The Tuesday Rush

I found the clock through one half-open eye as my brain stumbled into wakefulness. The bright red "6:04" made its way down my optic nerve and pounded on the firmly shuttered window to my brain. Suddenly the neurons started to fire and I jumped up. Geez! Ten minutes to get to the levee or I'll miss the training ride. On the bike in 4 and on the drops in 5 pushing the 39 x 13 down Carrollton Avenue. I arrive dripping sweat one minute late and there's just John there, waiting. I ask if we're late or early but the look on his face tells me he hasn't a clue. Just then we see a few riders coming our way and I know we're on time but everyone else is late.

The group was ultimately pretty big. I guess at least 15, complete with The Howard surging up to 29 or 30 mph every time he came to the front, which always seemed to be when I was trying to latch back onto the end of the paceline. Don't you just hate that? You take your pull, move over and start to drop back, anticipating the relative comfort of the draft at the back, but then you realize that you're going to have to be going 3 mph faster than you were when you were at the front just to catch the wheel of the last guy.

There was a flat on the way out and those in front coasted along for a while, not wanting to stop and suffer the sweat-in-the-eyes deluge that comes with a sudden stop in the summer. Pretty soon, the statute of limitations ran out and the group ahead of us started rolling faster. Courtney said "lets to, they can catch us at the turnaround" and a few minutes later the paceline was going strong again.

On the way back a little group rolled off the front while the rest of us were being civilized and waiting for everyone to regroup after the turnaround. Courtney was up there. She has a real knack for staying on the right side of the gaps. By the time we got a paceline going again, they had 20 seconds or so, and our group wasn't really in chase mode yet. When I came to the front the gap had grown slowly to maybe 30 seconds and I tried to lift the pace gradually a couple of mph. At 26-27 we were starting to close and with most of the group taking pulls we reeled in the escapees within a couple more miles. It was a pretty good ride today. Hot, of course.

When I got home I washed out all of the gatorade coolers from the Tour de La, enjoying the cool water on my feet, and rode in to work. It was already in the mid-80s.

So I've almost got all of the post-TDL chores wrapped up. The Chief Referee's report is ready to be mailed - just waiting for the 4-figure check for the USCF. I added more of the masters crit placings that Shane sent me today from the videotape, and I uploaded about 10 megabytes of photos from Malcolm and Laura. I also updated all of the LCCS points standings.