Recovery

After Saturday's ride I might have been well advised to make Sunday a recovery day, but to be honest, my legs didn't feel all that bad, so I took off for the Lakefront Giro Ride anyway. Out at the lake I met up with the group and noticed it was unusually small. This was both good and bad. On the good side, it meant that the available horsepower in the group would be somewhat limited. On the bad side, it also meant that the available draft would likewise be limited. At least we had a lot of NOBC riders there, along with Mike on his handlebar-less bike and Bret who was taking it easy on us.

I was still feeling OK as we narrowly missed getting run over by a car on Paris Road as it tried to pass the group on the right because the group was in the left lane -- until someone yelled "car back" and half the group moved over right in front of the understandably bewildered driver. Sheesh. Guys, you really need to stay in ONE lane, preferably the right one. The pace was reasonably fast, but also quite steady on Sunday, so it wasn't until we were halfway back that my lack of recovery really started to catch up with me. In fact, it not only caught up with me, it rolled right over me. I made one final effort up the Seabrook bridge and after that I was done, as in "well done." I limped home at about 12 mph, nibbling on what was left of a nasty PowerBar that I must have gotten at a race somewhere (hopefully this season rather than last) because I would never in a million years buy a "cookies and cream" Powerbar.

So by Sunday night I knew that Monday would have "recovery day" written all over it. Since I had my final Jury Duty day on Monday, I took the opportunity to skip my morning ride and sleep an extra hour before making the ride down to mid-city. I had a meeting that I really didn't want to miss scheduled for the afternoon, and so the person behind the desk told me "OK, I'll take care of you." Over the next three hours they called about 75 people, none of them me. At 12:30 there was only one court that might still need a jury, so they called out fifty names and the rest of us were finally free. So I was back in the office after a quick lunch and all was well.

Back to the Bluff

It was nearly 11 p.m. when I made the decision. Jason had sent out an email on Friday about a group that would be riding the infamous Red Bluff route on Saturday. There hadn't been any replies, perhaps because they were meeting at the Mandeville IHOP for 6 am. As I later learned, our group was only one of two. An earlier group of mostly triathletes was meeting at 4:30 am, which was well before my alarm went off, even though I had a good 40 minute drive across the causeway to make first. The Red Bluff loop is probably one of the hilliest training rides within easy driving distance, with a typical 32 mile circuit racking up nearly a thousand feet of accumulated climbing. Add to that some rough chip-seal roads, some long stretches of loosely attached gravel, and three or four long and steep climbs, and you have a recipe for a real leg-breaker, especially if you're planning on doing two or three laps.

The plan for the day was quite up in the air. When we arrived, we decided to head out on the course backwards to meet the early group, so we basically had a ten or fifteen mile warmup that brought us back to the cars. We hung around as the early group got water and stuff, finally heading back out to the course with our original group and a couple others. Riding the course in the normal direction, you get about a mile of flat road before starting the longish climb up to Red Bluff. By the time we got to the top, our group was already fragmented. Jerry was pushing the pace up the hills pretty effectively, but eventually we all came back together before turning left and starting the long return side of the loop. The pace stayed fairly fast and things kind of came apart again - more than once - before we got back to the cars with maybe 50 miles. Another stop of fluids and we headed out again for another 20 miles or so up Red Bluff and White Bluff and back. By then it was getting pretty warm and my legs were getting pretty tired, but I still couldn't resist pushing a bit over the hills.

So with all of the delays and route changes it turned out to be a longer day than I'd anticipated, but as I drove back across the Causeway I was feeling satisfied and happy that I'd made the decision to go back to the Bluff. When you do most of your training on the dead-flat roads around New Orleans, going for a nice challenging ride in the hills is always a treat, even when it hurts. I just wish I'd remembered to bring my camera along.

Tired Thursday Thighs

I was up and out the door by 6 am yesterday morning, trying to sneak in an hour or so before dreaded Jury Duty. Already it is that time of year when the blinky light stays clipped to the tire bag all week, a sure sign that we're tilting away from the sun again. At least the morning temperatures have been relatively mild lately, and I'm not even going to comment on the tropical weather for fear of jinxing this year's hurricane season. So I got in a nice little solo ride and then headed down to mid-city for Jury Duty at Tulane and Broad, locking the bike up to one of the many no-parking signs alongside a long row of parked police cars, and working my way through all of the shady dreadlocked characters holding their ridiculous pants up with one hand, I checked through the medal detector and walked down to the jury lounge. There I sat for the next three and a half hours with nothing to do except read email and try not to stare at the only attractive thing in the room who was sitting across from me. A bit after noon they called out fifty names, including mine, and sent the rest home. We were instructed to return at 1:30, so I pulled out a powerbar, bought a coke, and hung around upstairs, finally returning to the jury lounge just in time to find out that we could go home. Another bullet dodged. Meanwhile, the jury that I was almost on, the one that has been sequestered, and still is, since the 17th, rendered a guilty verdict in the first-degree murder case. Now they have to decide on the death vs. life in prison issue.

So after a few hours at work I was ready to head out to the lakefront for a little suffering. As usual, the training race didn't disappoint. I did a lot of work at the front and by the time we were down to the last couple of laps I was pretty well toasted. On the final lap I thought I'd launch an attack from about fifth wheel as we headed toward the fountain traffic circle, knowing full well I'd be caught quickly and probably blown right out the back, but that's what training races are all about, right? Anyway, just as I had formulated my plan I saw Woody, who was a few bikes ahead, glance behind him. I knew what that meant, but I wasn't quite fast enough. He launched a fierce attack and although I responded pretty quickly, I was a bit too far back and low on fuel to make it into his draft. By the time I was halfway around the circle, I was done for the day. The ride home was nice, though!

This morning my legs were feeling a little sore, so I was glad that the pace didn't go ballistic from the start. Instead, it just kind of gradually ramped up and up and up as the number of people pulling went down and down and down. A lot of the blame, or credit as the case may be, for that would have to go to Howard who was characteristically surging an extra couple of mph each time he'd come to the front. The ride back today turned out to be a lot harder than I'd expected. Often when the ride out is hard, the ride back will remain slow for a long time. This time, though, Howard and Brady were pushing the pace and eventually the rest of the group had had enough and let them, with me tagging along, go. It could have been a lot harder for me, but with both Howard and Brady to draft behind, I was getting some pretty nice recovery in-between pulls.

This morning's air served up a brief little reminder that August isn't always brutally hot and humid. The cool front that pushed through yesterday left us with a morning temperature in the low 70s and the kind of relative humidity that is considered normal in most other parts of the country. With my handlebars finally free of aerodynamic entanglements, I made my way in the semi-darkness out to the levee for the long Tuesday ride. Despite having skipped my usual Monday ride, thanks to Jury Duty, I could still feel a little bit of Sunday in my legs as they slowly got warmed up.

The ride out to the turnaround started picking up speed once we cleared the Huey P, and soon the numbers on the computer were staying up around 27 mph. I took a couple of pulls and then made the mistake of dropping almost all the way to the back of the paceline. I soon realized that the rotation was being short- circuited somewhere up ahead, but just didn't have the motivation to get myself back up there for a long time. It just felt so nice sitting in the draft this morning! Woody pulled off to turn back, and after that the pace eased up for a little while, but with Max, Rob, Matt and VJ up at the front, that didn't last too long. By the time we were halfway back home the pace was down to 25-26 mph and the number of guys in the rotation was dwindling. Situation normal. I had a little more left in the tank since I'd spent some time sitting in the draft on the way out, so I spent a bit more time in the front group on the return trip. Otherwise, it was a pretty typical morning ride. Whenever the weather is nice there are a lot of pedestrians, dog-walkers and slower riders up on the levee, and the closer we get to the Playground the more of them there are. That always seems to break up the group a little bit in the last few miles, since it's really not such a good idea to have a dozen riders zooming past the oblivious pedestrians at 27 mph.

I'm heading up to Baton Rouge in a little while for a meeting and kind of looking forward to some quiet time in the car. Hopefully I can keep my hands off of the BlackBerry while en route. I got an email from Dylan's father yesterday reporting on his condition after being in a head-on car accident. Dylan was in the back seat and the force of the impact, combined with his seat belt, pressed his spine into his intestines. After they took him to the Terrebone hospital they decided to MediFlight him to Ochsner for surgery since they knew he was bleeding internally. Fortunately they were able to patch up the ruptures in his intestine and he's back home after a long stay in the ICU and hospital with a feeding tube down his throat. He's expected to make a full recovery but will be off the bike for another month or so.

Solitude and Suffering

I rolled out of bed in the dark around 5:15 am and stumbled down to the basement to load up the station wagon with race equipment for the morning's LAMBRA Time Trial Championships. I stepped out the door and immediately noticed that the air was cooler and dryer than normal for this time of year. The night before I'd bolted on the clip-on aero-bars, thus effectively converting the Orbea into a Time Trial bike. I'd also removed the water bottle cages, just for the psychological benefit. I arrived at the race venue, aka the Swamp Tours parking lot, near LaPlace around 6:15 and immediately sprayed myself with mosquito repellent. I then unloaded the car, setting up the pop-up tent for registration, then running down to the start line to put up the race clock. A bit farther down the road I planted the big finish line flag at the big "40K" mark on the asphalt. By then a bunch of the NBO guys, who were in charge of the event, had arrived. Since pre-registration was required for this event, everything went smoothly, although there were a couple of people who had missed the registration deadline. The promoter wasn't about to open the door on exceptions, so there were two riders who just rode exhibition time trials and weren't scored.

So once things were under control and the Chief Referee, Adam, had arrived, I pulled the bike down from the roof and got in a little warmup. There was a moderate wind blowing out of the north, which on this course meant it would probably be a long way to the turnaround. After all of the stressing about the LAMBRA equipment, registration, results spreadsheets, etc., it was a relief to finally be thinking only about the impending 40 km of solitude and suffering. As usual, I was only about half-primed for this time trial. For one thing, I've rarely found them to be a lot of fun. For another, I think I'd need a few thousand dollars worth of new equipment in order to feel like I was on a level playing field. Even so, one can at least take some satisfaction in simply putting up a respectable time on a regular bike.

Eddie counted me down as I balanced at the starting line. At five to go I started the stopwatch on the computer. At one to go I grabbed the brake and stood up, and at "go" I powered away from the line, staying out of the saddle until I was up to 26 or 27 mph. A couple of downshifts later I settled into the aero bars as my breathing went into "gasping" territory. I could feel the headwind immediately and knew my current speed was unsustainable. Up the road I could see Tom H., my minute man. Over the next few miles my speed gradually dropped down until it finally stabilized at 24-25 mph when things were good. Every now and then I'd lose my focus and find myself down to 22 mph, requiring an effort to get back up to 24. Riding into an unsteady headwind, it was important to maintain an aero position and smooth pedal stroke, and although I felt I was being successful at that, I was still disappointed with my speed. I knew that I'd need to be seeing at least 27 mph all the way back just to go sub-hour.

The turnaround finally came and I rounded the pylon reasonably well. I'd already passed a couple of riders and could tell I'd made up some time on my minute man. As usual, the tailwind was a bit less of a relief than I'd hoped. It was also rather inconsistent. For the most part I was seeing 27 and 28 mph, with occasional stretches at 29 -30. Tom offered some encouragement when I passed him around halfway back, and by then I was really starting to hurt. The last five miles were a struggle and my speed was fluctuating a lot depending on the momentary status of my motivation. Finally I could see the finish about a kilometer away and started to gradually ramp it up, crossing the line at around 30 mph for a time of 58:33 and a mediocre but respectable average speed of around 25.5 mph. It was only the 18th fastest time of the day, but still good enough for first place in the 55-59 age group.

As soon as I got back to the results table I was told that my laptop had gone into hibernate mode and couldn't be revived. I took a look at it and for a minute was confused as to why it wouldn't power back up. That was until I looked down and saw that the power strip it was plugged into was in the 'off' position. Then, after entering the first batch of times and successfully printing out some of the results, the printer and laptop stopped communicating for some unknown reason. We were never able to get them to talk to each other again and had to resort to pen on paper for most of the results. Woody plugged his camera into my laptop after I finished the results and those photos, taken by his wife, I assume, are on the NOBC website. They're all kind of blurry for some reason. You really need to give some cameras a little while to finish auto-focusing. So the time trial event was a success with a good turnout of about 100 riders, and a really good turnout from the club.

Today was another Jury Duty day and sure enough I got called up to be on a jury again. Luckily I was once again rejected. I guess I'll never know if it was because I knew one of the defense attorneys. Anyway, it was about 3 pm before I made it back to the office. Tomorrow I have a big Board of Regents Support Fund meeting up in Baton Rouge, but luckily it isn't until early afternoon, so I'll be able to get in the usual long Tuesday ride. I have to admit that I was really happy to be removing the aero bars from the bike for the last time this season!

Aerobars and Bottle Launchers

The streets were still wet when I peeked out the door this morning and I wondered if more rain was on the way. So I moved the old ErgoBrain from the Orbea to the Cervelo and headed for the lakefront, firmly resolved to spend the ride following wheels as much as possible. With the LAMBRA championship time trial coming up on Sunday, the group was short a few riders, but I wouldn't say that the pace was easy. There was a big group of triathletes somewhere up the road. Even if I hadn't seen them getting started as I rode to meet the Giro, I might still have guessed they were out there just from the occasional water bottles we passed. Those seat-mounted bottle launchers they like to use seem to have trouble with the New Orleans streets. I was mostly sticking to my game plan today because the only thing worse than doing a 40 km time trial is doing a 40 km time trial with unhappy legs. There were still a lot of clouds in the sky as we headed back from the turnaround, but you could tell that things would be clearing up soon. In fact, we were expecting a cool front to come through, bringing a Sunday morning temperature in the low 70s. Somewhere along the way we caught up with a lot of the triathletes, some of whom mixed in with us, adding significantly to the amount of exposed thigh and shoulder skin.

Shortly after we exited Chef Highway onto the service road I heard Eddie C. yelling "flat" behind me. We were pretty close to the back at the time and most of the group kept going, but since I was in easy mode today, I turned around. One of the triathletes had flatted, so we all stood around and watched, offering wise advice to Eddie as he fixed the flat. After that, our much smaller group had a nice even ride most of the way back. Then, as we were heading up the Casino bridge I heard the nasty grinding sound of a very unhappy chain. Glancing to my right I could see that one of the triathletes had dropped her chain halfway up the overpass, so I turned back to make sure she was OK. We ended up with an even smaller group for the rest of the ride, but that was just fine with me today.

So now I'm sitting here at home with a ton of stuff lined up in the basement, wondering how I am going to fit it all into the station wagon. There's the Great White Box, the clock and clock stand, four big coolers, three boxes of goodie bags, the big finish line flag, and then of course my bike, bag, computer and printer. Since this race had required pre-registration, I have the results spreadsheet all ready to go already. All we need are start times and finish times. I just have to remember to make sure the registration folks note which LCCS category the older masters riders want to be scored in (35+, 45+ or 55+). I just set the alarm for 5:10, which should hopefully give me time to get out to the course by 6:15 or so. I'm sure it'll still feel like a rush to get the first rider started for the official 8 am start time. Since we've posted everyone's start time, I already know that I'll be going off at 8:56 for an hour or so of solo suffering. I bolted on the aerobars about an hour ago, so at least the bike is ready.

Oak Street and Little Dogs and Cats

After a nice smooth Friday morning levee ride with Scott, I eventually sauntered into the office to find a couple of videos in my inbox. The first, a short little video about the ongoing renovation of Oak Street, came by way of Tulane's "New Wave" email news service. Oak Street between Carrollton and Monticello is really the old business district of the Town of Carrollton. Although my house, technically, lies one block downriver of Lowerline Street, which was the "lower line" of Carrollton, when people ask me in what part of the city I live, I usually tell them "Carrollton." Since I grew up in this general area, we often headed to Oak Street to shop at the "dime store" and for things like haircuts, shoe repair, tailoring, McKenzie donuts and fabric. Later in life, there was the Maple Leaf Bar a bit farther down the road. They've been working on the street for many months now, and it won't be fully finished until November, which will be just in time for the cooler weather and my traditional stop at Zotz for a post-ride coffee. Before construction started I would ride down Oak St. almost every weekday on my way back from the levee ride, even though it was the bumpiest of the alternatives. It's exciting to see it finally getting this major overhaul, and I'm glad that the businesses are surviving the disruption.

The next video is something that Kenny put together about Matt's gallery as a joke.

Not Quite Yet

The long ride on Tuesday morning was a little different. Instead of the usual race out to Destrehan, the group was happily cruising along at a relatively steady and sustainable speed. I could feel a dull ache in my legs, no doubt left over from Sunday's ride in Cuba, so I was not inclined to do anything to rock the boat. Big Richard looked over at me and said something like, "this must be the first day of the end of the season." End of the season? Already? Well, not quite yet. As we approach the four-year anniversary of Katrina I remember how that disaster put a quick end to the 2005 race calendar. Even last year we ended up having to cancel one race and reschedule another because of a hurricane. So this year all of those races got moved up on the calendar so that we have our Time Trial championship this coming weekend. After that, there's only the Road Championships in September and then Rocktoberfest in October, with the 6-Gap Century, for which I just registered, sandwiched in-between. Even the Pepper Place criterium up in B'ham, which I've enjoyed going to the last couple of years, got cancelled. Even so, I doubt that too many riders will be easing up on their training until after the Road Championship, at the earliest.

So after narrowly evading the sequestered jury bullet on Monday, I found myself back in the Jury Lounge on Wednesday morning, having skipped my morning ride in order to get there on time. Out front, there were a couple of TV crews setting up their cameras to report on the start of the murder trial. By mid-morning I had been called again, along with 74 others, and we filed upstairs to stand in the non-air-conditioned hallway for a while until they sent us all back down to the jury lounge (I guess someone copped a plea at the last minute). I ended up being stuck there until nearly 3 pm. I got back to the office for a while, but then headed out a bit after 5 to ride out to the lakefront. The weather around here has been extremely unpredictable lately, with little thunderstorms just popping up randomly, but despite the somewhat threatening sky, I really needed to ride.

The group out on Lakeshore Drive was a bit late in coming together, and we rode about a lap and a half before things really got started. A couple of the usual suspects were absent, so the pace was relatively controlled. For some reason I was feeling really sluggish and lazy, occasionally dropping to the back, getting gapped off, and then having to chase back on. I was satisfied to have gotten in some miles, but really, my heart wasn't in it. Sometimes you just have to do the training rides on auto-pilot while you're waiting for the enthusiasm to reappear.

This morning's long ride probably wasn't nearly as fast or as hard as it felt, at least to me. The air was thick and humid, and I was hurting. I remember at one point there was a big surge and a gap opened in front of me. I stood up and gripped the bars tightly, and as I did sweat started pouring out of my gloves as it was squeezed out of the padding. We were already nearing the turnaround and the supply of riders willing to pull through was running pretty low. I myself had already taken a couple of rest breaks back behind the rotation. Fortunately, the group was inexplicably large today, so there was always some place to hide.

I'm signed up for the 40 km Time Trial on Sunday, but to complicate matters, I also have to bring all of the LAMBRA race equipment out there. I also need to set up the start list and results spreadsheet once I can download the registered riders on Friday. By then I'll know how many medals I'll need to put together. For the time trial we offer all of the USAC 5-year age groups for men and women, in addition to the regular skill-based categories. If there were three riders in every age group/category on offer, which of course there won't be, that would work out to over 100 medals. I'll also be helping with the results after I finish, so it will be a busy morning for sure. For some reason, I think that, assuming good weather, we are going to see some fast times this year -- just not from me.

Racing and Rejection (long)

The annual Meridian-Cuba Challenge attracted some pretty good fields last weekend. This event features afternoon criteriums on Saturday in downtown Meridian, Mississippi, followed by Sunday morning road races in nearby Cuba, Alabama. This year it attracted some pretty good fields. There are a few things that seem to set this particular race apart. One is the August heat of central Mississippi. Another is that it tends to attract a diverse field that appropriately "crosses the border" between the LAMBRA world and the Alabama/Tennessee/Georgia world. Probably the most notable thing, though, is the deceptively tough road course. I'm surprised every year by how much damage the constantly rolling circuit seems to do to the fields.

I drove up on Saturday morning with Mignon and about 200 pounds of LAMBRA race equipment, arriving just in time to deposit everything with Ricky, the Chief Referee, before the start of the first race. I have never understood why the parking Nazi blocks off all of the best parking on the already closed streets, forcing everyone to instead park farther away from the course on the roads that are open to traffic. Anyway, by the time the Women started it was getting pretty warm. With Masters National Champion Debbie Milne in the smallish group I wondered aloud how long she would wait before riding away from the rest of the field. Well, the answer was one and a half laps. Judith and Mignon stayed with the main group for most of the race, but toward the end Judith got gapped off, and them Mignon cracked.

I was registered in the 45+ races, both of which were combined races with the 35+, 45+ and 55+ classes all riding together. This is usually kind of confusing. This year they marked each age group's numbers with different color markers so you could tell who was in which age group. It would have been better to use separate number sequences instead. The referee was spending a lot of time sorting out the age groups from the finish video because he had to keep referring to the start list to figure out which riders were from which groups. Anyway, the masters race had a pretty big field and so I was surprised that the first few laps were fairly civilized. The civility, however, didn't last long. Masters Criterium Champion Terry Duran, wearing his stars and stripes jersey, launched a number of attacks, but he wasn't the only one. I ended up doing a whole lot more work than I had planned on during the first half of the race. As we got closer to the finish the responses to the attacks became slower and weaker, and they were additionally complicated by the fact that the 35+ guys weren't responding to the attacks by the 45+ guys and vice-versa. The ultimate result was that a couple of guys got off the front, then a couple more, and by the end there were, I think, six or seven up the road, leaving the pack to sprint it out for the crumbs. Although we were by then sprinting for the leftovers, it was a fun last lap anyway. Coming down the fast downhill into the final corner I was behind Mark G. when I saw Jason nudging his way over. If it had been anyone else I probably would have nudged back, but I backed off just a touch so he could slot in behind his teammate who I was sure was about to launch a big leadout. We flew through the last corner really fast -- so fast and wide that Jason lost Mark's wheel for a moment. Mark glanced back to make sure Jason was still there and put the hammer down big-time. I think I was already in the 12 at that point, and just hung onto Jason's wheel for dear life. Nobody came past Mark or Jason, but someone nipped me right at the line. A lot of the breakaway riders were 45+ riders, so I only netted a 6th place in the 45+, which was probably something like 11th or 12th overall, I guess.

The criterium left me feeling a little frustrated and disappointed, but after Jason handed me a beer in the parking lot, and Mignon gave me another at the motel, and I ordered one at Olive Garden, I was feeling a little better.

The next morning was relatively cool thanks to some high clouds that rolled in just before the start. My legs were feeling pretty good and I decided that I couldn't ride this one the way I'd ridden the criterium. If any little breaks were going to go off the front, I was going to be in them. Well, the first of the aforementioned breaks went off about 200 yards after the start, so I shifted down a couple of cogs and bridged up to the two riders, John McLachlan from Memphis and another rider I didn't recognize from Alabama Masters, I think. For the first three miles I just sat on the back as they traded pulls, waiting to see if the break was really going to go anywhere. When I finally looked back, I could see we had a big gap, so I figured I'd start working. I wasn't holding out much hope that we would actually stay out there to the finish, but since the pace was fairly smooth and fast, I figured we might avoid all of the sharp attacks and accelerations that would probably be happening back in the pack, especially on the hills. So we worked together really smoothly for about two-thirds of the first lap (the race was 2 laps plus a 3-mile stretch to the finish) until the pack finally reeled us in. I think it worked out well, because I was still feeling fairly good at that point. For the next ten miles or so there were a number of attacks with Donald D. and Jason spending a lot of time up at the front. I knew the hills would start getting to people eventually, so I was trying to conserve whenever I could. I guess there were seven miles or so to go when the pack caught Donald after another of his attacks and everything slowed down dramatically. I took the opportunity to roll though off the front at a moderate pace, just trying to keep things going, and looked back to see I suddenly had a big gap. I was kind of confused about that and was about to sit up when Greg from Alabama Masters came flying by yelling, "Let's go, Randy." So I stood up and latched on to his wheel and we got to work. After a couple of pulls Jason bridged up to us and the three of us started working together.

I thought about this a bit and it seemed like a good situation. Jason and Greg were both riding in the 35+ group, while I was in the 45+ group. Even better, each of them had teammates back in the pack who weren't likely to chase as long as the break looked like it would survive to the finish. That took a lot of horsepower out of the pack, which was already getting pretty tired, so our gap started to grow. Jason was starting to have some leg cramps on the climbs, but I was still feeling pretty good, and by the time we were four or five miles from the finish, I was fully commmitted to the break. As we made the last right-hand turn with three miles to go, I glanced back and could see the headlight of the lead moto about a minute down the road. The next time I pulled off, Greg came through and told me that we'd lost Jason. Considering that the pack could still see us, and we were getting close to the finish, I didn't think we were safe yet, so I kept the pressure on. There were two pretty decent climbs between us and the finish, and I know from experience just how quickly a pack can close a gap on a couple of tired riders like us. Greg suggested we keep working together and not sprint it out for the finish since we were basically in different races, so that's what we did, crossing the line together. By the time I had coasted down the road a bit and turned around, I could see the pack sprinting up the hill. I guess they were no more than thirty or forty seconds behind us. Unfortunately, Jason got streamed by the sprinting pack on the last climb. In the other races, Clark from Herring got into a 2-man break for the entire 3-lap race, only to have the pack catch them about 1 km from the finish. Mignon had a much better race than on Saturday, finishing 4th with Judith coming in 6th. The Cat. 4 races had a big field of nearly 50. Ed was 12th in the crit, but flatted in the road race. I think Steve got dropped in the criterium, but finished 19th in the road race. In the Cat. 5 race, Jordan followed up his solid 4th in the criterium with a 10the in the road race. New 13 year old Junior rider Robert M. had a great race, getting 4th in the omnium.

Today I was in the second panel for jury selection in a big murder case, and I was really worried I'd end up on the final jury. That would mean being sequestered for maybe a week with no newspaper, internet, television, or cellphone. The selection process took forever - much longer than the judge had expected - and they didn't even get started on my group of 13 until around 3 pm. After much repetitive questioning they finally made their decisions, keeping only three and rejecting the rest of us. I have never been so happy to be rejected! I would have had to make a lot of quick arrangements because of the time trial championships if I'd been selected.

Drafting and Dogs

The Wednesday morning ride was just what I needed. I'd been feeling kind of "off" all week, and just to twist the knife, my occasionally troublesome right leg had been acting up. I suppose I should get it checked out one of these days, but it's probably either a bulging lumbar disc or sciatica, or more specifically "wallet sciatica." Whatever, it usually just causes some mild discomfort running down the back of my leg. So the ride was smooth and good, as Wednesday rides should be, and by the end of the day I was looking forward to the lakefront training race. When 5 p.m. rolled around I dropped what I was doing and headed for home to change and make my way out to the lakefront.

For a change, I actually got there in time for the start (such as it is). We had the usual cast of characters, although Matt was conspicuously absent (as opposed to conspicuously present as is the usual case thanks to his neon wardrobe). The group did not seem to be feeling particularly aggressive today, so the pace was relatively slow, mostly in the 25-27 mph range, I guess. Naturally, Diego was there, which meant there would be attacks. It was probably his third attack that did it. I had dropped to the back for a little rest as we approached the fountain traffic circle, and was completely surprised when he attacked midway between the levee and the circle. So were the two or three guys in front of me. A big gap opened immediately and I was rather slow to go around and try to catch up. Well, it was too little, too late for me, so after a brief effort I eased up and was soon joined by a couple of others. We quickly started working together and over the next lap or two were gradually closing the gap.

With a couple of laps left, just as we came over the levee near "lovers lane" heading toward the fountain, a little miniature black poodle came darting across the four lanes of Lakeshore Drive right at us. It was like Deja Vu. This brainless dog ran right in front of us. As we grabbed for brake levers, I momentarily lost sight of him as the other riders blocked my view. I swear my collarbone started to twitch! At the last second he emerged in front of me and somehow I missed him, but I just had to take a few moments to coast and reflect on my narrow escape. By the time we all got back together and rolling again, the gap was way bigger than we were ever likely to close, and I was just about to back off and call it a day when a big pickup truck came up alongside. It was Matt. He'd seen what happened and decided to motorpace us back up to the group, eventually easing us up to 30 or 31 mph by the time we finally caught half a lap later. You should have seen the surprise on Kenny's face when we suddenly showed up! There was another attack, and then, after the traffic circle, another one, and when we caught that one I couldn't resist the opportunity to counter with a little slingshot over the levee. Well, any attack by me is bound to be a surprise, and this one was no exception. I guess they all decided to wait and make someone else start the chase, because when I looked back (mostly for help!) there was an inexplicably big gap even though my speed had already dropped down to 24 or so. Since it was the last lap, I decided to keep going to see how long I could hold them off before they came flying past like they did last week.

As I came around the fountain on the last lap they were just entering the circle, but I figured there would be a big attack and they would be coming past me at 34 mph any second. When I glanced back again, just before going over the levee, I could see them coming but this time they had waited too long. Sometimes even a blind squirrel finds an acorn..... To commemorate this rare event while simultaneously demonstrating the effects of sweat on a cellphone camera, Kenny even took a photo.

Bikes and Barristers

The air felt calm and cool, and I could hear the sound of my tires on the road as I threaded my way through the quiet city streets on my way to meet Keith at Puccino's. I knew it wouldn't last. We were headed across the lake for another Sunday morning group ride, and the only two options for the day were hot sunshine or pouring rain. I was hoping for the former. Our planned 7:30 am start had slipped to nearly 8:00 by the time the 18-rider group started rolling north toward Enon, and I was pleased to find that there was still just a bit of coolness to the air. The legs were feeling fairly good, despite the prior day's Team Time Trial effort, and the group was smooth and steady for the first 25 miles or so. By the time we made the right turn way up at the top of the 65-mile Enon- Plainview loop ride, I could tell that a few of the guys were starting to have trouble.

The next section of this ride features three significant climbs that sometimes split the group. The first one is the longest, climbing fairly steadily around a long curve so that you can't really see the top from the bottom. Nobody attacked that one and everyone went up at a moderate tempo. The next two are the short but steep little climbs that are more typical in this area, and I think we lost a few people as the pace surged. By the time we got to the right turn at Sie Jenkins Road, we were four or five riders short, but went ahead and pushed it a bit on Sie Jenkins anyway, since it's only a couple of miles long. After regrouping at Plainview, three or four riders decided to do their own thing and ride back a bit easier. We eventually all, or mostly all, came back together when we stopped at the Enon store. By then it was getting pretty hot and everyone needed fluids for the last leg back to the Lee Road School. I refilled my water bottle and remember thinking how delicious the gas station water tasted. I must have been really thirsty! The pace stayed fairly fast for the last stretch, and by the time I got back to the cars I was, as usual, drenched in sweat. It was another good training ride. Better, as I later heard, than the Giro Ride back in town where Eddie Delgado reportedly crashed and broke his collarbone. I think the official collarbone count for the year now stands at 2 -- considerably better than last year, anyway -- and not including VJ's femur break.

After a nice easy recovery ride Monday morning, I was back at the Criminal Court building in the afternoon for Jury Selection in a 1st degree murder case. Things were running nearly an hour late and the temperature in the courtroom must have been in the mid-60s when my little 10-person group was seated. The chairs, by the way, must have been installed by a very tall person because although they are nice and cushy, my feet don't even touch the ground. Between that and the temperature, I was really uncomfortable the whole time. So it turns out this case is a quintuple murder and the lawyers from the state were mainly interested in weeding out anyone who would be unable to consider the death penalty, while the defense attorney was also trying to get a feel for whether people would consider both the death penalty and life in prison. This lawyer was a real classic. He had a huge overhanging belly tugging at the buttons of his big white shirt, a bow tie, and black and white shoes. I was amazed that he wasn't wearing a blue and white searssucker suit. He talked a lot but didn't make a whole lot of sense. In the end, they released only three and the rest of us have to return next Monday for the final selection. In the meantime, they will be going through a number of other groups between now and Friday, so I guess they'll end up with fifty or so for the official Voir Dire on Monday. Anyway, I still have a bad feeling about this. Being sequestered for a week would definitely put a kink in my training, if not my mental stability.

It was another hot and humid long training ride on the levee this morning with a somewhat smaller group than usual. With nobody really pushing the pace into race simulation territory, things stayed together at 24-25 mph on the way out and perhaps a bit faster on the way back. As typically happens, the number of riders rotating pulls at the front started to dwindle dramatically by the time we were halfway back. A couple of times I took a longish pull hoping to give everyone a chance to get things together, only to pull off and find a big gap just a couple of riders back. That always feels kind of frustrating because you're expecting to have a nice long time to recover before coming to the front again. Once that doesn't happen, you're always unsure about where to get back into the rotation, and of course you can't pull at the same speed if you're not going to get the same recovery. Anyway, that's a fairly typical scenario and nothing to get bent out of shape about. I just drop back and take a little rest when I need it, and then move back up into the rotation when I can. Today I think the group split toward the end, and by the time we got back to the playground and VJ pulled off to go home it was just Big Richard and me.

Triple T

Back "in the day" one of the coolest handlebar stems was made by 3TTT, aka Techno Tubo Torino, and although I never had one of them, I always liked their style. For a long time, though they seemed to disappear and I kind of forgot about them as forks and headsets and stems evolved into their current forms. Then, early this year at the Rouge-Roubaix race one of the riders was showing me his new 3T handlebars and I realized that they must have made a bit of a comeback. Since I'd been unhappy with the bars I'd been riding for the past year, I eventually replaced them with one of the new 3T bars, and shortly thereafter with a new 3T stem.

The reason I got to thinking about the "triple T" stuff, as we used to call it, is that we had our annual Team Time Trial (TTT) championship this weekend over in Baton Rouge. It is always rather hard to assemble a good team for these 4-man time trials, especially if you're trying to get four riders who all qualify for the same category or age group. This year we somehow came up with four Master 45+ riders, and not only that, we did it more than 24 hours ahead of time. As usual, registration dragged on a bit, but nonetheless the first team took off only a little bit after the planned start time. With teams going off at 2-minute intervals, our team wasn't scheduled to go until almost 10:00, and by then it was getting kind of toasty out on the asphalt. I actually brought along a water bottle for this 32 mile race, which I usually don't do. Our team of Jorge, David P., Steve J. and myself started out fairly smoothly. We had planned on an easy start so that everyone would have a mile or so to get fully warmed up before we really got rolling. There was a moderate wind on the course, and since we were doing three laps that meant the wind direction kept changing. On the first downwind stretch we were pushing 29-30 mph, and that seemed to be about the best we were going to do if we wanted to keep everyone from blowing up completely. I felt that our first lap went very well and my only complaint was that we kept coming apart every time we'd go around a corner (there were two per lap). It definitely cost us a few seconds each time by the time we got reorganized into a paceline. By our second lap the strain was beginning to show and our speed was definitely starting to slip a bit. Soon after the start of the third lap we lost Steve, so we were down to three riders. It's amazing how much of a difference that makes. You get comfortable with having a certain amount of time for recovery after taking a pull, and then all of a sudden that time gets cut by 1/3 and you find yourself starting to struggle. Indeed, the third lap was a struggle for us, and when Dave started having trouble getting back on after his pulls we dropped the average speed down by at least 1 mph. That was also partially due to the wind, which seemed to be gradually increasing. Our final time of 1:11:25 (27 mph average speed) was respectable and good for 1st place in the 45+ age group, but it was only 8th overall and a good five minutes slower than the fastest of the day. Even so, I was pretty happy with our ride.

A Friday in August

Fridays seem to come in two basic flavors. There are the quiet, laid-back ones where the phone doesn't ring much and most of the emails are junk, and then there are the hectic ones where three things absolutely, positively have to get finished before the weekend. This particular Friday started out like the former and is looking like it will end like the latter.

I had gone to be early Thursday night, hoping that a little extra sleep would shift me out of the worn-out rut I've been in. I suppose it helped a bit, although I predictably woke up a number of times during the night, each time surprised that it was still far too early to get up. Nonetheless, I still managed to fall asleep after I turned off the 5:45 a.m. alarm, leaving me to rush out the door with fewer than ten minutes to make the trip to the levee. There were only four of us today, and we kept a nice easy Friday pace for the most part, rarely exceeding 22 mph. At the start the wind was calm and the air was humid and, well, it was a typical Friday morning in August. As we were finishing up the ride, somewhere near the playground, I remembered that the odometer should be getting somewhere near the 90,000 mark, so I pushed the button to check and, sure enough, I was just a mile or so away. Well naturally I had to stop and take a picture when all those zeros popped up. So that was pretty much the excitement for the morning.

I was expecting a quiet day at work today. I had to finish up a rather simple Department of Energy grant application for Phase II of our Clean Room project, but I didn't really have much else on my radar. I got everything together around lunchtime, and decided to make the ride over to Whole Foods for one of those expensive sandwiches with the fancy bread. Just as I finished and was getting up from one of the tables out on the sidewalk I looked over and saw Courtney busily clicking away on her cellphone or blackberry or whatever. It turned out that she was, at that very moment, sending me a text message because she had just seen someone in street clothes arrive at the bike rack with a full-Campi Pinarello with those expensive titanium zero-gravity (or equivalent) brakes. She was wondering if it might be hot. My guess is it wasn't since it looked to be in good condition and the seat and handlebars were still in their correct positions. It's just not the kind of bike you expect to see locked by just its top tube to the bike rack outside the grocery store. It would have taken about sixty seconds to walk away with a nice set of Mavic Ksyrium SLs. Speaking of badly locked bicycles, Bike Snob had some good examples the other day. And speaking of nationally recognized bloggers, I must sadly report that the Fat Cyclist's wife passed away on Wednesday.

Anyway, back at the office I assembled my little stack of paperwork and rode over to the main campus to drop it off at the Dean's office for signatures, taking a little extra time to check out the new clean room modules that are currently being installed in the engineering building. It's going to look really cool when it's completed.

So tomorrow is the team time trial. As usual, there are still people emailing and calling around trying to get the required 4-person teams together, and in the midst of all that I got an email from the promoter telling me that the big results spreadsheet I'd sent him was screwing up the placings. Sure enough, I'd forgotten to correct the formula, so I had to fix all of that and send him yet another version. I think we're going out to dinner with the neighbors tonight, so I won't have a lot of time to get things ready tonight. Hopefully I won't forget the championship medals or other stuff I need to take with me to Baton Rouge. Since I will need to get up around 5 am, I probably won't be thinking too clearly, so I'll have to stay up long enough tonight to get my act together. If that's even possible.....

A Bad Feeling

Hot, tired and dehydrated, I had just dropped back to try and recover in the skimpy draft of the little Wednesday evening training race when yet another attack launched from the front. This time I just couldn't lift myself up out of the saddle again to respond. It had been a long day already and it had been all I could do to summon up the motivation to make the rush-hour ride down Carrollton Avenue out to the lakefront in the first place. So with one lap to go, I uncharacteristically threw in the towel and let my speed drift down to the low 20s.


The day had started earlier than normal with a pre-dawn solo training ride necessitated by my 8:30 am report time for Jury Duty down at Tulane and Broad. I'd planned on arriving around 8:15 in order to get stake out a good seat in the "Jury Lounge" since I'd probably be stuck there for at least four hours. So at a quarter to six or so I clipped on the blinky light, which I hadn't used since early Spring, and headed for the levee bike path. By 7:15 I was back home, drenched in hot August sweat, hunting around the kitchen for something to eat. By 8 am I was right on schedule, ready to head out the door for the short ride down Fontainebleau and Jeff. Davis Parkway to Mid-City. "This is working out just fine," I thought. I shouldn't have thought that. It's like being on a training ride and telling someone that you never get flat tires.


When I pulled up in front of the court building, I got a bad feeling. There were a number of people standing on the steps around the door, but nobody was going inside. Just then, an ambulance pulled up right next to me and a couple of guys jumped out with a backboard. Apparently there had been some sort of medical emergency and a person was on the ground right at the front door. Eventually they transported him to the ambulance, after which we all waited in the blazing sun to get through security and the metal detector. Needless to say, by the time I got down to the "Lounge" I had to settle for a less-than-ideal spot near the rest rooms where there was a steady stream (no pun intended) of foot traffic. An hour or so later they hit the mute button on the television and announced that Judge Davis needed 75 jurors. I had a bad feeling about this, and just knew I was on that list. I was. So we all herd ourselves upstairs, stand in line, and are told to file into the courtroom. As we enter we're handed a clipboard containing a long questionnaire and a disturbing cover page showing a five-day "schedule for jury selection." My bad feeling got worse. This could mean only one thing. Yep. You guessed it. It was a first-degree murder trial. So now I'm scheduled to appear next Monday afternoon so that the lawyers can decide if I'll be easy enough to manipulate and/or whether I'll balk at the prospect of sentencing a murderer to death or life, assuming of course that the murderer's friends and family have been unsuccessful at intimidating or eliminating the witnesses. If I get selected for this jury it means I'll be sequestered in a hotel for the duration, which will be at least a week.


So that little bit of cheery news put a damper on my mood for the rest of the day. I rode back to the house to find something to eat, and then on to the office. Unfortunately I'd left my heavy U-lock at the house and forgotten to replace it with the light-duty one I normally use, so I had to bring the bike into my office for the day.


It was a bit after 5 pm when I left for home feeling rather noncommittal about doing the training race. What I really wanted was a big glass of wine and a long nap. Somehow I convinced myself that I needed to ride, though, and headed out to the lakefront, albeit a bit late and rather slowly. Naturally I got there a couple of minutes too late, so I jumped into the race two-thirds of the way through the first lap when Diego was going 32 mph off the front, a small chase group was trying to bridge, and everybody else was basically going flat-out. I latched onto the back of the small pack and knew immediately I was going to have trouble. It was probably mostly in my head, but I was feeling particularly sluggish and achy. The next few laps seemed kind of disorganized and I spent some time on the front helping close gaps and listening to Matt complain about the riders who were blocking and/or just not doing their share. A group had been off the front for a few laps, gaining maybe 30 or 40 seconds on the confused group, but everything came back together for the last couple of laps. By then I was toast, however, so then another attack launched, I just didn't have anything else to offer and dropped off. Rolan and I rode most of the last lap together, and as it turned out we probably could have caught the pack because they really slowed down a lot on the last lap. When I got home I decided it was time to try out that Recovery Drink mix. I wonder if I can make a Smoothie with this stuff?? Maybe one with a scoop of vanilla ice cream in it.....


I still felt kind of worn down this morning, and with a Team Time Trial coming up on Saturday, I guess I'll have to take it real easy tomorrow and hope the old legs return to normal.

Under the Courthouse and Update 1,350

Monday was the start of my month-long, twice per week Jury Duty stint for the Orleans Parish Criminal Court. In light of Sunday's hard ride, my own still-tender quads, and the need to report to the courthouse for 8:30 am, I decided it would allowable to skip the Monday morning recovery ride. The Criminal Court building dates back to the 30s, and is a fairly solid and impressive structure in classic courthouse style, conveniently connected directly to the adjacent Parish Prison. The jury pool, however, is located down in the basement. Considering the less than upscale location at Tulane and Broad, I had brought along my big U-lock and cable, both of which seemed far more substantial than the battered "No Parking" sign to which I reluctantly secured my bike. If there's a bike rack somewhere, I sure didn't see it. After clearing security at the door, where seven or eight security guards were hanging around with nothing better to do, I took the elevator down to the ground floor, otherwise known as the basement or parking garage, depending on which side of the wall you happen to be on. The Jury room is a big room with a low ceiling filled with fluorescent lights, a tacky bright blue vinyl tile floor, blue walls and 1980s style aluminum and vinyl chairs. It holds over a hundred people and by the time everyone showed up it was quite full. I settled into a spot in the corner near the coffee machine. Since I'm clearly a "visual learner," I instinctively chose a spot from which I can easily survey the entire room. On the wall were a couple of big LCD televisions, permanently tuned to some sort of daytime TV reality show crap, and scattered about was a collection of well-worn and random magazines dating back to well over a year. I felt trapped. Indeed, I was trapped. I'd left the Blackberry at home, but as it turned out Jurors were allowed to bring their cellphones. Luckily I had my trusty Palm Pilot and the room had some sort of wireless internet. It took me seven tries to get connected, but at least I could occasionally check my email and read the news while I waited. I was called once, along with 74 other people, and after we all filed upstairs to the huge hallway and lined up in order of number (felt just like grammar school) the Judge came out and said that we weren't going to be needed after all. We went back to the holding pen for another hour or two before we were finally released around 12:30. Boy, that was fun. Can't wait 'till Wednesday.....

So this morning was nice and hot and humid, which pretty much sums up the forecast for the rest of the week. Up on the levee there was the usual cluster of riders waiting for someone to say "Let's go." When I arrived I was still feeling kind of groggy, but when I saw that Tim and Woody were both on their Time Trial bikes, I figured I'd better wake up - fast. We weren't much past the Huey P. Long bridge when the pace started to climb rather dramatically. First was the shift to the big ring, and then "clunk, clunk, clunk" down the cluster, finally settling on the 15. The wind was essentially calm, and I soon found myself on Max's wheel going 29 mph. Up at the front Tim and Woody were doing a 2-man Time Trial with Rob sitting behind them and switching from one wheel to the other as they took their pulls. A few miles later I glanced to the side at our shadow. There were only five shadows, and the last was mine. Judging by the pace they were maintaining, I figured Tim and Woody would be turning around at the little dip as they sometimes do. Even sitting there with four riders in front of me, I was working pretty hard just to stay on as the pace fluctuated between 28 and 31 mph for the next ten miles or so. After the TT bikes went home, the three of us who were left dropped the pace down a notch and continued on, picking up the Destrehan crew along the way, and finally arriving at the new turnaround where they've got the bike path blocked off. The rest of the group arrived a while later, split up into a couple of smaller groups, and after a couple of recovery miles we got a nice paceline going for the ride back, arriving more or less together.

This is officially my 1,350th blog update, and the first post of this blog's 6th year. Some time around the end of this week or early next week the odometer on my bike should hit 90,000 miles. I think all that means is that I'm a stubborn creature of habit with too much time on his hands who's too cheap to buy a new computer for his bike ..... Actually, the old ErgoBrain has gotten to be more of a science experiment now, sort of like the Mars Explorer Rovers. How long will it last??

I wonder if I'll have the time and energy to make it out to the lakefront for the Tuesday Time Trial. It's kind of doubtful, but who knows? I could always bolt the old clip-ons to the Cervelo and get a little practice balancing on my front wheel in the 53x14.

Northshore Ride, Northshore Rain

I arrived at the Morning Call parking lot this morning to find only Woody, but we were loading his bike into the car one more showed up. Not to worry; I knew a number of people would be meeting us on the Northshore. It was time to go, so we drove across the street so he could park his car in the big Lakeshore Shopping Center parking lot where it wouldn't take up one of the more valuable spaces in the little strip mall. As we went past the Morning Call on the way to the Causeway I spotted Jen waving at us and pulled into the Post Office parking lot. She hopped into her car and dropped in behind us. Then, just as we were approaching the Causeway, I glanced in my mirror and she wasn't there. I figured she's stopped for gas, so I reached for my cellphone to call her, but discovered that I didn't have here number, so I didn't worry about it.

When we got to the parking lot at the Lee Road Middle School up on the northshore there was a pretty big crowd getting ready for the ride. I'd say around 20. Fifteen minutes later, though, Jen was still MIA, so I tried to call Brady but he didn't answer. I started to wonder if she had decided to bail out or maybe got lost trying to find the meeting spot. Anyway, we eventually rolled out, having never found out what happened to her. It was a few hours later by the time I found out that she'd indeed stopped for gas and was booking it across the causeway to catch up when she got pulled over for speeding. That made her so late that by the time she got there we were already gone. Definitely not a good morning for her.

Soooo, anyway, we had a nice big group that I knew wasn't going to stay together for the duration of our 65 mile ride. A number of riders were planning on cutting the ride short at one point or another. I think we lost a couple of people within the first ten miles, well before the pace started to pick up.

As we came over the watchtower hill, heading toward Enon, I looked up at the sky and thought, "We're going to get wet today," but it was warm and the roads were good, so I didn't really care. We were probably about 30 or 35 miles in, way out on the back side of the loop, when the first raindrops started to fall, and by the time we were heading east toward Plainview the light rain had turned heavier. I went to the back where I could sit up and stuff my camera into a Ziplock bag as the pace started to ramp up. We had already lost a few people, including Judith, so the group was starting to get down to a smaller core. Ed was looking pretty good today, as he had yesterday at the Giro, but a couple of the guys were starting to come off the back on the faster sections. Despite the rain and wet roads and constant wheelspray, there were still some attacks on the bigger hills, so this stretch was just as fast as usual, and it's usually very fast. Jay slingshotted past the group as we hit one of the longer climbs and put a big gap on us. We were practically to the turn onto Sie Jenkins Road by the time we caught him.

My legs were feeling pretty decent today, and we had picked up a pretty good tailwind, so I was happy with the fast pace. More than one rider, however, commented about the wisdom of going so hard in the rain on that old slippery macadam. Anyway, we regrouped at Plainview thanks to a flat tire and then headed back northwest right into the wind. I spent maybe a little more time hiding out in the back than I should have along this stretch.

Other than a brief stop at the Enon store on the way back, the pace was fairly steady today and I felt like I got in a good workout. Thanks to the rain I got back to the car with one of my two water bottles still full. Also thanks to the rain, my shoes were full as well. I really need to remember to drill some holes in the bottom of those Nike shoes. Later, as we pulled Woody's bike out of the car back in town, water poured out of the frame. As soon as I got home I got out the chain lube and cleaned things up. In the past when I've forgotten to do that I've found rust on the chain by the next morning.

Eggs and Ale

The humidity levels around here have been pretty impressive lately. While it's been fairly hot as well, you'd have to agree with the old adage, "It's not the heat, it's the humidity." So I walked out into that humidity at 6:30 this morning and immediately my glasses fogged over. I had a bag over my shoulder for the ride out to meet the Saturday Giro Ride because we were getting together for breakfast afterwards and I wanted both a bike lock and a pair of shoes I could walk in. I made it to the parking lot a few minutes before seven and found a place to stash my bag just in time to roll out with the handful of riders who were actually starting from the actual starting place at the actual starting time. The rest were somewhere up the road already because, well, I don't really know. We finally caught up to them as they hovered around the Elysian Fields traffic circle waiting for us.

There was little wind today, which made it relatively easy to sit in, even as the speed on Hayne Blvd. crept up into the 28-30 mph range. My legs weren't feeling too hot today. I don't know why, because I didn't ride at all on Friday. VJ was riding today, a notable achievement considering his bone-shattering crash in the Tour de La criterium barely six weeks ago. Anyway, I still got in a pretty decent workout, and by the time we got back to the parking lot I was soaked with sweat and out of water, which was normal under the circumstances. What wasn't normal was the extra-cold a/c at the cafe' where we had our meeting. After a few minutes of sitting there in my wet clothes I really started to get a chill and pretty much shivered my way through my breakfast of eggs and hash-browns. I probably should have had coffee instead of the two cold Cokes, but I don't think the coffee would have helped my hydration deficit.

One thing I had on my calendar for today was to finally replace the stripped water bottle boss on my aluminum Orbea. After riding home and taking a shower, I headed down to the basement workshop, pulled out the seat post, clamped the bike upside-down in the workstand and, with an abundance of caution, drilled out the old fitting. Later in the afternoon I went over to The Bicycle Connection to meet Robin, since he had installed a few of those before and had the special tool. It took just a minute to install, but I hung around for a while while Robin drilled out a similar fitting from Courtney's Seven. I didn't want to miss it if he accidentally slipped and put a hole through the back of Courtney's seat tube! Then it was back home to put everything back together. Along the way I learned that Mike Olheiser had won the elite national time trial championship. The guy has had a very busy month. Within the past few weeks he's won the masters national time trial, taken second in the masters road race, won the elite nationals road race, and won the elite nationals time trial. Oh, and he rode the Cascade Classic in-between. I wonder if he's feeling tired yet.

Well, by the time I got the bike back in shape it was time to try out the bottle of Abita Abbey Ale that I'd found at Robert's grocery the other day. I hadn't heard about this one, but it looked like my kind of beer. They even donate some of the sales to St. Joseph's Abbey near Covington. I always remember "The Abbey" because we'd go past it on our way to a little spot on the Boguefalaya River where we used to swim and camp when I was a kid. Anyway, I really liked this ale, and not just because it comes in a 650 ml bottle. It has a lot of flavor and is heavy with malt. Some people will probably hate it. No problem, because I'm not going to fight them for the Bud Light.

Tomorrow we've got a nice northshore ride on tap. I guess it'll be pretty hot, but I'm looking forward to it anyway. After that, I guess I'll have to start thinking about getting a new television set. Ours pretty much bit the dust a couple of days ago amid the smell of burning electronics. Power supply, I guess. Sure has been a lot of stuff breaking lately.