Powerless

Monday morning's ride was just an easy spin up on the levee. There was still just a bit of the weekend lingering in the legs and I figured a recovery ride was the best option. It was lonely and slow but by the end my legs were feeling fine. So you would have thought that this morning they'd be all recovered and ready for action, right? Yeah, me too.

When we started out this morning I felt perfectly normal. I was nice and warm with full tights, arm-warmers, vest, etc. to ward off the pre-dawn chill. With Woody and Howard and Brady in the group I knew it would get fast. It did. The only problem was that when I'd come out of the draft and hit the front I found that I had no power at all. I mean, I'd start out at the same speed as the guy who had just pulled off, typically around 25-26 mph, and watch my speed drop as I struggled to hold the pace. I started taking shorter and shorter pulls, but it wasn't really helping. Eventually I decided to skip a rotation and while I was back there try to tighten up my shoes. I had somehow left the velcro rather loose and the faster pace was causing my feet to slide forward, scrunching my toes in to the diminutive NIKE toe box. I did one shoe and a little gap opened. Max was dropping back after taking a pull and said something unpleasant about the fact that I wasn't pulling before slotting in ahead of me. I fiddled with the other shoe and then had a hard time closing the new gap I'd created. We were only a mile or so from the turnaround, but the next time the pace surged things kind of came apart. Jeff put in a hard pull as a gap opened, and when he started to fade I went around to try and close it, but I was losing ground the whole time. I pulled off expecting someone to come past, but when I glanced back I discovered that everyone else had backed off. Anyway, the bottom line is that I was just not feeling too sharp this morning, so on the way back I stopped at Zotz for a cup of dark roast and a few minutes to contemplate the meaning of life. It's nice to sit out there on the street and watch the little business district wake up in the morning. The Yoga place across the street has a class that must end right around when I usually get there, so I see those people walking to their SUVs so they can drive back home. Next to that shop is a furniture/decorating shop, and a women dressed a bit too nicely comes from around the corner to unlock the door and do whatever they do in there two hours before opening time. Next to that I can see someone straightening up the displays at the Super10. A typical morning on Oak Street.

So it's time to get down to brass tacks for the Tour de Louisiane. We had a little meeting last night to divide up some of the various pre-event duties - sponsorship solicitation, course arrangements, and various other decisions. We're hoping that we will be able to swing either City Park or the Superdome for the Criterium this year since Lakeshore Drive is all torn up and will remain that way until the levee work is completed next March. Hopefully one of those sites will work out and not cost us more than we can afford. Every few years we really need to break even on this race! At any rate, I'll probably put up a preliminary event announcement on the website today or tomorrow so I don't start getting calls asking if the event is going to happen. I mean, of course it's going to happen. There's just this little issue of exactly where.....

Long Rides in the Country

Unable to make the Tour de Tuscaloosa, I instead consoled myself with a couple of long rides in the country this weekend. Saturday we had an NOBC club ride on the calendar for the northshore. These rides are actually a lot of fun because they attract a nice mix of riders. The plan is to end up with two groups about mid-way through the ride so that nobody ends up getting dropped, lost, and calling me for directions from Bogalusa. I loaded up my backpack with an assortment of clothing options and rode out to Puccino's to hitch a ride with Viv at 7 am. Once over on the northshore, we had a nice little group of maybe ten, I guess. It was a lot colder over there than it had been on the southshore, and just to make it feel even colder, there was a fairly thick fog. I pulled on the knee and arm-warmers, a couple of jerseys, long gloves, etc. I knew it was supposed to eventually get up into the low 70s, but with a starting temperature of around 40 I just wasn't willing to be cold for those first ten miles. After all, that's what all those jersey pockets are for, isn't it?

The pace stayed mostly in the moderate range out to the turn at Highway 10 where we regrouped. At that point we kind of let the dogs loose so that there would be a faster "A" group and a slower "B" group. Pat told me that he would keep track of the "B" group and that they would take a little shortcut so that we could all meet up again at Enon for the final 14 miles back. This worked out pretty well. A small group of four or five formed and kept the pace fairly brisk until we all got back together. After leaving Enon, of course, there had to be a little push up the Watchtower Hill, and as usual that split the group up, so when we got to Tung Road I turned back and rode back in with a little group. Despite the relatively moderate pace, I found my legs a bit sore that afternoon. I guess I spent a lot more time out in the wind than usual. I put a little photo album up on the NOBC website with a few photos from the group ride.

So Sunday morning I headed back across the lake with Diego and Mignon for the regular Sunday northshore ride. The weather was a little warmer and the wind a little stronger, and I was expecting to get a pretty good workout. We started out with about a dozen, this time without the fog. As usual, I was warmly overdressed, and by the time we stopped just past Enon for a nature break and wardrobe adjustments I was more than ready to strip off the knee-warmers. I would have taken off the arm-warmers too, but I figured they wouldn't really be so much of a problem. The pace on this ride was fairly aggressive with some attacks and sprints thrown in for fun. I guess I'm still not feeling quite ready for the big sprint efforts, which isn't too surprising considering my training. We really need to work out someplace to have a weekday training race because the chances of me doing intervals and sprint workouts by myself are rather bleak. Anyway, we had a good hard pace on the back stretch as usual, and although a few people came off the back along there, most were back with us pretty soon. We didn't make many stops today, which was good. The longer we were out, though, the stronger the wind was getting. By the time we had to ride back toward the west on Hwy 1072 it was blowing pretty good. Most of the rest of the ride was in crosswind or headwind.

My legs were starting to feel the effects of two long rides in the hills, but in general they were still good. Even better, the right foot seemed quite happy. Perhaps that Specialized footbed and that little wedge I put in there are actually doing the trick. For the past few years it has been routine for me to have a lot of classic neuroma pain in my right foot by the time I hit 50 miles or so, especially on a hard ride. This weekend, however ..... no problems at all. I could definitely get used to this.

So anyway, today's ride was great, despite that little episode where the three deer bounded across Lee Road right in front of the group. Had to tap the brakes for that one. You never know if there's just one more deer waiting to come flying out of the underbrush on a collision course with your ribcage.

Almost Doored

How did it get to be Friday already? It's been kind of a busy week, and if time flies when you're having fun, it must fly even faster when you've got a few too many pots on the fire at once. To make matters worse, it was mostly a bad week for me riding-wise. Between the weather and various early morning obligations, I missed two days entirely, both of which were 'long' days. I was feeling so desperate for a ride that I got dressed early Thursday hoping that the line of showers on the radar would pass through in time. I pulled out the rain bike, put a rain jacket in my pocket, and was ready to head out into it. When I opened the door I was greeted by a loud clap of thunder, a gust of cold air, and a light rain. OK, so I guess I wasn't quite that desperate.

At least I got in a good ride this morning and it's looking pretty good for the weekend even though I had to pass on the Tour of Tuscaloosa. Today the weather was chilly and windy but the sky was clear and, eventually, the sun came up. When I got to the levee I wasn't really expecting anyone to be there. I saw Erich out for a long run in some sort of high-tech slippers that looked to be just slightly thicker than skin, so I rode alongside him for a little while until John showed up. We picked up Taylor somewhere along the way. At the turnaround, John started out earlier in order to do a few intervals so we kind of hung about a minute back until he got his fill and waited for us. Although I had started the ride feeling pretty sluggish, by the time I was on my way back home I was wishing I could ride all day. Well, that is until I missed getting doored on Oak Street by about a millimeter. Some woman had been sitting in her SUV for who knows how long talking on her damned cellphone when she suddenly swung her door open RIGHT in front of me. It took all of the bike handling skills I've acquired over the past four decades to keep from hitting it, and if there had been a car right behind me I'd probably have been roadkill. I actually pulled something in my shoulder while making that emergency maneuver. I initially screamed at her like a girl, then looked back and yelled, "Get off the phone and watch what you're doing," (well, there may have been an expletive or two in there somewhere) but she never took the phone from her ear and never stopped talking for a moment, nor did she even acknowledge my presence. Damn, if only I'd had a flashing rear light (see below)!

We're doing a club ride tomorrow on the northshore and I may return there on Sunday if the usual group ride happens, so hopefully I'll be able to put some miles in the bank.

Initial preparations for the 39th annual Tour de Louisiane are underway and if I can find the time I may put the preliminary event announcement on the website this weekend, although the location of the criterium is still up in the air and we don't yet have confirmations on the other courses, not that we're expecting to encounter any problems there. In the USAC news, it was great to see our trackies winning two gold medals in two days!

In other developments, the state's legislative season is rapidly approaching and as they say, "No man's life, liberty or property is safe while the legislature is in session." Margaret Thatcher put it a little differently when she long ago said, "Socialist governments traditionally do make a financial mess. They always run out of other people's money.....they then start to nationalize everything..." Aside from the national healthcare takeover and the state's healthcare privatization plans and budget freeze, on the cycling front there's a bill by representative Waddell from Shreveport on the table for the state legislature that would require bicycles to have flashing rear lights at all times, and a city proposal to increase the bicycle registration fee to $15 (I don't think there is any bicycle registration in neighboring parishes/cities). I'm sure they mean well, but really! Perhaps this is all just to divert attention from the fact that both the city and state are currently running on fumes, budget-wise, and the gas station is a very long way away. Or maybe it's just another effort by the city to get the people who might buy things to move out of town where they can buy them cheaper and without putting money into a parking meter after bouncing down our crumbling streets. You can contact councilman Troy Carter about that one.

I need a ride.

Expecting the Worst

The temperature was in the low 40s, the wind was in the mid-20s, I was still shivering uncontrollably from being out in it for two and a half hours and I'd left my knee-warmers at home. With two layers stuffed under my skinsuit and no warmup, I rolled to the start line looking for Jorge who was my teammate for the NOBC 2-Person Time Trial. He was still fussing with wheels (deep dish rims were looking kind of risky with the wind) and clothes but made it to the line with ten seconds to spare. I was expecting the worst.

My day had started around 5 am when I pulled on my base layer and new NOBC skinsuit, and covered it all up with a pair of jeans, a long-sleeve rugby jersey and a coat to go outside and load up the car. It was really dark and really windy and the temperature was somewhere around 42 in the city. Great weather for a time trial, eh? I arrived at the course in LaPlace around 6:30 and set up the popup shelter (which doesn't exactly "pop up" with only one person on hand), securing the two windward poles to my car so it wouldn't blow away. Soon the other club volunteers started to arrive and we got registration going a few minutes early. By then I was starting to shiver, and by the time we closed registration at 8:30 I was shivering so much it was getting difficult to hit the right keys on the computer. By 8:50 we'd started the stopwatches and dispatched our crew to the start line and turnaround(s), so I finally got the bike down from the roof of the car and then jumped inside to strip off my civilian clothes, revealing the hidden Action Figure skinsuit underneath. I stuffed another jersey under the skinsuit before zipping it up, and then started looking for my knee-warmers which, as it turned out, were sitting on my dresser at home. It was my first experience with wearing a skinsuit in cold weather like this - with arm-warmers, skullcap, full-finger gloves, and shoe-covers. I was still freezing, but it was time to roll.

So since neither Jorge nor I had gotten warmups, we started out fairly slowly. I was expecting the wind to be brutal, but once we got rolling and started to warm up, I realized it wasn't quite so bad. The course runs north and south, but the wind was coming mainly from the west. Most of the route has nice tall trees along the west side and they were pretty effective at blocking much of the crosswind. It felt like there was a bit of a tailwind component on the way out and we were going pretty good, mostly in the 25-27 mph range with a few brief surges up to 29 or so. I suppose we could have pushed it up another mph, but I was nervous about putting too much into it and then maybe falling apart on the way back. As expected, of course, the return trip was slower. We spent a lot of time in the 24-25 mph range, and the crosswind demanded one's constant attention, even when drafting. When we hit the long unprotected stretch along the Ruddock boat launch our speed dropped all the way down to 22 for a while, and it seemed like forever before we got back up to 25. Even so, I was a bit surprised that it wasn't as bad as I'd expected, and we crossed the finish line after the 40 kilometers with a time of 59 minutes flat. Under the circumstances, I was pretty happy with that. It turned out to be good for 2nd place in the 40+ and 8th overall, but not even remotely close to Tim and Woody's winning time of 55:32. So other than the fact that we probably lost six or seven hundred dollars on the event, which we did without an event sponsor and with low entry fees, it was still fun and things went pretty smoothly.

So this morning I figured I'd better get the legs moving for an hour or so, although by the time I finally got out the door after removing the clip-ons, changing wheels, putting on lights, etc., it was already too late to meet anyone who might have been similarly foolish enough to ride. The wind was still blowing and it still felt like winter, and I turned around early since I was only going 15-16 mph on the way out. I never saw any other riders this morning, but I was glad I'd ridden. The legs had been sore yesterday evening, but felt a lot better this morning.

End of the Week

It was chilly Thursday morning and I pulled on the long tights before heading out in the dark to meet the early ride on the levee. At least I wasn't late this time. I guess we had about a dozen up there. Sometimes when it's dark like this we're ten miles down the road before I know who all is actually there. I think I finally turned off the headlight somewhere out past the airport. Brett was with us today, riding PowerCranks again. I don't know how he does it. On the way home I asked him about it and he explained that he really uses them because they seem to benefit his running rather than his riding. So I'm glad I don't run much. The ride was was smooth and steady, and like the day before, we had a headwind more or less all the way back.

Today I didn't make it out in the morning. I had to take my dad to a pre-op appointment for a kind of routine procedure that you really don't want to know about. We were over at Baptist for a couple of hours and they were pretty thorough with the inquisition. As we were sitting in the waiting room I glanced out the door and thought I saw someone I recognized. Sure enough, it turned out to be Lesley who later came in to run through the questions for the anaesthesiologist, but not before mentioning that she had known me since Icebreakers. Veeery long time ago, back when the guys (we were all in grammar school) all wore button-down collar pastel colored shirts with matching socks, penny loafers, and pants short enough to show the socks. At least now my pants are a little longer. A runner and swimmer, she helped me out with my brief flirtation with off-season running in the early 80s, and a few years later was working at Baptist in obstetrics when The Daughter was born.

So I finally got the Rouge-Roubaix results uploaded to the USAC Results and Rankings database - only four errors came back, which is pretty good considering the number of riders. It took about a week to get all of the final times from the Chief Ref., and then I wanted to wait a few days for the smoke to clear since there are always a few typos. This year there were only two people who found incorrect times! Of course I found numerous incorrect or missing license numbers that I had to look up one by one. Now all I have to do is update the LCCS rankings. That shouldn't be too hard, although for the 50+ masters I'll have to sort out the 55+ guys since we use 55+ for the LCCS.

Sunday is our club's annual 2-Person Time Trial over in nearby LaPlace. There's a cold front coming through Saturday night and right now it's looking like the rain will be over with but the wind will likely be epic. The course is basically straight north and south, and I think that by the time the race starts there should be a hefty northwest wind blowing, probably in the neighborhood of 20 mph. I'm kind of hoping it will be more out of the north so we'll at least have that blazing fast return trip to the finish line.

Oh yeah, I still need to set up the registration and results spreadsheet and get a printer working and charge the clock and radios and figure out how to use LAMBRA's new printing stopwatch that handles something like 2,000 splits.

Surplus Recovery

After a nice but probably unnecessary recovery day on Monday, I was ready for a good Tuesday morning training ride. There were, however, complications, one of which was Daylight Savings Time which essentially robs those of us who ride in the morning of daylight and gives it to those of you who ride in the afternoons. It's just robbing Peter to pay Paul unless someone can figure out a way to slow the rotation of the earth, which would, of course, have other untoward global consequences. But I digress.

So I woke up on time but my brain was still clearly operating on CST. I looked at the thermometer and couldn't decide what to wear. Like I said, my brain was still on CST. I went downstairs and opened the door. It was dark and it felt cold, so I decided I needed knee-warmers. I put the headlight on the handlebars and the tail light on the seat bag. In the background the clock continued to tick, tick, tick. I went back upstairs and searched through the pile of cycling clothes on the bedroom chair. No knee-warmers. Brain still dysfunctional. I went back downstairs and searched through my bag. Everything inside is black this time of year. It was dark. I pull everything out, one by one. No knee-warmers. I'm getting pissed. The clock is ticking. Back upstairs to rummage through the bedroom. Still no knee-warmers. I am NOT riding without those damned knee-warmers. It's a matter of principle now. Tick, tick, tick.... Maybe I threw them in the laundry hamper? Ahhhh, there they are. Back downstairs with warm knees. Check the watch. Shit, I'm way too late to make the 6:15 start.

So I end up a good five minutes behind the group. It's pitch dark and the headlights from the oncoming traffic down on River Road are blinding me. I decide I'll just motor along and catch them on the flipside. I'm going pretty good with a nice tailwind as the sun finally starts to filter in, and then somewhere out near the airport I see a bunch of riders standing around fixing a flat. Actually one of them is sitting down surrounded by various and sundry tire implements. This is always a bad sign. We do not sit down to fix flats. It's a rule. Ask Robin.

It turned out that the rest of the group, which was rather small anyway, had continued on while these four or five had stayed behind to supervise the flat-fixing procedure, which is taking f o r e v e r. Soon after we got rolling again we saw Woody and Tim (or maybe Erich?) coming back. They must have turned around at the "little dip." We continue on, planning on hooking back up with the main group on its way back from Ormond. Then, a little while later we saw what was left of the "main group" coming back. They had apparently turned around early at The Dip. The guys in our group start asking each other if we are going to turn around too. I was determined to get in the full ride, however, so although we lost a couple of guys at the Dip, three or four continued on out to the Turnaround.

I knew the ride back was going to involve some headwind, but it didn't take long to realize I'd seriously underestimated it. There was a stiff and steady east northeast wind blowing and home was, basically, 21 miles away to the east southeast. The paceline quickly went silent and the pulls got short, the way pacelines do when everybody is just wanting to get it over with. Suffice it to say, it was a very long ride home on Tuesday. On the plus side, it was also a decent enough aerobic workout, and my legs were feeling reasonably recovered from the weekend. If aerobic workouts were what I needed right now, which they aren't, it would have been perfect.

This morning wasn't so good. I could hear the cars on the wet street when I awoke and one glance out the window confirmed that there was a very light rain. I considered, however briefly, putting on the rain jacket and taking the rain bike out again, but I knew the bike had a flat tire -- I really need to put some Mr. Tuffy's in those tires -- and I ended up pulling the covers back over my head and getting in an extra hour of "recovery sleep." Not that I needed it. In fact, I've accumulated quite a bit of surplus recovery time lately. At some point it's just no longer "recovery." I had told myself I'd just go for a ride this evening, but then I remembered that I have to pick up The Wife from the airport at 5:30. Oh well.....

Perhaps it's only me

So I slept late this morning and enjoyed every minute of it. I didn't feel guilty about not riding. Really. Even though the weather was beautiful today. Really. It didn't bother me at all. Really. So anyway, having basically nothing of interest to log on the ol' weblog.....

It it just me, or does Bike Snob just have this marvelous way with words?

"By yesterday, though, the worst of the storm was over, and I ventured out to survey the damage. At this time of year the world often seems simultaneously haggard and invigorated after a nor'easter--kind of like an amorous couple after a vigorous mutual garden-tending session."

So I got home today after work to find an empty dog food can rolling around on the living room floor. I could swear I'd put that half-full can back into the refrigerator. Maybe I left it on the counter? Or maybe The Dog has figured out how to open the 'fridge? Naah. I must have left it on the counter.

Way Up North

That missing hour of sleep hit me pretty hard this morning, but somehow I managed to drag myself out of bed anyway. My legs were feeling surprisingly good, and even better, the forecast was calling for a high in the 70s. Of course, it was still kind of chilly when I left the house, but I wasn't really prepared for the dramatic temperature drop way up north in Mandeville. By the time I arrived at Lee Road Junior High, the thermometer had dropped down to 40. But hey, the sun was out and the wind fairly light, so I dressed a little more lightly that I otherwise would.

We had a nice little group of maybe seven or so today, and a nice little tailwind as we headed north toward Enon. For some reason, I wasn't really feeling up going for any of the usual sprints today, but otherwise I felt pretty good. Early in the ride, Jaro broke a spoke on his Mavic wheel and because they use a special spoke wrench, we couldn't really do much about it except loosen the brake cable. I was kind of surprised that the wheel survived the ride just fine, even though Jaro went for a couple of the sprints.

Great Weather and a Little Crash

I got up early this morning so I could hit the Harrison Avenue Starbucks before the Giro Ride. The number of people meeting there at 6:30 am has been slowly growing over the last year or so and it's basically become the alternate Giro Ride start. I counted around 17 this morning when we rolled out to meet the rest of the group at Marconi and Robt. E. Lee. By the time we were at the base of the Seabrook bridge there must have been fifty riders in the group and I knew it would be a fast one. There was a strong and steady northwest wind blowing today, and considering the abundance of horsepower in the group, I was expecting a hard ride. In fact, I was looking forward to it. Now you would think that after all these years of riding the Giro I would have enough sense to stay near the front on a day like this, but no, there I was lounging around in the middle of the group when suddenly the pace jumped up. I don't even know where or when the split happened. All I know is that before I knew it there was a 30 second gap that was growing at an alarming rate and I was on the wrong side of it. A small chase group formed pretty quickly, but the twenty riders on the other side of the gap were already going at least 35 mph. Our group was going pretty hard, but even at 32 to 34 mph, we were steadily losing ground. After the ride I checked my maximum speed. I hadn't sprinted, and I hadn't gone hard on a downhill, but I still had a 38 mph maximum.

Anyway, our little group kept pushing, and I guess we limited our losses somewhat, but by the time we got near the turnaround we were at least 1:30 in arrears. I have to admit, I was kind of pissed with myself, although I'm confident that I got a sufficiently hard workout anyway.

So the return trip, which was largely into a 20-25 mph headwind, started out smoothly enough, but as we got closer to the Goodyear Sign sprint the pace started to heat up a bit. Riders started crowding the front anticipating the sprint. I was maybe ten riders from the front and looking forward to a good sprint when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw, or sensed, a couple of riders bumping into each other behind and to my left. I don't thing either of them went down, but somewhere behind them somebody must have zigged when the other person zagged and a few seconds later I heard the unmistakable sound of a crash. I slid over to the shoulder and hit the brakes so I could turn around. There were a couple of riders on the ground - Mignon and Erich. Luckily they weren't too badly hurt. Also, luckily, the car that was about to pass the group stopped in time. Erich ended up with road rash on his chin. Mignon must have tumbled quite a bit because she did a little damage to all the usual places. Both were back on their bikes and riding strongly fifteen minutes later, although I suspect the next day or two will be a little uncomfortable for them.

So despite the wind and the crash and missing the break, the weather today was spectacular. Blue skies, temperature in the 60s, low humidity. It was nice, really nice. After the ride we met for breakfast and a little club meeting to try and get our act together for the upcoming 2-Person Time Trial. I went over to Freret Hardware to pick up some marking paint and then drove out to the TT course in LaPlace so I could check the course and freshen up the paint markings for the start, finish and turnarounds. Since it's so close to St. Patrick's day, I used green paint this time. Tomorrow I'll hit the northshore for a little training ride in the country. Since my legs seem to have survived today without much damage, and since the weather is looking to be nice again, I'm looking forward to that too.

River Fog and Wheelspray

Temperature-wise, it is starting to feel more like early Spring around here, but of course that means more southerly winds. More southerly wind means a better chance of rain, which is exactly what we got last night. By morning, in this case 5:45 am, the streets were still pretty wet but the temperature was in the low 60s, so I aired up the tires on the old rain bike, hopped up on the vintage Concor saddle, clipped into the old Shimano/Look pedals, shifted into the 44 chainring with the old Simplex retro-friction lever, and headed for the levee. I knew it would be foggy again and I wondered if anyone would show up considering the wet streets. I needn't have worried. It seems that the warmer weather trumped the wet streets for most people, so we ended up with maybe fifteen riders. Well, that's before three of them flatted, anyway. Even Mike W. showed up. With Lakeshore Drive pretty much out of commission lately, we've been seeing more of the lakefront riders on the levee. We had a light tailwind for much of the way out, and if it hadn't been for the occasional patches of dense fog, I'm sure we would have been flying. As it was, the fog definitely kept the speed down a bit, although we were definitely pushing the comfort level, visibility-wise. In light of the conditions, and my personal distaste for wheelspray, I was keeping a bikelength or two between me and the rider in front of me. The Rain Bike's fenders kept the bike, and my backside, pretty clean, but I still got enough wheelspray to arrive home fairly wet and quite dirty, at least when viewed from the front.

On the home front, The Wife is out of town at a conference until next week so I have full-time dog-walking duties. I think Renzo is slowly coming around. He's still hesitant to approach, even when I'm holding his full food bowl in my hand, but if I lead him to the bowl he'll happily stay and eat with me in the room. The way to a dog's heart is through his stomach. Mine too.

For a really good writeup on Rouge-Roubaix, you really ought to take a look at Brian Toone's blog. He gives a great description of what it was like in the middle of the Cat. 1/2/3 race.

Quick Recovery

I felt like I was back to my normal dull routine today. I'd skipped riding on Monday because my legs were still quite sore from R-R, but Tuesday morning I was back on the bike for the long levee ride. As Tuesday morning rides go, this one was pretty tame. It had rained during the night and the road was wet when we started out. In fact, we weren't too far up the river when we picked up a light drizzle, so we were wet from rain or wheel-spray for most of the ride. The temperature was warmer, however, so it was more messy than cold. I was still feeling my legs every time I'd try to make a hard effort to close a gap or something, but in general I was feeling fairly well recovered. I guess that since I'd ridden all of the dirt sections essentially alone I never had to make any of those really, really hard efforts that would normally be required to stay with the group. The result is that I seem to be making a nice quick recovery, at least for an old guy. The young guys were probably all back to normal by Monday night.

This morning the temperature was around 60F and although the sky was overcast, the chance of rain had been lowered from earlier predictions. I rolled out toward the levee feeling pretty good, but when I made the turn onto Willow Street and looked way, way down the road toward the river I said to myself, "Damn! It's going to be foggy." It's amazing how often I forget about the possibility of fog, only to be surprised once again when I hit the river. I should have known. The combination of a warm and humid south wind and the icy cold river water pretty much guarantees some fog along the levee. My glasses were fogged up and in my pocket within two miles, but in general the fog was only thick in patches here and there. We did get surprised by an oncoming truck at one point, but otherwise it was manageable. The ride back toward town was a little harder because of the headwind and crosswind, but everyone was taking really long steady pulls so you didn't really notice it much until your rare turn at the front came up.

I've been collecting a few photos from Rouge-Roubaix to put on the LAMBRA website. People have sent me everything from cellphone snapshots to really nice photos and I'll have to pick just three or four for the LAMBRA home page that I can crop down to a smaller size without losing too much of the images. Maybe tonight. I'm anxious to get the individual finish times from Ricky so I can update the results. The times really tell the story in this race. The other thing that tells the story is the over placing within each race. For example, where did the 1st place Cat. 3 rider finish in the "A" race? It should be interesting. Although most people posted their photos to Facebook, where only other Facebook users can see them, Allen Richard put up his album on Picasa and his photos are pretty good:

Allen Richard's Photos from Rouge-Roubaix

Not According to Plan

An 80 mile time trial wasn't quite what I'd been expecting, but sometimes these things happen, I guess. This is going to be a long one, so you might want to go refill your coffee cup at this time.....

The alarm had gone off promptly at 4:10 am Sunday morning, leaving me just enough time to dress, eat, make coffee, and load up the car for the trip to St. Francisville for the twelfth annual Rouge-Roubaix. I picked up Mignon right on time and we were on the road by 5, just as planned, and even with a stop for coffee in Baton Rouge (the Starbucks on College opens at 6:00!) we arrived with plenty of time to register and transfer the LAMBRA equipment to Ricky. This was partly because I latched onto the draft of Woody's truck as it flew past me at 80 mph on the interstate. It was 39F when we arrived, but the sky was clear and I knew it would warm up quickly. Most riders were going without even knee-warmers and I followed suit on that, although I still pulled on my arm warmers and an old jersey as base-layer. It was still pretty chilly for our group's start, around 8:20. The combined Women/Masters field was a nice manageable size (58 rides), the pace was moderate at best, and I rather was enjoying the novelty of having so many good women racers in the group. Right after we end of the neutral section one masters rider rolled off the front and since I happened to be on his wheel I followed. He wasn't going all that fast so I figured it would help me warm up a little. Eventually he looked back and realized the whole pack wasn't behind him. We took a couple of pulls as we waited for the rest of the group to wake up.

So things were going along according to plan. Than, when we were just 17 miles into the ride and I was starting to think about the first gravel section at 22, I felt my front tire suddenly go all squishy. Damn. I raised my arm so people could go around me as I dropped back. It was a bit of a challenge to control the bike on the rough pavement with a flat front. I glanced behind me and saw a following car, so once I got to good spot I hit the brakes, pulled over and removed my front wheel just in time to see the following car drive right past me. Huh?? I stood there dumbfounded for a moment, then I realized it wasn't the wheel truck. In fact, the wheel truck was nowhere in sight. --Game Over-- So I put the wheel back on and got rolling again, thinking I'd at least limit the damage until I could get a wheel. Unfortunately, I had to go really slowly and almost lost it a couple of times as the flat tire squirmed around on the rim. After a couple of miles of that the following car finally showed up. Someone else had flatted just before me and so they had been attending to that. The following car wasn't the one I'd put my wheels into, however, so although I got a perfectly good wheel, it didn't have a magnet so I'd have to ride the rest of the ride in Retro mode - no computer, no speedometer, and most importantly no odometer. Oh well. By then I guess I was at least ten minutes behind, so it was going to be a training ride for me.

Shortly after I'd gotten rolling again I passed the follow car pulled off to the side and noticed Jorge and Rich just getting back on their bikes. I thought one of them must have flatted and the other stayed to help. There were a couple of other guys right up the road, so I caught up to them and started looking back for Jorge and Rich. I could see a few more riders back there, including Jorge and Rich, chasing. I backed off and waited for them and pretty soon it was just the three of us. I thought, "Great! Now at least I'll have a couple of teammates to ride with." So we got a nice little paceline going for a few miles. Just before we got to the first gravel section I heard Jorge say something about the gravel, and next thing I knew he was way off the back. I think Rich dropped off just as we started the gravel, so I was on my own again. At least I was able to pick my own line! This section of unpaved road was OK, but I swear the gravel rocks were bigger than usual. They must be using a cheaper grade! As I neared the end of this 7 mile stretch I started picking up some of the riders who had lost contact with the main pack, but none of them stayed with me when I went past, so once I was back on the asphalt I was alone again. After a few miles a rider came flying past me on the left so I got out of the saddle and latched on. I thought it must be a strong rider from our group who had flatted. No such luck. I saw his number and quickly realized it was a Cat. 4 rider from the race that had started 15 minutes behind us, so I backed off a few bike lengths so I was out of the draft and just tried to hold the gap. This was good because I didn't have a speedometer. After another few miles he sat up to wait for the lead Cat. 4 group that was closing in on him, and once they passed me I figured I'd pace myself off of them too, so I positioned myself four or five bike lengths off the back alongside the motoref, and that's basically how it stayed for a long, long time. They weren't going particularly fast so I wasn't having any trouble holding the gap, but I knew I'd eventually pay for the effort.

After a while I could see a small group about 45 seconds ahead of them that had to be one of the masters/women groups. We were slowly catching them, so I figured it would be pointless to try and make the bridge solo. Once we caught, the masters were relegated to the off-the-back position like me, but at least I was back among my own kind again! A few miles before the second gravel section, two of us went past the Cat. 4s and started working together. This was probably the nicest part of the whole ride for me, but it didn't last long. We were still ahead of the 4s as we made the turn and crossed the old wooden bridge, but just as we hit the gravel I heard the lead Cat. 4s coming up fast from behind. Halfway up the long climb there was what was basically a sand trap and everyone had to dismount and walk. I had already let most of the Cat. 4s go, and since I was hopelessly off the back of my own race I wasn't really too motivated to kill myself on this section just to stay with a group I couldn't work with, so once again I was all alone. This section wasn't too bad except that between my failing eyesight and the vibration I really couldn't focus on the road on the downhills. I may as well have been riding the downhills with my eyes closed and there were more than a few "Oh Shit!" moments, but somehow I survived and emerged on the other end all alone once again. The long time trial was starting to wear on me now and my troublesome right foot was really hurting despite the $45 Specialized footbeds, but I was otherwise rolling along at a respectable enough pace. Just before the start of the last gravel section at around 80 miles I passed the guy with whom I'd been off the front at the start.

Maybe it was my imagination, or perhaps exhaustion-induced delirium, but the rocks on this road were huge! Just as I started up the impossibly steep climb in my 39x25 (all I had) I hit this section of washboard that almost knocked me right off the bike. Right after that the big rocks knocked my front wheel sideways and since I was barely moving at that point I figured I may as well walk it up the rest of the way. There was one guy who had been behind me who came past and made it all the way up. I rode the rest of this gravel section alone, coasting down the downhills and using the guy who'd passed me to keep me motivated. Toward the end of the gravel he pulled ahead and I lost sight of him. I spent the next fifteen miles or so in a very dark and lonely pain tunnel. The legs were still working OK, but I really had no idea what my speed was and didn't really care much anyway. This section of the course is theoretically paved, but some sections definitely stretch the definition of "paved." Without an odometer, I kept trying to figure out how far I had to go, but there really aren't many landmarks along this stretch. At one point I really thought I was on the last stretch until I came to yet another turn arrow. Damn, that was demoralizing.

The race crosses a low-water bridge that's maybe five miles before the finish and just before I got there a small group of Cat. 4s with two masters tagging along caught me, so at that point I latched onto them for the last few miles to the finish, putting in a little sprint up the last hill just for show. All-in-all, it was pretty disappointing to have missed out on the real race, but it was certainly a worthy training ride nonetheless. It was the first time I'd ever flatted in this race, and although I haven't done an autopsy on the wheel yet, I think it must have been a pinch flat because I'd whacked a pothole pretty hard about a mile before it went flat. I think if the wheel truck had been available at the time and I'd gotten a reasonably quick wheel change I could have caught before the gravel because the pace hadn't been particularly fast.

After the race I had my fill of Pastalaya and Shiner Bock, and found out that the reason Jorge and Rich had been stopped earlier had been to attend to teammate Dave Patterson who had crashed and landed in a barbed wire fence! I talked to him that night. He had gotten pretty cut up and needed some stitches for his face and superglue for his ear, but at least he hadn't suffered a concussion when his head whacked the fence post. Note to self: avoid barbed wire fence when crashing. It's around noon on Monday right now and my quads are still pretty sore! Today is going to be a revovery day.

Another Season

It was a little bit warmer this morning as I rode out the lakefront. As I made my way north on the quiet early-morning streets I formulated my plan. You see, tomorrow is Rouge-Roubaix, and even if it's not exactly on your "A" race list, you definitely don't want to start this one with sore legs. I figured I'd head out with the Saturday Giro Ride, remaining safely in the draft, and then turn around somewhere between the end of Hayne Blvd. and Chef. Highway. There was a little surprise waiting for me on Lakeshore Drive, however. As I approached the intersection with Canal Blvd., I could see a big crane at work, and as I got closer I could also see that the road was closed off. Damn. I looked at my watch. 7:00 am and not sign of the group. They must have taken Robert E. Lee. So I turned around and started back. When I saw Brett coming toward me I told him about the closure and he turned around too. We made our way to Robert E. Lee and then to Leon C. Simon, picking up Brady along the way. I knew we were ahead of whoever had started at the parking lot because Brett was rolling along at a pretty good clip. I told Brady I was going to wait somewhere around the bridges, but after we came over Seabrook I looked up ahead and could see a whole bunch of riders waiting at the top of the Casino bridge. Hmmm. We stopped when we got to them, and although I told them that there were definitely riders behind us, the front of the group rolled out anyway and, of course, we all followed. I ended up turning back at Chef Highway with Brady, and we later picked up Robin and Keith, so we had a nice spin back to the lakefront and I got home with a nice smooth 45 miles under my belt.

Later in the day I cleaned up the bike (for the first time in at least a month) and charged up all of the LAMBRA radios. I decided to swap out one of my carbon water bottle cages - the one that doesn't grip the bottles well - with a good stainless steel one. Don't want to be launching bottles in the middle of the group. It took quite a long time to get my act together for this race, but eventually the bag was packed, the radios and cameras and race clock were fully charged, and the lit to the Great White Box (GWB) was clamped shut.

Tomorrow I'll start yet another racing season by jumping in the deep end. I miss the old days when the Season Opener was a nice little 25 mile road race with a $2 entry fee and a bottle of wine for the winner. I guess this will be my 39th or 40th racing season. Tomorrow I'll be up around 4:15 to load up the car with the GWB, clock, stand, flags, chairs, etc., with the plan to be on the road at 5:00. That should get me to St. Francisville by 7 am. I'll then have to transfer the officiating equipment to the Chief Referee, Ricky, and then make the crucial wardrobe decisions. With a morning temperature of around 40 F, but a forecast high in the mid-60s, I guess I'll have to be kind of cold for the first hour or so. I guess the big decision will be whether or not to wear the knee-warmers. I probably will, since I don't think my knees have seen sunshine in months anyway. Arm-warmers? Definitely. What I'm really hoping for is a late start!

Crazy is as Crazy Does

Yes, I went ahead and signed up for Rouge-Roubaix again, this time without adequate fitness and with very, very mixed feelings about a $79 entry fee for a one-day race with no cash prizelist. Somehow the masters got left out of the prizelist altogether this year, which probably explains the huge Cat. 1/2/3 field. It's also the first year that the masters aren't racing with the 1/2/3s. The but prizelist for Cat. 1/2s and the Cat. 3s has drawn a lot of horsepower to the race this year. I expect carnage, pure and simple, but somewhere in the back of my mind I'm still kind of wishing I'd entered as a Cat. 2 instead of a Master. Hope springs eternal. They'll almost certainly hit the 125-rider field limit, and considering that some of the roads in the first 25 miles or so are way too narrow and winding for that, it may get a little chaotic if one or two of the teams gets aggressive early. Mitch is thinking about the possibility of separating the Cat. 3s into a separate race, but that won't be so simple. For one, he'll need to come up with the additional support vehicles, and for another it will probably piss off some of the teams that have Cat. 3s who they are counting on to cover things for the team leaders. Anyway, I'll be riding with the old guys and the girls, and since the latter are competing for real prizes, I wouldn't be surprised if they end up controlling the race. I hope all of the masters and women can also control their bikes. As usual, my personal opinion about riding this race again is that I am obviously just plain crazy. Now there's a news flash! At least the weather forecast is calling for moderate temperatures and a low chance of rain.

This morning's long levee ride started out pretty chilly but the sun was out in full force and it really warmed up quickly. It was the first morning this year that I've gone out to meet the 6:15 am ride without my headlight. Guess it must be Springtime. I think we just get a week or two of early morning daylight before we switch over to daylight savings time, though. Anyway, we had a good group this morning and the relatively light wind made it easy for everyone to stay together despite the not insignificant effort being made by those pulling at the front. I did a good amount of pulling myself, actually. Brett was riding Powercranks today and at one point when I was behind him in the paceline I thought, "I wonder why Brett doesn't look as smooth as usual." Then, of course, I remembered about the Powercranks. Normal humans probably couldn't ride 45 miles on those things on a good day.

So I broke down yesterday and ordered a pair of Specialized Body Geometry footbeds. I figured it would be worth the experiment to see if the metatarsal button built into them has any positive effect on my hotfoot problem. It's not likely I'll use any of the varus wedges that come with them since I've never had any hint of knee tracking issues, but if they help with the neuroma problem they'll be well worth it. We'll see.

Shoulder to the Wind

I knew it would be bad. It had stormed Monday evening so heavily that I had to call for extraction from work. One of the entrances to the parking lot had been so flooded that we didn't dare drive through it in the Volvo and instead took the longer way home. Later that night the weather forecasters were talking mainly about the wind, and indeed it was strong enough to knock out power here and there around the metro area.


Our crazy dog seemed kind of restless and even uncharacteristically wandered back to the study to see what I was doing late that night. As soon as I turned to look at him he freaked and ran back to the bedroom where he could cower on the floor next to The Wife. The poor guy was obviously abused by someone, probably a man, because he is still rather fearful when he finds himself alone with me, even though I have taken to walking around the house with dog treats in my pocket.


When I got up to ride this morning, the rain had moved off to the East and the streets were at least thinking about drying up. I didn't really want to get on the bike. There was a north wind that must have been in the 20-25 mph range, the temperature was in the low 40s, and the sky was cloudy, but like I said, I knew it would be bad. It was.


I guess I got to the levee more or less at the usual 6:15 am time, but as I'd expected, it was deserted so I didn't even slow down. As soon as I felt the full force of the wind I made the easy decision to shorten the day's ride to 20 miles since, at the speeds I would be going, it would probably take just as long as the usual 26 mile ride. Doing the regular Tuesday long ride, alone, in that wind, did not even enter my mind. I probably spent most of the headwind and crosswind sections of the ride in a 39 x 14, plugging along at 12-15 mph. The crosswinds were so strong that I had to really put my shoulder to the wind and lean the bike a few degrees just to remain upright. I passed Erich, who was running, and on the way back I saw Jon on his way out. Otherwise, I had the levee pretty much all to myself. This was good, because I occasionally needed a bit more real estate than usual when the crosswind would try to push the front wheel out from under me. At least I got in a ride. It wasn't fast and it wasn't fun and it probably wasn't all that great of a workout, but sometimes you just have to put your shoulder to the wind and do the ride anyway.

Winter Camp Weekend

Driving up to Percy Quinn in a rainstorm wasn't exactly how I'd wanted to start our annual training camp weekend. I had packed pretty much everything I owned, just in case we were going to be riding in a cold rain. In fact, I was kind of expecting that we'd be riding in a cold rain at some point. By the time we arrived, though, the rain was already much lighter. Even better, the cabins we had this year was much nicer -- cable TV, functional heat, and even a fireplace. Still, went I hit the sack that night, I was still not holding out much hope for the morning.

Things were looking better at 7 am, though. The rain had stopped, and the radar looked pretty good even though the sky was still overcast and the temperature was in the 30s. We decided to wait until around 9 am before departing on our planned 85 mile ride, which turned out to be a good move. Additional riders started to filter in, and by the time we headed out we had a group of around 14 rolling down the road with a nice little tailwind. The day's ride would take us south on the MS Tour route for a sweet out-and-back ride. As always, we had a fairly diverse group, but nobody was really lagging and nobody was really surging, so things were nice and smooth. For most of the day, in fact, we rode a steady double paceline. When we came to an intersection about 30 miles out we noticed a touring tandem stopped at a little store there, so we decided it would be a good place for a quick stop. By then the sky had cleared up, the temperature had risen, and it was a beautiful day.

The tandem riders were on their way from southern Florida to Oregon, and more than one of us questioned why you would choose to take such a long tour in a northwest direction in the winter! Anyway the ride out to the turnaround was smooth, and for the last few miles we let the dogs loose so the fast riders could kill themselves racing to the top of the long hill. After that, we regrouped and started the long ride back into the headwind. I guess we had 25 miles or so to go when things started to string out and the group started to split up. By the time we got the the last intersection the front group was down to just three, the gap was measurable with a sundial, and my right foot was absolutely on fire, so we stopped for a while while I rubbed my problem foot and waited for everyone to regroup one last time. After ten or fifteen minutes everyone had arrived, my foot was feeling much better, and we were starting to get chilled. Just as we got back on the bikes, though, Kenny said, "I have a flat!" We sent most of the group ahead while we fixed it. It turned out that he'd put some Slime style tire protectors in recently and the sharp edge had worn a hole in the tube. The next day he'd have the same problem with the same wheel, so the tire protector came home in his pocket instead of his tire.

That night we had a big food festival. Steve had prepared three different pasta and chicken dishes, there was cheesecake, wine, beer, snacks, a big salad that Mignon made in one of the ice chests, etc. And of course we had some good discussion about racing plans for the 2010 season, general race strategy, training, etc. We even went out and collected some firewood so we could get the fireplace going. A combination of ingenuity and brute force was required to reduce some of the firewood to a size that would fit into the little fireplace.

Sunday morning's plan featured a shorter 45-mile ride with lots of chip-seal roads. For the most part we kept the group together on this ride, only putting the hammer down for the last five miles or so. All-in-all it was a great weekend. The weather was a lot better than I'd been expecting, and although the congestion in my lungs is still not quite cleared up, I felt pretty good on the rides, especially considering my last two weeks of woefully inadequate training time. Now the question is whether to plunk down that obscene amount of cash to enter Rouge-Roubaix, knowing that I'm nowhere close to being ready for it.