The back of the pack can be a dangerous place. In return for a good draft and easy pedaling, you always flirt a bit more closely with disaster. That fact was driven home today no fewer than three times.
Because of an early Sunday ticket to ORD and planned subsequent cross-country adventure to what is practically the farthest point in the contiguous Unites States from New Orleans, I had to pass on the Vuelta de Acadiana races over in Lafayette this weekend. The consolation prize, as usual, would be the trusty old Giro Ride. Friday night was the annual welcoming party for the new Psychiatry residents. It's a nice casual affair with hamburgers, salad, Plum Street snoballs and ad libitum wine and beer. At least one of those ingredients must have been responsible for the difficulty I had getting going this morning. However difficult it was, however, I still dragged myself out of bed and was on the road by 6:10 am, headed for my Saturday iced coffee at Starbucks. Since it was a holiday weekend, and since there was a race in Lafayette, I wasn't expecting a very big turnout. That expectation was confirmed, to a certain extent, but fortunately we still managed to gather the quorum necessary for a good Giro Ride.
I was thinking it might be an easy one, but by the time we were a couple of miles down Hayne Boulevard I knew it wouldn't be. Kenny was really on a tear today. At one point I found myself on his wheel as took a monster pull that must have been three miles long at an average speed of at least 29 mph. When he finally pulled off I pulled for maybe twenty-five pedal strokes before I had to retreat to back of the paceline. That turned out to be a bit of a mistake.
So we're flying down what's left of Paris Road, and come across the I-10 overpass, dropping down to the I-510 spur where we have to two lanes of interstate traffic to get to the right lane and, about a mile later, the exit ramp. I'm sitting near the back of the pack, and glancing over my right shoulder I can see a couple of cars coming around the curve. I yell, "Cars!" The first car goes past, the next is coming. The front of the paceline cuts in front of the car to the right lane. By the time the back of the paceline gets there, the car is overlapping the riders ahead of me and the driver is completely confused. I see the brake lights go on and have to hit the brakes to keep from slamming into the back of the car. Crap. By the time I extricate myself and go around the bewildered motorist there's a big gap to the rest of the field. I pick up Scott and and shift into time trial mode. The group is not slowing down, but at 25 mph or so I'm generally holding the gap steady. We come off of the interstate and make the left turn onto the service road, running through a red light in the process. Somewhere along the service road I lose Scott, but I'm not quite ready to throw in the towel yet because there's a pretty good chance they'll ease up for a little while when they get to Chef Highway. I luck out and don't have to slow down as I turn onto Chef, and up the road I can see the group spreading our across the road. This is my only chance, so I bury myself for half a mile and finally catch them before the pace ramps up again.
Back in the pack I figure I'll stay near the back for a while to recover. Apparently I'm a slow learner. Kenny is driving the pace again and it hardly ever drops below 27,so I'm still hanging out near the back. Somewhere around Highway 11, I hear, and then see, a little dog dash out from a driveway into the back of the pack. I immediately have one of those deja vu experiences. I swear, my collarbone started to ache! The front of the paceline didn't even see the dog, but at the back there is chaos. The dog, suddenly realizing he's in the middle of a pack, panics and starts bouncing around like a squirrel in a pinball machine as riders swerve and slam on their brakes. I've got two handfuls of brake myself, and feel my rear wheel come momentarily off the ground, but then somehow the dog makes it to the shoulder and we're all past him. A short chase and we're back to the group just in time for the pace to ramp up again.
As we made our way back from the turnaround the temperature got higher, the pace got slower, and the conversation sagged. As I rode back up town with Brett all he could talk about was how good that cold recovery drink he had waiting at home was going to taste. Shortly after I got back home, and still in my sweaty riding clothes, I fire up the laptop to watch the live video feed from the first stage of the Tour de France. It's looking like it will be a big pack sprint until, about 7 km from the finish, one of the riders nails an errant spectator and riders start going down like dominos. Only the riders near the front were spared. The rest will get to start Day 2 of the Tour over a minute down on GC.
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