Double Tailwind

It was still warm and muggy Tuesday morning when I took off for the regular levee ride.  Down here in the real South (as opposed to, say, Atlanta) Spring is pretty much a done deal now and Summer is fast approaching.  Last week I dumped all of the winter riding clothes into the wash, looking forward to a summer full of mornings when I don't even bother to check the thermometer.  Up on the levee we had a pretty big group as we headed upriver.  It's now light enough at 6:15 am that I don't bother with the headlight any more, and strap on a little rear blinky light just for those mornings when it's cloudy.

So with a fair amount of horsepower at the front, assisted by a nice little tailwind, the group was rolling along at a pretty good clip. I was still mostly hanging out near the end of the paceline as we came around the bend a the country club and continued into River Ridge.  Up ahead there was someone walking or jogging on the right side of the road, and also a rider approaching from the other direction.  As sometimes happens, the timing was working out so that the collision alert warning was about to sound. The riders in front called out, "Slowing" or something to that effect as they started hitting the brakes and the paceline started to bunch up.  Ahead of me and a bit to the left I suddenly saw Doug's front wheel go horizontal and knew someone must have touched wheels.  There was a moment of warning as he tried to save it, but I wasn't sticking around to watch and immediately bailed onto the grassy side of the levee behind Tim.  By the time I got turned around and back onto the asphalt, Doug was sitting there on the river side of the levee looking both beat-up and stunned as he mumbled something to the effect of, "My wife is going to kill me."  It took a while before he finally stood up, and I gather that he may have bounced his head off of the pavement on the way down.  Mark G. gathered him up and they headed back as the group clipped in to continue the ride.  We later learned that Doug had broken something in his shoulder.

So the rest of the ride went smoothly out to the turnaround at Ormond, with a couple of easy miles as we started back, but then we noticed a huge dark cloud building to the northwest.  The pace ramped up a bit as riders started doing the calculations.  "If a cold front leaves the station at 7:15 going east northeast at 15 mph and the pack departs Ormond at 20 mph, will the riders get wet before they reach the playground?"  After a few more miles it was looking like we would easily outrun the rain, but right about that time, somewhere around River Ridge, I think, we suddenly felt a cold, cold downdraft.  The temperature must have dropped ten degrees in fifteen seconds and soon the wind shifted around to the north.  All of a sudden we had a tailwind on the way back after having had a tailwind on the way out.  That never happens, but I didn't hear any complaints.  I don't think the temperature got above 70F the rest of the day.

This morning there was a stiff north wind and it was chilly enough for knee and arm-warmers as I rode out to meet the morning ride. I guess the combination of cooler air and strong wind kept a lot of people in bed this morning because we had only Donald, Big Richard, Mignon and myself.  Despite the wind, though, it was a lovely morning and we had a good ride.  On the way out we ran into Roy Tedesco who was sitting on the side of the bike path apparently waiting for someone with a pump to come along.  We stopped and got his tire aired up and he rode with us out to the turnaround where he continued on as we headed back.  The river level is rising rather quickly right now and the difference between yesterday and today was immediately noticeable.  The nice thing about the rising water, though, is that as it begins to flood the batture we start seeing lots of wildlife.  There were at least four or five varieties of herons, lots of wood ducks, whistling ducks, and a big hawk with red shoulders.