we went over to my sister's house for a crawfish boil (her daughter just graduated from high school and is headed for the Naval Academy this summer). Unfortunately, that meant that I had to miss the training race - again.
There's a road race and time trial up in Monroe this weekend, and I'd like to go if I can. Hopefully some other club riders want to go too. It's a pretty nice road race course with a few decent hills, although I could always do without another time trial!
This evening we went over to my sister's house for a crawfish boil (her daughter just graduated from high school and is headed for the Naval Academy this summer). Unfortunately, that meant that I had to miss the training race - again.
There's a road race and time trial up in Monroe this weekend, and I'd like to go if I can. Hopefully some other club riders want to go too. It's a pretty nice road race course with a few decent hills, although I could always do without another time trial!
Tuesday, May 24, 2005
42 Hazy Miles and One
I woke up this morning already feeling rather warm. The a/c in The Daughter's room is obviously seriously low on whatever has taken the place of good ol' freon and the little 5,000 BTU unit in my bedroom is definitely not up to the task of cooling both rooms. So it felt nice to hit the road in the relatively cool but quite hazy early morning air as I rode out to meet the Tuesday ride. I was almost a mile away when I heard the train blow its horn so I wasn't too surprised when I arrived at the crossing near the end of Oak St. and found a long line of motorized coffee-slurpers impatiently awaiting the lifting of the gate. I rode around in little circles for a few minutes until the train passed, and then had to wait forever to get across the River Road onto the bike path. As we started out I could see the sun over my right shoulder, looking like a big burnt-orange ball behind the thick morning haze.
We had a good-sized group this morning and as usual Rob was pushing the pace. After a few rotations the speed drifted up into the upper 20s, and it didn't take me too long to figure out that, with the combination of unreasonable speed and steady headwind, I would get quite enough of a workout tucked safely into the group near the back. I knew it would get fast on the return trip with the wind at our backs, and since I'm not Superman, I thought it wise not to blow my legs up too early. Somewhere along the way, way out past the chemical plant, a little group of us split off the front, which turned out to be because Todd had flatted and the word didn't quite reach those of us who happened to be nearer the front at the time. We had been chasing Rob and a Triathlete almost all morning and were finally starting to close the gap, so we had a pretty hard ride, finally making contact near the Luling bridge.
The return trip, thankfully, remained civilized for quite a few miles, despite the fact that "The Donald" had rolled off right away. By the time the pace picked back up, he had I guess three minutes or so on us and it wasn't until we were most of the way back that he was easily in sight again. Of course, by then a few of the guys could smell blood and heaven forbid we should fail to catch him before the Huey P., so things started to ramp up and we spend a long time around 28-29, with a final mile or so that had us up to about 32.
Last night I joined some folks from the office for dinner at "One," which is a fairly new little restaurant down on Hampson Street in Carrollton. The service was good, the prices a little high, the wait rather long, but the food was awesome. Somewhere, squeezed into a corner of that old shotgun house, there is a real Chef. This place was, IMHO, well worth whatever the wait and whatever the cost. I had "Orechiette Pasta with Wild Mushroom Jus, Oven Dried Tomatoes &Pine Nuts, Finished with Cured Black Truffles & Reggiano." Damn, it was good. I will definitely have to save my pennies for a return trip to this place, especially since it's right in my neighborhood. Between the Abita Turbo Dogs at Monkey Hill and dinner at One, it was a pleasant evening and a great unofficial send-off for Irena who is headed to Yale's B-school in August.
We had a good-sized group this morning and as usual Rob was pushing the pace. After a few rotations the speed drifted up into the upper 20s, and it didn't take me too long to figure out that, with the combination of unreasonable speed and steady headwind, I would get quite enough of a workout tucked safely into the group near the back. I knew it would get fast on the return trip with the wind at our backs, and since I'm not Superman, I thought it wise not to blow my legs up too early. Somewhere along the way, way out past the chemical plant, a little group of us split off the front, which turned out to be because Todd had flatted and the word didn't quite reach those of us who happened to be nearer the front at the time. We had been chasing Rob and a Triathlete almost all morning and were finally starting to close the gap, so we had a pretty hard ride, finally making contact near the Luling bridge.
The return trip, thankfully, remained civilized for quite a few miles, despite the fact that "The Donald" had rolled off right away. By the time the pace picked back up, he had I guess three minutes or so on us and it wasn't until we were most of the way back that he was easily in sight again. Of course, by then a few of the guys could smell blood and heaven forbid we should fail to catch him before the Huey P., so things started to ramp up and we spend a long time around 28-29, with a final mile or so that had us up to about 32.
Last night I joined some folks from the office for dinner at "One," which is a fairly new little restaurant down on Hampson Street in Carrollton. The service was good, the prices a little high, the wait rather long, but the food was awesome. Somewhere, squeezed into a corner of that old shotgun house, there is a real Chef. This place was, IMHO, well worth whatever the wait and whatever the cost. I had "Orechiette Pasta with Wild Mushroom Jus, Oven Dried Tomatoes &Pine Nuts, Finished with Cured Black Truffles & Reggiano." Damn, it was good. I will definitely have to save my pennies for a return trip to this place, especially since it's right in my neighborhood. Between the Abita Turbo Dogs at Monkey Hill and dinner at One, it was a pleasant evening and a great unofficial send-off for Irena who is headed to Yale's B-school in August.
Monday, May 23, 2005
Tuff
Man, it feels like summer now. We had a nice steady recovery ride up on the levee this morning where John told me that Keven L. had broken his collarbone last week. Apparently a parent and young child were walking along the bike path and just as Kevin got to them the boy turned into Kevin's lane. Kevin was on his TT bike and did not land gracefully. This will be his second broken collarbone since last October when he crashed dramatically in the Rocktoberfest race.
It's kind of funny, but there is always a controversy over whether it's worth putting Mr. Tuffys in your tires or not in order to reduce the number of flats you get. I don't have a particularly partisan stand on that issue, myself, and although I've never used them I guess they probably work OK. Matt left me the following e-mail this morning about Rob, who often preaches the benefits of Tuffys as he's waiting for yet another rider to fix yet another flat on the group rides:
Dear Legeai,
Yesterday, Todd, VJ, John Thompson, Konrad and myself (Big Player Pimp Rinard) went to the Red Bluff . The second portion of the road is pretty chewed up. However, when we get to the turn around your buddy Konrad has a flat. After taking it apart he complains that he got a flat yesterday too. Well, as it turns out the fucking tuffy had a course edge and was rupturing the inner tube so after much deliberation Todd convinced Rob to take the tuffy out of the tire. Now, this was tremendous fodder for a shit-stirrer like myself and I told him tuffys sucked and that you would definitely be informed at the unreliability of this product that he so strongly endorses. So we made it back without any catastrophes. Todd went for the final city limit sign but of course I came around him and gloated for the next mile and a half back to the car how wonderful I was. By the way summer has arrived we sweated our balls off.
Matt
Now that's funny!
Free dinner tonight! We're having a good-luck dinner for Irena in our office who is heading off to Yale Business School in the fall and will be quitting her job here shortly. It will be at a place called "Monkey Hill" on Magazine Street, which used to be the infamous "Audubon Tavern" before the snobby neighbors got tired of the all-night action in the neighborhood. I thought it was still just a bar, but I guess they must have a meeting room or something. Should be interesting.
It's kind of funny, but there is always a controversy over whether it's worth putting Mr. Tuffys in your tires or not in order to reduce the number of flats you get. I don't have a particularly partisan stand on that issue, myself, and although I've never used them I guess they probably work OK. Matt left me the following e-mail this morning about Rob, who often preaches the benefits of Tuffys as he's waiting for yet another rider to fix yet another flat on the group rides:
Dear Legeai,
Yesterday, Todd, VJ, John Thompson, Konrad and myself (Big Player Pimp Rinard) went to the Red Bluff . The second portion of the road is pretty chewed up. However, when we get to the turn around your buddy Konrad has a flat. After taking it apart he complains that he got a flat yesterday too. Well, as it turns out the fucking tuffy had a course edge and was rupturing the inner tube so after much deliberation Todd convinced Rob to take the tuffy out of the tire. Now, this was tremendous fodder for a shit-stirrer like myself and I told him tuffys sucked and that you would definitely be informed at the unreliability of this product that he so strongly endorses. So we made it back without any catastrophes. Todd went for the final city limit sign but of course I came around him and gloated for the next mile and a half back to the car how wonderful I was. By the way summer has arrived we sweated our balls off.
Matt
Now that's funny!
Free dinner tonight! We're having a good-luck dinner for Irena in our office who is heading off to Yale Business School in the fall and will be quitting her job here shortly. It will be at a place called "Monkey Hill" on Magazine Street, which used to be the infamous "Audubon Tavern" before the snobby neighbors got tired of the all-night action in the neighborhood. I thought it was still just a bar, but I guess they must have a meeting room or something. Should be interesting.
Sunday, May 22, 2005
Rode Hard and Put Up Wet
A small group of masters riders got together this morning for a training ride over on the Northshore. It was already getting pretty warm by the time we rolled out around 8:30, and by the time we got back three hours later it was probably around 90. It turned out to be a pretty challenging ride with Jay and Steve pushing the pace and attacking the little hills. By the time we stopped at the store in Enon after 35 miles or so, sweat was already starting to drip in my eyes from the soaked pads in my helmet.
When we rolled back into Abita Springs, I could feel the day's damage in both quads, and as soon as I stopped the sweat started pouring into my eyes and I had to run and grab my water bottle quick to wash it out. We walked over to the Abita Brewpub afterward where I had a nice little Turbodog and, eventually, a hamburger. Our waitress was having more than a little trouble, and admitted she had been out last night until 6 a.m., so we cut her a little slack for being up-front about it, even though she screwed up about half of the orders.
Wondering what Armadillo Ale tastes like . . .
When we rolled back into Abita Springs, I could feel the day's damage in both quads, and as soon as I stopped the sweat started pouring into my eyes and I had to run and grab my water bottle quick to wash it out. We walked over to the Abita Brewpub afterward where I had a nice little Turbodog and, eventually, a hamburger. Our waitress was having more than a little trouble, and admitted she had been out last night until 6 a.m., so we cut her a little slack for being up-front about it, even though she screwed up about half of the orders.
Wondering what Armadillo Ale tastes like . . .
Saturday, May 21, 2005
Zoom Zoom
I'm lying in bed, it's a few minutes before 6 a.m., and the phone rings. "You da guy wit da littl dawg?" I ask the dimwit who he's trying to call. "Ah meen da lil poodle." He finally figures out he got a wrong number and hangs up. A minute later, of course, he calls again. I knew I shouldn't have answered the phone in the first place.
It was time to head out to the Giro ride anyway. The group today was huge, and the pace was mostly fast. At times it was crazy-fast. One thing the flatlanders down here know how to do and that's "go fast." We spent large amounts of time around 30 mph. You would have thought it was the world championships or something. Without much of a wind, however, most people were able to hang on. The sprint at the end of Chef Highway would have been nice if I had moved up earlier. As it was, I waited too long and got hung up a little behind people who obviously had no intention of sprinting.
On the way back, after the Chef Highway sprint, we were on the service road when Lawrence hit one of those chunks of broken concrete that we tried to clean up last week and flatted. A group stayed with him while he changed it, but most of the ride just slowed down for a while. Not enough that he would have a snowball's chance in hell of ever catching, you understand. I wasn't feeling too bad today, but for some reason didn't really want to go quite as hard as we were. One thing for sure. It was hot. It's almost 4:30 right now and the temperature outside is still above 91F, so I guess it's safe to put away the arm-warmers now.
Since it was so toasty warm, I naturally decided to go out in the sun when I got home and trim the hedges and stuff. Looking forward to a nice ride out in the country tomorrow.
It was time to head out to the Giro ride anyway. The group today was huge, and the pace was mostly fast. At times it was crazy-fast. One thing the flatlanders down here know how to do and that's "go fast." We spent large amounts of time around 30 mph. You would have thought it was the world championships or something. Without much of a wind, however, most people were able to hang on. The sprint at the end of Chef Highway would have been nice if I had moved up earlier. As it was, I waited too long and got hung up a little behind people who obviously had no intention of sprinting.
On the way back, after the Chef Highway sprint, we were on the service road when Lawrence hit one of those chunks of broken concrete that we tried to clean up last week and flatted. A group stayed with him while he changed it, but most of the ride just slowed down for a while. Not enough that he would have a snowball's chance in hell of ever catching, you understand. I wasn't feeling too bad today, but for some reason didn't really want to go quite as hard as we were. One thing for sure. It was hot. It's almost 4:30 right now and the temperature outside is still above 91F, so I guess it's safe to put away the arm-warmers now.
Since it was so toasty warm, I naturally decided to go out in the sun when I got home and trim the hedges and stuff. Looking forward to a nice ride out in the country tomorrow.
Thursday, May 19, 2005
Summer Pattern
It was quiet and cool this morning as I threaded through the neighborhood to the 6:15 levee ride. I arrived early and waved to Rob as he went by on his Time Trial bike talking to Chad. I knew we'd see him later. The group came together as usual and Dan and I found ourselves at the front of a long double paceline. Everyone was talking and the pace was easy. After a few miles Dan looked over at me and asked how long I thought we keep the pace this slow. I had to laugh. By then Rob was back in the group, along with Robin and Luke and Eddie and at least a couple more guys on TT bikes, so I knew our time at the front was nearing an end. Soon, Rob and somebody else on a TT bike rolled off the front. The group didn't react at all, so Robin eventually went past on his TT bike and made the bridge pretty quickly. Back in the group the pace started to lift a bit, but not enough to keep the trio up the road from continuing to pull away.
On the way back, Rob, Dan and I were rotating up front as we went past an oncoming woman rider. Apparently just after we passed, she freaked out a bit when she met the pack and locked up her rear wheel, blowing out the tire or something. We never heard a thing and didn't realize that the pack wasn't right behind us for quite a while. The group stopped to help fix the flat. Robin told me that they used an energy bar wrapper as a boot to keep the tube from coming through the hole. Anyway, it felt good to be back on the bike and by the time I got home it was already warming up fast.
It took me a couple of hours to update the LCCS points using the results that Adam sent over last night. The Giro de Brandon, I learned, still had not awarded the omnium prizes!! Adam mentioned in his email that he would have done them but nobody ever told him what the points schedule was (he was the official). I swear, I will never understand race promoters who don't feel a sense of urgency in getting the results done! Luckily, we don't use the omnium results for the LCCS rankings. I still haven't been able to get the Tour de La website updated. Maybe tomorrow, I hope!
Looks we're back into he typical New Orleans summer weather pattern where it gradually heats up until clouds start building up and by 3 p.m. we get a few thunderstorms passing over. We're trying to get a Northshore training ride organized for Sunday. Maybe we can do the Tour de La road race course.
On the way back, Rob, Dan and I were rotating up front as we went past an oncoming woman rider. Apparently just after we passed, she freaked out a bit when she met the pack and locked up her rear wheel, blowing out the tire or something. We never heard a thing and didn't realize that the pack wasn't right behind us for quite a while. The group stopped to help fix the flat. Robin told me that they used an energy bar wrapper as a boot to keep the tube from coming through the hole. Anyway, it felt good to be back on the bike and by the time I got home it was already warming up fast.
It took me a couple of hours to update the LCCS points using the results that Adam sent over last night. The Giro de Brandon, I learned, still had not awarded the omnium prizes!! Adam mentioned in his email that he would have done them but nobody ever told him what the points schedule was (he was the official). I swear, I will never understand race promoters who don't feel a sense of urgency in getting the results done! Luckily, we don't use the omnium results for the LCCS rankings. I still haven't been able to get the Tour de La website updated. Maybe tomorrow, I hope!
Looks we're back into he typical New Orleans summer weather pattern where it gradually heats up until clouds start building up and by 3 p.m. we get a few thunderstorms passing over. We're trying to get a Northshore training ride organized for Sunday. Maybe we can do the Tour de La road race course.
Wednesday, May 18, 2005
Over and Out
The conference that's sucked up all my time since Sunday ended around mid-day and my head finally started to clear up around 3 p.m. After last night's dinner party I ended up down in the French Quarter until around 2:30 a.m. It was fun and all, but between the walking, dancing, alcohol and lack of sleep, I am pretty wasted today. I got this nice framed copy of the conference poster for being on the committee and all. I liked the watercolor poster with the image of one of the corners of Jackson Square, so I think this one will go on the wall in my office. The meeting was held at the old Fairmont hotel and although it lacked a few of the conveniences that more modern hotels have, I have to say that the food was great. Usually the food at these meetings is merely adequate, but here it was really excellent. Even the wine was OK! Much, much better than we get at the Hilton in D.C. for our big annual meeting. Next year's regional meeting will be in Miami Beach. In the past, I almost never went to the regional meetings, but if I can, I may try to make Miami next year.
I had been thinking about trying to make the training race today, but under the circumstances it's probably better that I skip it and get some sleep instead! Besides which I came here by car this morning and would have to make a mad dash through traffic back home and then out to the lakefront in order to get there in time. So I'll do tomorrow's morning ride.
I had been thinking about trying to make the training race today, but under the circumstances it's probably better that I skip it and get some sleep instead! Besides which I came here by car this morning and would have to make a mad dash through traffic back home and then out to the lakefront in order to get there in time. So I'll do tomorrow's morning ride.
Tuesday, May 17, 2005
Second Day
Second day off the bike because of the NCURA conference. It's been interesting and informative and all that, of course, but I'm starting to feel fat and lazy and just generally wierd from all the coffee and the big lunch, with dessert. I think the hotel is trying to make up for the deplorable lack of service with the food, which is, by the way, first rate as far as conference food goes. I just got out of a 90-minute session on U.S. Export Control Regulations. I know, you can't wait for me to tell you all about it. Suffice it to say that they are absurd and seriously threaten the development of the very technologies that the Fed is afraid will fall into the hands of "the enemy" which, in one way or the other, they define as every other country in the world. Never mind that those very technologies were often, if not usually, developed with the help of foreign nationals, foreign faculty members, foreign students, etc. Sheesh!
In a few minutes I'm heading back over to the hotel for the "dinner party" and then maybe a visit to the hospitality suite, and then, assuming I survive the 5-block walk along Canal Street in the dark, it's back home to crash. Tomorrow I think I'll go out early and get in an hour on the bike before hustling downtown for the last half-day, and hopefully I'll be able to make it out to the lakefront training race.
In a few minutes I'm heading back over to the hotel for the "dinner party" and then maybe a visit to the hospitality suite, and then, assuming I survive the 5-block walk along Canal Street in the dark, it's back home to crash. Tomorrow I think I'll go out early and get in an hour on the bike before hustling downtown for the last half-day, and hopefully I'll be able to make it out to the lakefront training race.
Sunday, May 15, 2005
Fast Forward
This weekend sure has gone by fast! I've been a busy little worker bee this weekend, but at least I was able to get in both Giro rides. Saturday's Giro had some good fast sections in the usual locations (along Chef Highway, for example), although the group was particularly disinterested in riding hard on the way back. A few of us ended up rolling down the road to get in a better workout.
Then I hustled over to the office and packed the old Volvo full of stuff for the NCURA conference being held a few blocks away at the Fairmont Hotel. I think I had to make like five trips back and forth to the car. Anyway, I got it all delivered, and then stayed until around 6 p.m. stuffing packets and organizing name badges and that sort of thing.
That evening The Wife decided she wanted to spring for a new air conditioner for the living room, which was nice since we have been using the one that had been in The Daughter's bedroom and of course that one is going to need to go back. So we head out to Sears and pick up a 12,000 BTU a/c, which worked great until we turned on the TV and a/c in our bedroom, at which point the circuit breaker blew. I was afraid of that! Our old house is wired in a completely haphazard manner, and it seems like all of the wall outlets in the front of half of the house are on the same circuit. We discovered that as long as the TV wasn't on, we could run both air conditioners, so it was OK, but I'm going to have to fix it soon. Luckily all of the wiring in question is readily accessible from the basement, and I know which circuit I can tap into without overloading anything, but it will have to wait until Tuesday when I can go pick up a nice grounded outlet and some wire and do a little ad hoc re-wiring. An electrical inspector would have a heart attack if he saw my house!
There are a few people I know riding the Joe Martin Stage Race this weekend. I hope I can get an update some time soon. I keep telling myself I should do that race, but something always seems to get in the way. I checked with Gina, who is riding the women's pro/1/2 race and she said she had great legs for the first stage on Friday until she dropped her chain on a hill and ended up finishing like 15 minutes down. It looks like it will be a hard race. Around 60 women, she said.
This morning's Giro was the usual smaller, less intense group that we get on Sundays, although there were a few good fast stretches and I got a good workout out of the 65 miles I put in. I was in the mood for some sprint work, and so made some pretty good efforts here and there and especially on my favorite overpasses.
In a few minutes I have to head back to the conference hotel for the welcome reception where I'm hoping there will be some food and wine, but I won't be able to hit the French Quarter tonight since The Daughter is due back around 10:30 and it's also The Wife's birthday. I should really get her a present soon. She always says she needs clothes, but that just ain't gonna happen.
Then I hustled over to the office and packed the old Volvo full of stuff for the NCURA conference being held a few blocks away at the Fairmont Hotel. I think I had to make like five trips back and forth to the car. Anyway, I got it all delivered, and then stayed until around 6 p.m. stuffing packets and organizing name badges and that sort of thing.
That evening The Wife decided she wanted to spring for a new air conditioner for the living room, which was nice since we have been using the one that had been in The Daughter's bedroom and of course that one is going to need to go back. So we head out to Sears and pick up a 12,000 BTU a/c, which worked great until we turned on the TV and a/c in our bedroom, at which point the circuit breaker blew. I was afraid of that! Our old house is wired in a completely haphazard manner, and it seems like all of the wall outlets in the front of half of the house are on the same circuit. We discovered that as long as the TV wasn't on, we could run both air conditioners, so it was OK, but I'm going to have to fix it soon. Luckily all of the wiring in question is readily accessible from the basement, and I know which circuit I can tap into without overloading anything, but it will have to wait until Tuesday when I can go pick up a nice grounded outlet and some wire and do a little ad hoc re-wiring. An electrical inspector would have a heart attack if he saw my house!
There are a few people I know riding the Joe Martin Stage Race this weekend. I hope I can get an update some time soon. I keep telling myself I should do that race, but something always seems to get in the way. I checked with Gina, who is riding the women's pro/1/2 race and she said she had great legs for the first stage on Friday until she dropped her chain on a hill and ended up finishing like 15 minutes down. It looks like it will be a hard race. Around 60 women, she said.
This morning's Giro was the usual smaller, less intense group that we get on Sundays, although there were a few good fast stretches and I got a good workout out of the 65 miles I put in. I was in the mood for some sprint work, and so made some pretty good efforts here and there and especially on my favorite overpasses.
In a few minutes I have to head back to the conference hotel for the welcome reception where I'm hoping there will be some food and wine, but I won't be able to hit the French Quarter tonight since The Daughter is due back around 10:30 and it's also The Wife's birthday. I should really get her a present soon. She always says she needs clothes, but that just ain't gonna happen.
Friday, May 13, 2005
It's a Wrap
It's been warmer and warmer each morning lately, and the early sunrise is making it easy to get out of bed. This morning we had a pretty decent sized group up on the levee, which is really unusual for a Friday. A nice moderate speed of 22-23 mph and a smooth paceline made for a good Friday ride. Tomorrow I'll do the Giro ride before heading downtown to help out with the NCURA meeting setup around noon. It wasn't until a few minutes ago that I finally wrapped up my PowerPoint presentation, although I'm sure I'll tweak it a few times before Monday.
I got an e-mail the other day from an Atlanta rider who will be in town this weekend. He's planning on riding the Giro ride. His name is Donald and he'll be wearing a green & grey Cycleworks jersey.
The Daughter finished her exams today and is much relieved but anxious to get back to training. She hasn't been able to work out since her ankle surgery and is not a happy camper about it since the combination of not being able to walk well or work out plus final exam week is a recipe for putting on weight. Meanwhile, she lost her debit card and before she could call it in someone charged a few bucks' worth of gas to it. Of course now it'll be a week or so before it is replaced, and they're sending it to her place in Iowa City, so one of her roommates who is staying there will mail it to her. In the meantime she may actually have to practice the long-forgotten art of check-writing.
I've got to try and find some time to update the Tour de La website with the 2005 information, set up online registration, fill out and send in the permit application and insurance certificate requests, and, oh yeah, do my state income taxes! I actually started working on a completely new site for the TdL a couple of months ago but I just don't know if I'll be able to get that all together in time. I may just end up updating the old web page instead.
I got an e-mail the other day from an Atlanta rider who will be in town this weekend. He's planning on riding the Giro ride. His name is Donald and he'll be wearing a green & grey Cycleworks jersey.
The Daughter finished her exams today and is much relieved but anxious to get back to training. She hasn't been able to work out since her ankle surgery and is not a happy camper about it since the combination of not being able to walk well or work out plus final exam week is a recipe for putting on weight. Meanwhile, she lost her debit card and before she could call it in someone charged a few bucks' worth of gas to it. Of course now it'll be a week or so before it is replaced, and they're sending it to her place in Iowa City, so one of her roommates who is staying there will mail it to her. In the meantime she may actually have to practice the long-forgotten art of check-writing.
I've got to try and find some time to update the Tour de La website with the 2005 information, set up online registration, fill out and send in the permit application and insurance certificate requests, and, oh yeah, do my state income taxes! I actually started working on a completely new site for the TdL a couple of months ago but I just don't know if I'll be able to get that all together in time. I may just end up updating the old web page instead.
Thursday, May 12, 2005
Summer Heat
Man it's gettin' hot 'round here. I'm sure I shouldn't be complaining (yet), because the early morning hours are still rather pleasant, but once the sun came up today it warmed up fast. It's 87F right now. The Thursday long ride was pretty good this morning, with a smaller and more manageable group than Tuesday. We had a very light tailwind on the way out, and the pace stayed pretty steady and fairly fast. Somewhere along the way I almost went down when I hit some sort of big stick or branch that was lying lengthwise in the road. I never saw it, since I was a few riders back. Robin stopped to pick it up, which I didn't realize. I had thought he might, so I sat up for a second and looked back, but it looked like everyone was still riding. Anyway, it was good that nobody went down, but it would have been better if someone had called it out a little earlier so we all could have navigated around it. Just as we got to the turnaround we ran into Matt R., who has been in Europe for a while, I think. Matt's an artist (one of the ones who actually makes a living at it) here in New Orleans. You can check out his website - some of his stuff is really pretty damned good. The return trip started out kind of easy but after a while Rob got uncomfortable with the slow pace and soon we were criusing at 25 mph or so. Just a few of us were rotating at the front, and it was a pretty good workout, I thought. Around the Country Club Matt flatted and I think everybody hung around until he was rolling again. That crash in the sprint in yesterday's Giro d' Italia was pretty interesting! I don't think Bettini intended to force Cooke in to the barricades, but he certainly did close the door and leave no room for anyone to pass on his left. The officials were right to relegate him. Cooke would definitely have won that sprint if he hadn't gotten slammed in to the barricade. Then again, you won't find me trying to come around an Italian sprinter between him and a barricade!! I think Bettini was just instinctively taking the shortest line to the finish and wanting to keep all of the competition on one side where he could see them.
The Daughter has just one exam left this semester, and of course I've forgotten exactly when it is. Meanwhile, I really need to finish up this blasted PowerPoint presentation and move on to more important things!
Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Cascade
Tuesday started out nicely enough. The long training ride had a huge group - I'd say more than 20. Then, about midway out as the group was approaching a spot where there's a big hole way over on the left side of the road, things went wacky. The pace was quite fast at the time and we were strung out into this long line in the right lane. Somebody called out the hole as usual, but I guess a rider up near the front was surprised and HIT THE BRAKES!! Geez, we almost had a big "Yard Sale" right there on the levee (bikie lingo for a road full of bike parts). When the guy in front of me hit the brakes, I had to bail out onto the levee to the right, narrowly missing a signpost. Meanwhile, Robin had to bail to the left and hit the hole, I think, doing some severe and terminal damage to his rear wheel in the process. The whole thing was completely unnecessary and I was irritated about it the rest of the ride. The pack split shortly after the "brakes" incident, which was a good thing, and the pace stayed pretty fast. By the time I got home, I was fairly tired. The Wife wanted me to go up to Baton Rouge with her in the morning to look at a car for The Daughter, and so after checking in at the office, we headed up the river. I was expecting to be back at the office by 2 p.m. at any rate, since The Wife would be meeting a couple of her sisters up there and getting a ride back with them after visiting her mother.
So we get to the car dealership and swing a decent deal on the car, which as I predicted earlier ended up being way more expensive than one of us had been planning on, and decide that we can actually wrap up the whole deal while we're up there. We had financing already arranged, but the guy who handles the details of the transactions was out to lunch and one thing led to another and we didn't get the whole thing finalized for a couple more hours. By now, it was around 3 p.m., so any chance of getting back to the office was gone and I was stuck hanging around the old folks home while the sisters happily enjoyed playing numerous rounds of Bingo with their mom and the other residents. Of course, I could have headed home myself, since The Wife had the "new" car, but it didn't seem worth it at the time. Unfortunately, I had by now completely forgotten about an NOBC meeting we were having in New Orleans at 6 p.m. to work on preparations for the Tour de La., so I missed that as well. By the time we're done at the old folks home, it's time for one of the sisters to catch a plane, etc., etc, so the bottom line was that we didn't get home until around 8 p.m.
Naturally the Princess will be sporting some nice wheels. Not exactly what you'd call a "prudent" choice of car by any stretch, but definitely a cool car for college. Hey, you're only a college student once. In ten years she may be stuck with a 4-door econo sedan, so I figured I'd throw a bit of common sense (and large wad of cash) out the window on this one. She deserves it.
This morning's ride was pretty fast for a Wednesday ride. We are getting into our classic Summer weather pattern now with a humid South wind and morning temperatures in the mid-70s. Later in the summer, it will be well over 80F in the morning, so I'm not complaining. On the way out, Rob flew past the paceline with Bob in tow and so I got out of the saddle for a few cranks and latched on myself. Rob was on his TT bike, surging up to 28-30, so only one or two other riders made it up to us. One was Robin who was also riding a TT bike this morning. Being smart enough to know not to spend much time out in the wind when there's a maniac on a TT bike pushing the pace, I happily sucked wheel most of the time, just taking a couple of pulls when the speed was slower. When we were about a mile from the turnaround, Rob surged again and Bob motioned for me to come through so he could ease off. I just laughed, since I was pretty much maxxed out myself. Bob's heading over to France for the summer around the end of the week to do an internship. Anyway, it was a nice workout. I was feeling sorry for myself for having spent so much on a car until Robin said that he had spent yesterday buying a HOUSE for his daughter. Ouch!
Now today I'm even farther behind at work, farther in debt, and likely will have to miss the training race this afternoon, and quite possibly the one day of this weekend's Giro de Brandon race that I was hoping to be able to do. Just a couple of little things that had nothing to do with bike racing will probably end up messing with my riding big-time. Cascade Failure.
So we get to the car dealership and swing a decent deal on the car, which as I predicted earlier ended up being way more expensive than one of us had been planning on, and decide that we can actually wrap up the whole deal while we're up there. We had financing already arranged, but the guy who handles the details of the transactions was out to lunch and one thing led to another and we didn't get the whole thing finalized for a couple more hours. By now, it was around 3 p.m., so any chance of getting back to the office was gone and I was stuck hanging around the old folks home while the sisters happily enjoyed playing numerous rounds of Bingo with their mom and the other residents. Of course, I could have headed home myself, since The Wife had the "new" car, but it didn't seem worth it at the time. Unfortunately, I had by now completely forgotten about an NOBC meeting we were having in New Orleans at 6 p.m. to work on preparations for the Tour de La., so I missed that as well. By the time we're done at the old folks home, it's time for one of the sisters to catch a plane, etc., etc, so the bottom line was that we didn't get home until around 8 p.m.Naturally the Princess will be sporting some nice wheels. Not exactly what you'd call a "prudent" choice of car by any stretch, but definitely a cool car for college. Hey, you're only a college student once. In ten years she may be stuck with a 4-door econo sedan, so I figured I'd throw a bit of common sense (and large wad of cash) out the window on this one. She deserves it.
This morning's ride was pretty fast for a Wednesday ride. We are getting into our classic Summer weather pattern now with a humid South wind and morning temperatures in the mid-70s. Later in the summer, it will be well over 80F in the morning, so I'm not complaining. On the way out, Rob flew past the paceline with Bob in tow and so I got out of the saddle for a few cranks and latched on myself. Rob was on his TT bike, surging up to 28-30, so only one or two other riders made it up to us. One was Robin who was also riding a TT bike this morning. Being smart enough to know not to spend much time out in the wind when there's a maniac on a TT bike pushing the pace, I happily sucked wheel most of the time, just taking a couple of pulls when the speed was slower. When we were about a mile from the turnaround, Rob surged again and Bob motioned for me to come through so he could ease off. I just laughed, since I was pretty much maxxed out myself. Bob's heading over to France for the summer around the end of the week to do an internship. Anyway, it was a nice workout. I was feeling sorry for myself for having spent so much on a car until Robin said that he had spent yesterday buying a HOUSE for his daughter. Ouch!
Now today I'm even farther behind at work, farther in debt, and likely will have to miss the training race this afternoon, and quite possibly the one day of this weekend's Giro de Brandon race that I was hoping to be able to do. Just a couple of little things that had nothing to do with bike racing will probably end up messing with my riding big-time. Cascade Failure.
Monday, May 09, 2005
Catch-up
What I thought would be a nice relaxing weekend where I could catch up on some things and maybe make some progress on others turned out to be, well, not that. Saturday started out nicely enough with a good Giro ride. The ride was not without problems, though. Just after we came down from the Casino bridge, which is when the pace usually picks up, someone in the group got a flat. So, we all stopped and waited for what seemed like an unusually long time until the flat got fixed and then started up again. Just as the pace got back up there was another commotion near the back of the pack. I never was quite sure if it was another flat or what, but by then the statute of limitations had about run out and the guys near the front were ready to throw out the yellow flag and issue a "delay of game" penalty. Most of the group just slowed down for a minute and then kept going. Anyway, we had a pretty good Giro ride, and as I was riding home I was already thinking about a bunch of stuff I had to get ready so I could run the NOBC track races that evening up in Baton Rouge. When I got home, The Wife was anxious for us to hop in the car and drive up to B.R. to visit her mom, shop for cars, and then do the track meet. I explained that I still had to fix up the Excel spreadsheet so I could do the results, gather up all of the stuff I would need like numbers and pins and paper and megaphones and tape recorders and stopwatches, etc., etc., so she happily drove off to Whole Foods to pay large sums of money for organically grown this and that, while I got my act together.
When I arrived at the velodrome around 5:00 that evening, Ben told me that Mike had just called to say that he was in New Orleans at the Home Depot picking up stuff for his house and would be late. Mike, you understand, had the motorcycle that we needed for the Kierin race that was one of the first events scheduled for the night. As it turned out, Mike arrived just as we were finishing up the flying 200 sprints, so we were able to go ahead with the Kierin more or less as planned. So we line everyone up on the track and Mike takes off on the motor to get up to speed and when he comes around again we let the riders loose so then can latch onto the motor. The way this race works is that the motor basically paces the riders up to around 27 mph and then after two and a half laps it pulls off, leaving the riders a lap and a half to sprint it out for the finish. As Mike comes around turn three, I see the line of riders suddenly pass him uptrack and wonder what's going on. Turns out, Mike is OUT OF GAS! So we go ahead with the next event while Mike runs out for some gas for the motorcycle. Anyway, thanks to lots of help recruited from the friends and family who were there for the races, we eventually got everything done and the races were actually a lot of fun to watch, especially the final event which was the Cat. 1,2,3 Points Race.
In a Points Race, there's a sprint every five laps and the top 4 riders get points. They guy with the most points at the end wins. But it's not quite as simple as that, because if you are able to break away from the pack and lap them on the 333 meter long track, then you get an extra 20 points. Likewise if the pack laps you , you lose 20 points. Well, toward the end of the race, a couple of guys who haven't been taking many of the sprints so far roll off the front and the pack fails to respond. As it turned out, the pack kind of blew it, because these two guys lapped the field about 100m before the pack got the bell for their last lap. We then had the two guys in the break sprinting it out for first and second from inside the pack, passing two of the pack riders in the process. Bottom line: The two guys in the break get 20 extra points, along with points for the top two places in the last two sprints, and that's enough for them to finish first and second on points!
So we finally get back to New Orleans around midnight, at which point The Wife discovers that she had not left her wallet and cellphone at the house, she had lost them! After a major search that included wandering around outside the house with a flashlight, we decide that they are not in the house. The next morning, I get up at 5:45 to ride out to the Sunday Giro ride, and The Wife jumps out of bed and says she has figured out where the wallet and phone MUST be. We had stopped at Laura's house on the way to Baton Rouge to pick up some stuff for the race, and that's where the phone and wallet must have fallen out of the car, so we drive over there and hunt around, but no luck. I ride off to do the Giro ride.
Sunday's Giro was kind of schizophrenic. There were some sections that were good and fast, but on the way back, the group seemed content to putter along at a sub-20mph pace. A couple of people rolled off the front, and a bit later so did I. I ended up doing a nice 5k time trial, after which a couple more riders caught up with me and we rode in together. A few of the guys went over to Pensacola for a little criterium they had on Sunday. Mark said the turnout was really low, but they had a nice picture in the local paper anyway.
As I'm coming in along Lakeshore Drive, I call the wife on my cellphone to see if she's had any luck with the search, but she says she's out of ideas, so I tell her it's time to call the bank and all and put a "hold" on all the credit stuff. Just after that I called Laura to let her know I had left the cash box on her porch earlier that morning and to tell her about the lost stuff in case she knew anything. She hadn't seen the phone or wallet, but as she's talking to me on the phone and walking around in front of her house looking for it, her neighbor sees her and tells her he found it!! I call Candy and it takes me about 15 minutes to get her because the line is busy from her calling to cancel credit cards. Luckily, she had only gotten one of them stopped before I called, so we were really relieved.
Being Mother's Day, we naturally went to the office to try and squeeze in a little work before the family get-together at The Sister's place that afternoon. That was a complete waste of time, since I was so tired from lack of sleep (and maybe the Giro ride too) that I couldn't get anything useful accomplished. By the time I got back home after the Mother's Day thing, I was ready for bed even though it was probably only about 7 p.m., so at least I finally got to catch up on my sleep!
When I arrived at the velodrome around 5:00 that evening, Ben told me that Mike had just called to say that he was in New Orleans at the Home Depot picking up stuff for his house and would be late. Mike, you understand, had the motorcycle that we needed for the Kierin race that was one of the first events scheduled for the night. As it turned out, Mike arrived just as we were finishing up the flying 200 sprints, so we were able to go ahead with the Kierin more or less as planned. So we line everyone up on the track and Mike takes off on the motor to get up to speed and when he comes around again we let the riders loose so then can latch onto the motor. The way this race works is that the motor basically paces the riders up to around 27 mph and then after two and a half laps it pulls off, leaving the riders a lap and a half to sprint it out for the finish. As Mike comes around turn three, I see the line of riders suddenly pass him uptrack and wonder what's going on. Turns out, Mike is OUT OF GAS! So we go ahead with the next event while Mike runs out for some gas for the motorcycle. Anyway, thanks to lots of help recruited from the friends and family who were there for the races, we eventually got everything done and the races were actually a lot of fun to watch, especially the final event which was the Cat. 1,2,3 Points Race.
In a Points Race, there's a sprint every five laps and the top 4 riders get points. They guy with the most points at the end wins. But it's not quite as simple as that, because if you are able to break away from the pack and lap them on the 333 meter long track, then you get an extra 20 points. Likewise if the pack laps you , you lose 20 points. Well, toward the end of the race, a couple of guys who haven't been taking many of the sprints so far roll off the front and the pack fails to respond. As it turned out, the pack kind of blew it, because these two guys lapped the field about 100m before the pack got the bell for their last lap. We then had the two guys in the break sprinting it out for first and second from inside the pack, passing two of the pack riders in the process. Bottom line: The two guys in the break get 20 extra points, along with points for the top two places in the last two sprints, and that's enough for them to finish first and second on points!
So we finally get back to New Orleans around midnight, at which point The Wife discovers that she had not left her wallet and cellphone at the house, she had lost them! After a major search that included wandering around outside the house with a flashlight, we decide that they are not in the house. The next morning, I get up at 5:45 to ride out to the Sunday Giro ride, and The Wife jumps out of bed and says she has figured out where the wallet and phone MUST be. We had stopped at Laura's house on the way to Baton Rouge to pick up some stuff for the race, and that's where the phone and wallet must have fallen out of the car, so we drive over there and hunt around, but no luck. I ride off to do the Giro ride.
Sunday's Giro was kind of schizophrenic. There were some sections that were good and fast, but on the way back, the group seemed content to putter along at a sub-20mph pace. A couple of people rolled off the front, and a bit later so did I. I ended up doing a nice 5k time trial, after which a couple more riders caught up with me and we rode in together. A few of the guys went over to Pensacola for a little criterium they had on Sunday. Mark said the turnout was really low, but they had a nice picture in the local paper anyway.
As I'm coming in along Lakeshore Drive, I call the wife on my cellphone to see if she's had any luck with the search, but she says she's out of ideas, so I tell her it's time to call the bank and all and put a "hold" on all the credit stuff. Just after that I called Laura to let her know I had left the cash box on her porch earlier that morning and to tell her about the lost stuff in case she knew anything. She hadn't seen the phone or wallet, but as she's talking to me on the phone and walking around in front of her house looking for it, her neighbor sees her and tells her he found it!! I call Candy and it takes me about 15 minutes to get her because the line is busy from her calling to cancel credit cards. Luckily, she had only gotten one of them stopped before I called, so we were really relieved.
Being Mother's Day, we naturally went to the office to try and squeeze in a little work before the family get-together at The Sister's place that afternoon. That was a complete waste of time, since I was so tired from lack of sleep (and maybe the Giro ride too) that I couldn't get anything useful accomplished. By the time I got back home after the Mother's Day thing, I was ready for bed even though it was probably only about 7 p.m., so at least I finally got to catch up on my sleep!
Friday, May 06, 2005
Finally Friday
Seems like it's been a long week, and I'm glad it's Friday. Although there was nobody at the pumping station meeting spot this morning, I picked up a few riders along the way and had a nice steady Friday ride. On the way out we saw this pickup truck about half-way up the levee that had obviously just been hit from behind, but we didn't see another damaged car and the police hadn't arrived yet. On the way back, the police were all over the place and we finally spotted the other car. It was in the parking lot across the street, firmly wedged into a parked Porsche and another car. Bad aim, dude!
Yesterday Norman sent me a draft flyer for the Baton Rouge "stage race" that is planned for the first weekend of June. It's actually a one-day omnium, so I suggested he should call it that. I think he just kind of slaps these flyers together without much thought and then sends them to me so I will do the work. Anyway, I made a number of suggestions, such as actually putting the correct dates on the flyer. He had sent it to Shane as well, and Shane picked up on something that I had missed. Norman was planning on putting six groups on an 8-mile loop concurrently. Ha! Totally impossible, rather dangerous, and in violation of a new USCF rule about overlapping groups. I also saw the draft race bible for the upcoming Mad Potter omnium. It looked much much better, although for the road race there was also going to be a problem with overlapping groups. I'm sure they will figure out a way to deal with that one, though.
I've got to slip out in a few minutes to look at more cars during lunch. Damn, I hate dealing with these used car salesmen!
The Daughter should be having her last classes of the semester today. She called yesterday to say that she had aced her Bio lab report. Not ordinarily a newsworthy event, but her teacher had really slammed her last one and she was having a hard time figuring out why. Apparently this particular teacher is a well-known pain in the arse, which would have been nice to know before signing up for the course.
Yesterday Norman sent me a draft flyer for the Baton Rouge "stage race" that is planned for the first weekend of June. It's actually a one-day omnium, so I suggested he should call it that. I think he just kind of slaps these flyers together without much thought and then sends them to me so I will do the work. Anyway, I made a number of suggestions, such as actually putting the correct dates on the flyer. He had sent it to Shane as well, and Shane picked up on something that I had missed. Norman was planning on putting six groups on an 8-mile loop concurrently. Ha! Totally impossible, rather dangerous, and in violation of a new USCF rule about overlapping groups. I also saw the draft race bible for the upcoming Mad Potter omnium. It looked much much better, although for the road race there was also going to be a problem with overlapping groups. I'm sure they will figure out a way to deal with that one, though.
I've got to slip out in a few minutes to look at more cars during lunch. Damn, I hate dealing with these used car salesmen!
The Daughter should be having her last classes of the semester today. She called yesterday to say that she had aced her Bio lab report. Not ordinarily a newsworthy event, but her teacher had really slammed her last one and she was having a hard time figuring out why. Apparently this particular teacher is a well-known pain in the arse, which would have been nice to know before signing up for the course.
Thursday, May 05, 2005
Weekday Triple
I was feeling a bit tired this morning as I finished up the weekday triple - 26mi. Wed. morning; 24 mi. Wed. evening training race; 44mi. Thurs. morning training ride. There was a decent but still inexplicably small turnout for the training race yesterday, but I felt like it was a good workout for me even though I had it easy and drove out there in the car instead of riding from home. It was still quite windy, and although you would think that the upwind stretch would be the worst, I think it was the downwind stretch that caused a lot of the casualties. With the wind in our faces, riders were reluctant to come to the front and the pace would surge, then slow down depending on who was attacking. The tailwind stretch, however, stayed pretty fast, and it was easy to motor along at 27 mph on the front, although the slight crosswind would put the last few riders into the left lane at times.
For the most part, the pace wasn't too hot, but there were some really fast bits that split things up so that by the mid-way point there were probably only six riders left who hadn't been dropped and jumped back in. Although Tim flatted at the end of the first lap, he was back in the group pretty soon and he and Howard were busy keeping things animated most of the time. It seemed like everyone made at least one futile solo effort yesterday, but nobody was successful. Over the last mile I found myself on The Howard's wheel, maybe five or six riders back. Tim was taking a long, long pull, so it was as if the whole group got a nice leadout for the sprint. As we came over the levee with about 400 meters to go, I noticed Howard shift down one cog and of course shortly thereafter he jumped. About the same time, Noel, who was up near the front, also jumped, but by the time Howard pulled even with Noel, he was on top of that huge gear, and between that and the tailwind he was already going about 35 mph. I was sitting on Howard's wheel and when he pulled even with Noel, I switched over to Noel's wheel for the duration. I think Howard said he maxxed out at almost 41 mph. I checked my computer and indeed I had a max of about 40.
Tailwinds sure are fun!
This morning's long ride had a nice turnout, and although the pace definitely kept us in "training effect" territory, it wasn't too severe. I had decided before I arrived that I would criuse at the back for most of the ride since I could still feel my legs from yesterday. There were really only about four guys who were pulling when the pace got fast, but when it would settle down everyone would rotate through. There's been this big patch of broken glass for the last few days, and once again when we rolled through it on the way back BJ flatted. Robin had already stopped to try and clear it off, so after the flat was fixed and the group rolled on, I stuck around and rode in easy with Robin, who just can't understand why the group keeps riding over the glass every day but never stops to deal with it. By the time I got home, my rear tire was going soft! Of course, Rob keeps lecturing about Mr. Tuffy's every time someone flats. Maybe one day I'll actually buy some. They're actually a pretty good idea for your training wheels, although of course you'd never want those extra 113 grams of rotating weight in your racing tires.
For the most part, the pace wasn't too hot, but there were some really fast bits that split things up so that by the mid-way point there were probably only six riders left who hadn't been dropped and jumped back in. Although Tim flatted at the end of the first lap, he was back in the group pretty soon and he and Howard were busy keeping things animated most of the time. It seemed like everyone made at least one futile solo effort yesterday, but nobody was successful. Over the last mile I found myself on The Howard's wheel, maybe five or six riders back. Tim was taking a long, long pull, so it was as if the whole group got a nice leadout for the sprint. As we came over the levee with about 400 meters to go, I noticed Howard shift down one cog and of course shortly thereafter he jumped. About the same time, Noel, who was up near the front, also jumped, but by the time Howard pulled even with Noel, he was on top of that huge gear, and between that and the tailwind he was already going about 35 mph. I was sitting on Howard's wheel and when he pulled even with Noel, I switched over to Noel's wheel for the duration. I think Howard said he maxxed out at almost 41 mph. I checked my computer and indeed I had a max of about 40.
Tailwinds sure are fun!
This morning's long ride had a nice turnout, and although the pace definitely kept us in "training effect" territory, it wasn't too severe. I had decided before I arrived that I would criuse at the back for most of the ride since I could still feel my legs from yesterday. There were really only about four guys who were pulling when the pace got fast, but when it would settle down everyone would rotate through. There's been this big patch of broken glass for the last few days, and once again when we rolled through it on the way back BJ flatted. Robin had already stopped to try and clear it off, so after the flat was fixed and the group rolled on, I stuck around and rode in easy with Robin, who just can't understand why the group keeps riding over the glass every day but never stops to deal with it. By the time I got home, my rear tire was going soft! Of course, Rob keeps lecturing about Mr. Tuffy's every time someone flats. Maybe one day I'll actually buy some. They're actually a pretty good idea for your training wheels, although of course you'd never want those extra 113 grams of rotating weight in your racing tires.
Wednesday, May 04, 2005
Tired
Still feeling rather run-down today, not that I felt particularly bad while I was riding this morning. We had a nice and civilized levee ride despite a gusty crosswind most of the way, but after I got home I was really feeling tired and disengaged. Maybe I'm fighting off some bug? Anyway, my head feels foggy and all I really want to do is sleep.
I'll be out at the lakefront this evening for the training race anyway. Sometimes you start feeling better once you get on the bike, so it's worth a try.
We went around and looked at a few cars last night and at lunch today for The Daughter. There was the nicely priced Mustang that, of course, just wasn't there. I suspect it's one of those cars that was "just sold" or that they just can't seem to find on the lot. Bullshit. Just more of the old bait-and-switch crap that has gotten Saturn such a loyal following. So we ended up trying out an '04 Jeep Liberty that was OK and priced reasonably well, but didn't have cruise control, which is a non-trivial thing if you're making 1,000 mile road trips. I wasn't too impressed with the ride, myself, and it's been quite a while since I've driven a straight-six with rear wheel drive. Anyway, looks like we'll keep looking, but The Daughter does seem to like that particular car, and I have to admit it looks kind of nice. I'm just really dreading the combination of insurance and note, however. When I bought my first car, it was a 6-year-old Triumph, cost under $2,000, and I think I wrote a check for about $200 that covered insurance for the year. Man, things sure have changed. Anyway, it would all be fun if the budget wasn't so tight and if The Wife wasn't so paranoid. Of course, she wants all sorts of warranties, including the extended warranty, which is usually an extra grand or so and ends up making a cheap car painfully expensive.
Realdo is currently trying to get a team together for the Tour de Guyane in Frency Guyana in August. If he can get some of the good local guys to go, I think they would have a blast. It's 9 stages and the promoter covers your lodging and meals and even some of your travel costs.
I'll be out at the lakefront this evening for the training race anyway. Sometimes you start feeling better once you get on the bike, so it's worth a try.
We went around and looked at a few cars last night and at lunch today for The Daughter. There was the nicely priced Mustang that, of course, just wasn't there. I suspect it's one of those cars that was "just sold" or that they just can't seem to find on the lot. Bullshit. Just more of the old bait-and-switch crap that has gotten Saturn such a loyal following. So we ended up trying out an '04 Jeep Liberty that was OK and priced reasonably well, but didn't have cruise control, which is a non-trivial thing if you're making 1,000 mile road trips. I wasn't too impressed with the ride, myself, and it's been quite a while since I've driven a straight-six with rear wheel drive. Anyway, looks like we'll keep looking, but The Daughter does seem to like that particular car, and I have to admit it looks kind of nice. I'm just really dreading the combination of insurance and note, however. When I bought my first car, it was a 6-year-old Triumph, cost under $2,000, and I think I wrote a check for about $200 that covered insurance for the year. Man, things sure have changed. Anyway, it would all be fun if the budget wasn't so tight and if The Wife wasn't so paranoid. Of course, she wants all sorts of warranties, including the extended warranty, which is usually an extra grand or so and ends up making a cheap car painfully expensive.
Realdo is currently trying to get a team together for the Tour de Guyane in Frency Guyana in August. If he can get some of the good local guys to go, I think they would have a blast. It's 9 stages and the promoter covers your lodging and meals and even some of your travel costs.
Tuesday, May 03, 2005
Fast 1
It was still nice and cool this morning and by the time we got rolling past the Jefferson Playground there was a pretty good-sized group for the long Tuesday ride. The wind was still a significant factor, but for the outward trip it would be more at our backs than in our faces. It didn't take long for things to get out of hand, though, and after Robin took a particularly fast pull the group started to disintegrate. For a while there I felt like I was in a race for which I was not well prepared, and was out of the saddle a couple of times closing gaps to keep from being dropped by the front group. We probably had eight or nine guys left by the time we were half-way out, and the pace was holding a steady 27-28 mph most of the time, but at least it became a little more consistent and I didn't feel like I had to save a little bit after taking my pull to be sure I would be able to get back onto the tail end of the paceline. My legs were feeling OK today so the fast pace felt good, although I was being careful not to do too much work at the front.
There were a lot of peds and pups out walking around as we approached the end of the bike path, so we had to back off a bit early. I coasted down toward the turnaround and when I looped around I felt that familiar squishy feeling. Yeah, the rear tire was flat. It was another piece of white clamshell. A long stretch of the road has been covered with pieces of clamshells lately and this is the second flat I've had in a week because of it. Todd and I changed the tube pretty quick, but I think Rob K and maybe one other rider didn't wait around.
The ride back was relatively civilized but still fast, and when Robin stopped to pick up a big piece of glass (actually it was the broken neck of a Vodka bottle), Woody and The Howard kept rolling. For some reason, they decided to make us chase after that and so the pace picked up a lot despite the occasional headwind. We finally caught them somewhere in Jefferson Parish after Robin took this long suicide pull at 30 mph. That was the last I saw of Robin, in fact.
Anyway, it was a good training ride, I thought, even though an hour later when I was standing up on the commuter going up the Broad St. overpass with a big messenger bag over my shoulder and my Bass Weejuns bending under my feet, my legs were hurting.
So I can tell we're getting close to Tour de La time because I've already gotten my first e-mail from a new rider who wants to make it his first race. I always get a few of those as we lead up to the TDL. A fairly competitive stage race like that is really not the ideal choice for a rider's first race. The Cat. 5 field will be about at its 50-rider limit and will include a number of guys intent on getting upgrade points. The master's race will usually have a few really fast Cat. 2 and Cat. 3 guys who will keep that race fast too. I always try to get the new racers to do one of the other races in the area first so that they at least have an idea how the road race and criterium will go and don't get surprised by the pace or the attacks and end up getting spit out the back right away. Still, bike racing can be an unforgiving sport and at some point you just have to dive in the deep end and see if you can swim with the big fish or end up being shark bait.
There were a lot of peds and pups out walking around as we approached the end of the bike path, so we had to back off a bit early. I coasted down toward the turnaround and when I looped around I felt that familiar squishy feeling. Yeah, the rear tire was flat. It was another piece of white clamshell. A long stretch of the road has been covered with pieces of clamshells lately and this is the second flat I've had in a week because of it. Todd and I changed the tube pretty quick, but I think Rob K and maybe one other rider didn't wait around.
The ride back was relatively civilized but still fast, and when Robin stopped to pick up a big piece of glass (actually it was the broken neck of a Vodka bottle), Woody and The Howard kept rolling. For some reason, they decided to make us chase after that and so the pace picked up a lot despite the occasional headwind. We finally caught them somewhere in Jefferson Parish after Robin took this long suicide pull at 30 mph. That was the last I saw of Robin, in fact.
Anyway, it was a good training ride, I thought, even though an hour later when I was standing up on the commuter going up the Broad St. overpass with a big messenger bag over my shoulder and my Bass Weejuns bending under my feet, my legs were hurting.
So I can tell we're getting close to Tour de La time because I've already gotten my first e-mail from a new rider who wants to make it his first race. I always get a few of those as we lead up to the TDL. A fairly competitive stage race like that is really not the ideal choice for a rider's first race. The Cat. 5 field will be about at its 50-rider limit and will include a number of guys intent on getting upgrade points. The master's race will usually have a few really fast Cat. 2 and Cat. 3 guys who will keep that race fast too. I always try to get the new racers to do one of the other races in the area first so that they at least have an idea how the road race and criterium will go and don't get surprised by the pace or the attacks and end up getting spit out the back right away. Still, bike racing can be an unforgiving sport and at some point you just have to dive in the deep end and see if you can swim with the big fish or end up being shark bait.
Monday, May 02, 2005
Springtime Weather!
I am just amazed at how nice the weather has been around here. Yesterday morning we were in arm-warmers for the first half of our Northshore ride. That is not normal for May when I would typically expect the high temperature to be in the 80s. I rode out to The Morning Call to meet Kevin who was giving me a ride across the lake, and stopped off at the Starbucks for my usual small coffee. I don't know what kind of metabolism you would have to have to be able to handle a large coffee, but the small one provides enough caffeine to keep me going for hours. There were eight or nine of us for the ride, and although it was rather windy, we had an awesome day and got in some good training. After a 10-mile warmup and a "nature stop" necessitated by the combination of cold and caffeine, the group started a nice fast paceline that we kept up for the whole day. With no firm route in mind, we ended up doing around 75 miles, going through Folsom. Since we didn't go North of Enon, we missed out on a lot of the hills, but there were still enough to get me out of the saddle a few times. There were also some great tailwind sections where the group was just flying along at 29mph. Of course, we threw in a few town sign sprints along the way, but the final sprint for the Abita Springs sign didn't happen because of some oncoming traffic. The town sign sprint is definitely not worth dying for!
I headed out this morning for the levee, again in arm-warmers, but it was deserted and my mood was - how should I put this? - "reflective," so I just rode slowly, enjoying the scenery and trying not to think too much about all the work I have waiting for me at the office.
I tracked Gina down this morning to see how things went at the Athens Twilight Criterium. She said that the streets were still wet but not too bad. It was fast, fast, fast, though and she ended up getting gapped off about half-way through. It sounded like the DeFeet team had a great trip anyway. She didn't get back to Charlotte until around 2 a.m. this morning and when I talked to her she was on her way to Boone, already running a bit late. Some of the guys went up to Clear Springs for a 24-hour mountain bike race last weekend, and Branden, John, Richard and Rusty ended up coming in first! I think they do this as sort of a relay type event, but still it has got to be hard because that is not an easy course at all. Branded had the fastest lap time of the event, and that was 53 minutes for a 9.5 mile loop!
Realdo is off to France at the end of the week for a long visit, not returning until around the 22nd of the month. Meanwhile, The Wife has started the search for a used car for The Daughter, who will be coming back from school briefly on the 15th. Yesterday she wanted to drive around to various car dealers, but we found most of them to be closed (it was a Sunday afternoon) so I got her on the internet to search through the local classifieds where it seems that all the dealers now have their cars. I hope we can find something that will work and that we can also afford!
So, bad news for Ekimov! Sounds like he must have been chasing back to catch up with Lance on a training ride around Austin last Thursday when he hit a pothole and came down on his stem with his sternum, cracking it and crashing badly enough to also injure a couple of vertebrae. Yeouch! That's gotta hurt. I'll bet he had his head down and never even saw the pothole that he hit. Interestingly, most of the online cycling sites were incorrectly reporting that he had been hit by a car.
I headed out this morning for the levee, again in arm-warmers, but it was deserted and my mood was - how should I put this? - "reflective," so I just rode slowly, enjoying the scenery and trying not to think too much about all the work I have waiting for me at the office.
I tracked Gina down this morning to see how things went at the Athens Twilight Criterium. She said that the streets were still wet but not too bad. It was fast, fast, fast, though and she ended up getting gapped off about half-way through. It sounded like the DeFeet team had a great trip anyway. She didn't get back to Charlotte until around 2 a.m. this morning and when I talked to her she was on her way to Boone, already running a bit late. Some of the guys went up to Clear Springs for a 24-hour mountain bike race last weekend, and Branden, John, Richard and Rusty ended up coming in first! I think they do this as sort of a relay type event, but still it has got to be hard because that is not an easy course at all. Branded had the fastest lap time of the event, and that was 53 minutes for a 9.5 mile loop!
Realdo is off to France at the end of the week for a long visit, not returning until around the 22nd of the month. Meanwhile, The Wife has started the search for a used car for The Daughter, who will be coming back from school briefly on the 15th. Yesterday she wanted to drive around to various car dealers, but we found most of them to be closed (it was a Sunday afternoon) so I got her on the internet to search through the local classifieds where it seems that all the dealers now have their cars. I hope we can find something that will work and that we can also afford!
So, bad news for Ekimov! Sounds like he must have been chasing back to catch up with Lance on a training ride around Austin last Thursday when he hit a pothole and came down on his stem with his sternum, cracking it and crashing badly enough to also injure a couple of vertebrae. Yeouch! That's gotta hurt. I'll bet he had his head down and never even saw the pothole that he hit. Interestingly, most of the online cycling sites were incorrectly reporting that he had been hit by a car.
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