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.