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!