The Weekend Already?

It was the shortest of weeks and it was longest of weeks. Every day I'd tell myself, "I'll post an blog update tonight," and every day I'd fall asleep before I did. So here it is Friday night. It's pouring down rain outside thanks to one of those little unpredictable summer thunderstorms, and I still need to get my act together for tomorrow's team time trial over near Baton Rouge. Since I have to bring a bunch of essentials for the race (generator, clock, etc., etc.) I'll need to leave around 6 am.

So this was a long and hot week. Tuesday's long levee ride was kind of strange. The ride out to the turnaround was mostly pretty civilized until we got way out past the dip. At some point I think Donald got irritated at Howard's surges, and by the time things really got rolling on the way back I had the distinct feeling that they were battling each other up at the front. Brady was there too, so the bottom line was that the ride back was way faster than the ride out. That evening I went out to the Arena for a little practice criterium. I wasn't really into it, but nonetheless got in a pretty good workout. I was impressed with Steven Noya who launched a couple of really strong and well-timed attacks. That afternoon I'd learned that Stan Truxillo, who was a very active racer and NOBC president for a few years before moving to Texas in the mid-80s, had collapsed on a bike ride with a "massive" heart attack. Someone administered CPR and luckily the hospital in Austin was equipped to put him into therapeutic hypothermia right away. I was still fearing the worst, but when they warmed him back up early Thursday and he came out of the induced coma he seemed to be in great shape. He's now scheduled for bypass surgery on Tuesday.

By Wednesday morning I was still not feeling fully recovered from the weekend, much less the previous day, and although the morning ride was smooth and steady, I probably should have done an even easier recovery ride alone. I was certainly wishing I had on Thursday morning when the levee ride got pretty fast. Then, on the way back, I found myself off the front with VJ and Rob, both of whom were on their TT bikes. It was like doing ten miles of motorpacing. I think I went to the front twice and very briefly at that. This morning's ride was a pretty typical Friday ride, which was a good thing. Hopefully my legs will still be functional tomorrow.

In the meantime, a number of LAMBRA riders have been up in Louisville at Masters Nationals. It hasn't been going too well for some of them, apparently. I haven't gotten any reports from them yet, but I've been surprised at how far down some of the area's strongest masters have been finishing in the Road Races. On the plus side, Debbie Milne won her Road Race for the second year in a row, apparently finishing something like five minutes ahead of 2nd place. The criteriums start tomorrow.