Out with a whimper

You would think that the week between Christmas and New Year's Day would be filled with long training rides and piles of miles.  Indeed, it should.  In fact, it wasn't.  Last weekend I did two Giro Rides, both in uncomfortably cold weather and with uncomfortably sore legs. The legs were sore because I spent a few hours on Friday removing part of a large Sweet Olive tree so that the chimney repair guys could get a 40-foot ladder in the right place to re-point my chimney.  It's been leaking whenever there has been a driving rain, and as it turns out, the brick were being held in place primarily by gravity rather than mortar.  So while the gutted kitchen awaits the post-holiday return of the contractor, the chimney guys spent about six hours working on the chimney which is now only the vent for the furnace.  It was not inexpensive, but at least it's no longer clogged up with the remnants of a squirrel or bird nest and should now be more or less watertight.  Meanwhile, I spent hours and hours scraping paint off of an old door that had been down in the basement for probably fifty years so that I could use it to replace the one that the burglar kicked in a few years back.  I put a third coat of polyurethane on one side of it tonight, and a third coat of stain-killer paint on the wall stains from the chimney leak.  Anyway, all of this extracurricular labor left me sore all over for the Saturday Giro.  It was bad day to have sore legs. A cold front had come through, leaving us with a morning temperature in the upper 30s and a cold wind that can be described only as "brutal."  I wasn't going to be able to do the long ride to Slidell anyway, but in this case I was not feeling particularly deprived in that respect. There were a few riders in town from Lake Charles for the Saturday Giro, and the predictable result was that the pace got really fast once we hit Hayne Blvd, despite the wind.  Halfway down Hayne, when the pace once again surged, I eased up behind another rider to look for a little more shelter nearer the back.  Bad move. As it turned out, the back of the pack was already off the back and the few riders left behind us immediately streamed past at way too high of a speed for us to be able to latch on.  So before I knew what had happened, three of us had been spit unceremoniously out the back.  The paceline ahead was still accelerating, so when I saw us coming up on the intersection with Bullard Avenue I said, "Take a right here!"  That little shortcut usually gets you a couple of minutes by the time you meet back up with the group a few miles downrange.  When we arrived at the service road, however, the group was nowhere in sight. As it turned out there had been a flat near the end of Hayne Blvd.  Eventually they showed up, at about 30 mph, of course, before easing up for a moment on Chef Highway to regroup.  Then a long rotating paceline formed up as the pace again increased.  As Matt dropped back past me I noticed his front quick release was completely released!  It took me a little while to get back to him to tell him.  I guess that's why they still put those lawyer tabs on the fork ends.  At the turnaround a number of crazy people continued on to Slidell, so relatively speaking the return trip was civilized.  Then, as we were coming back down Hayne Blvd., Chip mentioned that his handlebars had come loose and said he thought he could probably make it back. Really?  Loose handlebars on a bike are not to be taken lightly, and since I had a multitool with me we stopped to tighten it up (he had just gotten it back from the shop!). 

Sunday was practically more of the same, except that it was even colder at the start and there was even less horsepower in the group.  On the one hand, that kept the pace within normal bounds.  It was still kind of a miserable ride for me, though, since my legs felt like blocks of wood the whole time.  Even this morning it was still pretty cold when I met a couple of the guys up on the levee at the relatively luxurious hour of 7 am. The night before I'd had the idea that I might get in one last long ride for 2012, but it was not to be and I returned home after a modest 30 miles.  The Corps of Engineers has its "Mat Sinking" rig tied up near Oschner this week.  I guess they must be putting down some more concrete matts to prevent the river from scouring out a new path at the bend.

So we placed orders for an actual official finish line camera, which was around $5,000, plus another laptop, an iPAD, and an expensive tripod and camera mount for LAMBRA.  Should be interesting at the first few races when we're still trying to figure out how it all works!

So 2012 wasn't a very great year for me.  In addition to a less than stellar racing season, along with at least a couple of broken bones and a fair amount of time of the bike, I lost a few friends this year.  One who I saw often, and a few old friends who I hadn't seen in a while but who I liked a lot. I'll try and look on the bright side and expect 2013 to be better.  Maybe by then my parts will finally arrive and I can build up this new bike!

Twas the ride before Christmas

Twas the ride before Christmas,

and all through the pack,

not a rider was talking,

not even in back.

The leaders were surging;

"we'll drop them," they laughed;

but the pack just tucked lower;

and hung in their draft.

The bunch was all quiet,

and gasping for air,

their buddies were dropping

thou' they gave not a care.

And my teammate and I

now pushing the pace higher

were just getting ready

to launch a new flyer.

When somewhere in back,

there arose such a clatter,

I thought I should look

to see what was the matter.

Under my arm

I glanced with a frown,

almost expecting

to see riders go down.

The glare of the sunlight

on the asphalt below

gave to the paceline

a sickening glow.

When, what to my watering

eyes should appear,

but a dude on a track bike,

with one massive gear.

With a tiny old rider

tucked low on the bike,

I knew in a moment

it had to be Mike.

He pushed on the pedals,

and lept on ahead;

"it's no social ride,"

was all that he said.

Now Woody, now Ryan,

now Jordan, and Ben!

On Howard, on Kenny,

ride fast as you can.

Up the left came the paceline,

and out went the call,

Now dash away, dash away,

dash away all!

As dry leaves that 'fore

the wild hurricane fly,

When they meet with an obstacle,

mount to the sky,

So up to the break

'way the coursers they flew,

with a whole bunch of stragglers,

and Keith Andrews too.

And then, in a twinkling,

I heard a light thump,

The delicate shifting

of one soon to jump.

As I reached out to shift,

and was turning around,

Right down the middle

Howard came with a bound.

He was dressed in a skinsuit,

from his head to his toe,

And he leapt out ahead

to put on a good show;

A half-empty Camelback

he had flung on his back,

And he looked like a madman

as he glared at the pack.

His eyes -- how they dared us,

to take up the chase.

and the riders up-shifted,

to match his cruel pace!

He veered to the left,

to get a clean line,

and the pack got strung-out

for the twentieth time;

The riders were closing,

the gap he had done,

but many were dropping

off one after one;

The pack came together,

now elbow-to-belly,

it shook and it wiggled

like a bowl full of jelly.

The riders were having,

some jolly old fun,

And I laughed when I saw it,

now the race had begun;

With wink of his eye

and a twist of his head,

a Herring-Gas rider

was the next one to dread;

He spoke not a word,

but went straight to his deed,

And pulled us all up

to a dizzying speed;

then turned with a jerk,

his hand on his ass,

And giving a nod,

he dared us to pass;

He sprang to his feet,

to his team gave a sign,

And away they all flew

down white-painted line.

But I heard him exclaim,

ere he quickened his pace,

"HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL,

AND TO ALL A GOOD RACE."

Weekend Before Christmas

I headed out Saturday morning knowing I would be overdressed by the end.  As I rode to Starbucks in the dark wearing my NOBC jacket over a long-sleeve thermal jersey, however, I was quite comfortable.  I was planning on doing the long ride out to Slidell again, and with the clear sky I was pretty sure it was going to warm up substantially by the time I got back home five hours later. I'd missed two days of riding during the week already, so at least my legs were finally feeling normal again. There was a good sized group on hand for the Giro Ride, and I decided early on that I'd take it easy on the way out, see how I felt when we stopped in Slidell, and then hopefully get some exercise on the way back.  Things went smoothly on the first part of the ride, especially once we crossed the Chef bridge and fell into a steady paceline.  The wind was light and the sun was shining and basically it was a great day for riding.  When we climbed the long bridge over the Rigoletts at Fort Pike the group got pretty strung out, and when the front of the group didn't slow down to regroup at the bottom a few riders got stranded in no-mans-land.  John and a couple of others dropped back, but the front of the pack never even looked back.  After the stop at the gas station in Slidell, it felt pretty chilly as we started out again, but of course we eventually warmed up.  After we crossed the bridge again I started spending more time at the front, which wasn't all that hard since we had a light tailwind most of the way back.  Later that afternoon I ended up spending three hours or so scraping paint off of an old door and kicking myself for not wearing a dust mask while doing it. Maybe I'll find a little time to do the other side of that door tomorrow, especially if it turns out to be as rainy as predicted.

So Sunday morning was a bit warmer and a lot more cloudy and the Giro group was a little smaller than it had been on Saturday.  It was just as well, since I was going to have to turn back early in order to make a brunch at Brennan's.  On the way out down Hayne Blvd. we came to one intersection where the front riders blew through the red light.  I looked over and saw the car in the left lane slowing down but the car in the right lane was going probably 50 mph and showing no indication of slowing down.  The rest of us had to slam on the brakes to avoid disaster.  The handful of riders who had gone through kept going, which I consider to be rather bad form for this sort of ride.  Anyway, I turned back at Chef Highway and got a nice workout riding home, and an hour later I was sitting at Brennan's sipping a gin Bloody Mary as my recovery drink.

Blown Away

The Thursday morning storms washed away any chance I had for a ride yesterday, so I was out the door early this morning with some sort of vague idea of maybe putting in a few extra miles. Ha!  Well, that idea was quickly blown away once I got up onto the levee and felt the full force of the wind. It was dark and cold and extremely windy up there.  On the other hand, the place was deserted.  I rode the usual 26 miles out to the upriver end of Jefferson Parish at a low effort level.  That translated into speeds in the 16 mph range since most of it was headwind. I had already decided it wasn't worth killing myself today. As often happens when I ride alone on the levee, I spotted a bald eagle out around River Ridge and got yet another of my fuzzy out-of-focus Bigfoot style photos.  Anyway, tomorrow's weather should be nice and if one is looking for the opportunity to punish oneself, there's always the Saturday Giro.

Today is our last day at work until January, and other than a conference call at 10 am, it's been really, really quiet, probably because most people have already bailed out for the holidays. I rode over to Taqueria Corona for lunch with Kenny and then over to the Campus Recreation office at the Reily Center to drop off some paperwork, only to find the office closed.  I guess it won't matter one way or the other since that paperwork wasn't likely to move off of anyone's desk until January anyway. While I was there I walked over to the football field to watch them putting in the test piles for the new stadium.  In order to minimize the impact on the neighbors and judicial system they're pre-drilling the holes and then just dropping the pilings in. So I was just starting to feel like things were under control when I got a call from The Wife informing me they had just dropped the Volvo in to a deep enough pothole while parking off of Magazine Street to break the radiator.  Great timing.  So there's just enough time to get it towed to the Volvo dealer where it will sit until after Christmas while I pay for a rental car waiting to find out how many thousands of dollars it will cost me to get my car back.  This sort of thing always seems to happen around Christmas.

Holidays Coming

     Long morning shadows on the levee.    

After skipping my Monday ride (the damp streets from an early rain provided a more than adequate excuse) I figured these old legs would be nice and fresh for Tuesday's ride.  I figured wrong.  My quads complained with every effort right from the start and I quickly resigned myself to short pulls and lots of wheelsucking. Sometimes that happens after a good weekend of riding, although to be honest I don't remember it happening much back when I was in my 20s.  For that matter, though, I don't remember a whole heck of a lot of what happened back when I was in my 20s anyway.

I was up late last night to pick The Daughter up from the airport, which was extremely busy even at midnight, so it was something of a struggle to get out of bed this morning to ride.  The floor guy was scheduled to arrive at the house at 8 am, though, and now that we have four people in the house and are down to only one functional bathroom, I figured I'd better get moving.  There were just three of us, Mark, Richard and myself, this morning.  Scott's apparently out of town, probably on a little ski vacation if I had to guess.  The weather was really nice with a temperature in the mid-50s and clear skies and a light southeast wind.  Tomorrow it will probably rain when the next cold front drags through. My legs were still not back to normal, although they did feel a little better than yesterday.  We were taking long pulls at 20-22 mph this morning, and by the time we got to the turnaround my legs were starting to loosen up a bit. Shortly after we turned around, Donald, Kenneth and that triathlete woman whose name I can  never remember came past so we tagged along for the ride.  Donald pulled for a few miles before Kenneth finally went around him and got a little bit of a rotation started.  With the light headwind, that allowed for everyone to at least get out of the infamous Zone 2 for a little bit.  Anyway, it was a nice ride and I arrived back home just as the floor guy, who is sanding away as I type, arrived.  I expect it will be a quiet couple of days at the office between now and Friday unless some kind of unexpected fire erupts.  This is the time when a lot of staff and faculty take some extra time off to extend the long holiday vacation that we enjoy at the university.  After Friday, the next work day for us will be in January, unless, of course, there is one of those aforementioned fires.  I am hoping against hope that my long-awaited parts from Great Britain arrive before Friday since I had them shipped to the office.  If not, the new bike won't be seeing the light of day until the first week of January at best. The last, and first, time I ordered some parts from probikekit.com they arrived in about five days.  This time it's been three weeks already, and I can only assume they're stick in Customs somewhere or otherwise have been relegated to the low-priority bag at the U.S. Postal Service. The prices were great, and although I knew there was a chance that shipping would take longer than usual, I really wasn't figuring on a whole month.  I'm still hoping to make it to the local bike shop for some other stuff I need, but I had been holding off until I could start building the new bike since I know there will be a few items that I discover I need during the process.

Easier at the Back

The wind had shifted.  I stood there in the dim morning light staring into a dresser drawer full of riding clothes.  What to wear?  The temperature was 60F and it looked a little overcast. It was a big change from the cold temperatures earlier in the week. I finally settled on a thin jersey underneath my regular one, plus arm-warmers. but skipped on the knee-warmers.  If I ended up doing the long Giro Ride out to Slidell, I'd be plenty warm enough.  Too warm, most likely.



Riverboat passing on the Friday ride.

I arrived at Starbucks a bit later than usual.  My internal debate over what to wear had cost me at least five minutes.

The ride started out a little faster than normal and then when we hit Hayne Blvd. it just stayed up in the 25 mph neighborhood, averaging 25.2 mph for the next 16 miles.  There was a little slowdown as the riders doing the long ride crossed the Chef bridge, but the pace soon picked up where it had left off.  I was mostly staying out of the battle, drafting fairly easily behind the main rotation.  We were nearing the Rigolettes when the rider ahead of me inexplicably dropped his chain.  I slowed and gave him a push so he could try and get it back onto the chainring without stopping, but no luck. The guy on the lefty Cannondale mountain bike stopped with him as I sprinted back up to the tail end of the group.  We later learned that Scott's front derailleur had broken somehow and he had called his wife for extraction.

By the time we left after the stop at the gas station in Slidell I was starting to feel chilled, so it was good that the pace soon picked up. My plan was to do more work on the way back, which I did, although I would periodically sit out a couple of dances to control the overall effort level a bit.  After all, it's December, and although it's easier at the back, it isn't that much easier.  Anyway, I felt pretty good under the circumstances and arrived back at the house tired but definitely not completely wasted.  94 miles seemed quite adequate when I got back home where the contractor and company were busily building a new back staircase.

I think I'll just do another Giro Ride tomorrow.  The Wife needs the car for shopping, so as long as I get a hall pass on the shopping trip, I'm happy with that.

Another Early Turn

The pre-dawn temperature was again around 40F, but the wind had diminished considerably when I arrived, a couple of minutes late, at the ride start. Scott and Richard were there, but that was about it.  We picked up Pat and Lenny and Judd by the time we hit the playground, but it was already clear that there wasn't enough combined horsepower to keep the pace much above the low 20s today.  That was fine with me because for some reason my quads were loading up quickly every time I'd take a pull, even at the serene 21-22 mph consensus speed.  Nobody had said anything about turning around early, at least not that I heard, but I knew they were thinking it. A small group and slower pace translates into a late arrival back home when we do the longer ride all the way out to Ormond.  As we approached The Dip, where I figured we'd probably turn around, Lenny was on the front.  He had been pushing the pace a bit. At the last minute the others ahead of me sat up and started asking each other "are we turning around here?"  Lenny was already heading down the Dip, oblivious to what was going on behind him.  I had to grab the brakes as I tried to guess who might be following him and who might be turning back.  In the end, everyone stopped except for Lenny.  We watched him as he pulled off and motioned for the next rider to come around.  There wasn't a next rider.  Finally he figured it out and turned around.  Oh well.  That was a clear lack of planning on everyone's part. I wasn't feeling very good at all, so the ride back into a slight but increasing wind was frustrating, even though I was taking short pulls.  Just after the bridge I started to feel some mushiness in my rear tire and gave the bike a little bounce.  I felt the rim touch the asphalt and knew I had a flat, so I coasted to a stop around the playground to change it.  Still wearing my gloves, I stuffed the new tube into the tire as Judd walked up with a floor pump that he had in his car. I probably got about 90 psi in there before it blew off the rim because I hadn't taken the time to check that the tire was properly seated.  Fortunately I had another tube and was more careful that time.  I was glad I'd picked up a big can of tire patch glue at Auto Zone last weekend and had patched a couple of extra tubes. Of course my rear tire most definitely needs to be replaced.  I can see the casing in a couple of spots.  I just haven't taken the time to deal with that.  Guess I'll have to now.

So this week's mileage isn't adding up very well so far. I didn't ride on Monday, and then we turned around early both Tuesday and Thursday.  Perhaps I'll do another ride out to Slidell on Saturday to balance things out, assuming that this achy feeling I have right now doesn't turn out to be the early symptoms of a cold or something.

Acclimating

It was another cold and breezy morning and I had to dip into my diminishing reserve of self-discipline just to get out from under the covers.  This is the time of year when just getting out the door in the morning becomes a laudable goal.  Really, though, there is no point to skipping rides when the temperature is still, however barely, in the 40s, unless of course you happen to be one of those people who seek winter refuge in air-conditioned fitness centers, returning to the roads only when the first hints of spring appear.  I'm not one of those.  Although I have been known to attend winter Spin classes and have even ventured into the Reily Center's weight room on occasion, I would in general prefer to be riding an actual moving bike on actual roads in the actual weather, assuming conditions aren't overwhelmingly dangerous.  So there I was riding up to the meeting spot on the levee this morning at precisely 6:40 am wondering why I was again the only person there.  A minute later Big Rich rode up and, knowing there would be no others, we headed off down the road.  A couple of miles later we spotted Donald and Mignon coming toward us and waited as Donald, whose knees were bare, turned around to join us. We did the usual Wednesday ride at a moderate pace as I dreamt of hot coffee and hid from the wind behind Richard. On the way back we saw Ben who turned around and rode with us for a while looking all toasty warm in his Assos winter jersey. 

Yesterday afternoon we had the dedication ceremony for Flower Hall, a science/engineering research building that our office worked on just over a year ago as part of a grant from the Economic Development Administration.  While I was standing there I heard someone say, "Hey Randy."  I looked over and saw Brett Reagan, all dressed up in a nice suit looking like quite the executive (which technically he is).  It turns out he is on a Board with the building's major donor, Paul Flower.  Small world.  I still had work to do, so I passed on the free wine, which took quite a bit of willpower, checked out the finished 4th floor and its spectacular view, and headed back to work.

It wasn't too long after I got home this morning that the workmen started to arrive.  The kitchen demo is essentially done and we're entering the sheetrock and electrician phase now. I wrote another check to the contractor and hopped on the bike to work.

Cold and Grey December Day

It was still just arm-warmer weather on Sunday, so Ben and I drove across the lake to make the northshore ride rather than spend yet another day on the asphalt of Chef Highway.  I guess there were around twenty when we rolled out from Lee Road Junior High for the regular 64 mile winter ride.  This year the standard course has shifted a bit, eliminating Tullos Road and most of 1072 in favor of south Choctaw and Dummyline, and a couple of miles of 1072.  It was a good ride that turned out to be a bit faster than I'd been expecting.  I was pleased to find that my legs were responding reasonably well after Saturday's 90+ miles.  Not that I wasn't feeling those miles, of course, but at least it wasn't bad enough to have me throwing in the towel on the climbs.  So the bottom line was 312 miles for the week, which was the best I'd seen since July and more than ample excuse for skipping Monday morning's ride, especially once I checked the radar and saw the line of rain storms moving in my direction.  Monday turned out to be pretty dismal with lots of rain and dramatically falling temperatures behind the cold front.

Back at home, the kitchen renovation is moving along fairly well.  The old pine floors look to be salvageable after spending the better part of the past sixty or seventy years with linoleum glued to them.  The beam to (hopefully) support the roof once the back wall studs come out is in place, so the whole thing should be opened up by this afternoon.  Meanwhile the old concrete back staircase that is also scheduled to be replaced is literally crumbling as the result of the extra use by the contractor and so that job may need to be moved up before they completely collapse underneath someone.

By this morning the temperature had dropped a good twenty degrees and I rolled out the door at 6:15 to a cold and grey December day with a strong north wind. With the temperature below 40F for the first time this fall, it finally felt like winter.  I was wearing my trusty NOBC winter jacket, skull cap, long tights, etc., so I was pretty comfortable when I arrived right on time atop the levee to find nobody there. I stopped for a minute, hiding from the wind behind one of the big stacks, and a little while later Big Richard rolled up. There was nobody else in sight so we headed out, soon picking up three more riders who were coming from the playground.  It was going to be a long ride, but with so few in the group I knew we'd be turning around early. On the plus side, the strong crosswind and resulting eschelon would allow only five to get any degree of shelter for much of the ride. The pace stayed moderate today and I think we were all just glad to be out there getting acclimated to the colder temperature. For much of the return trip I was getting in about forty pedal strokes at 22 mph at the front before my quads told me it was time to pull off.  I listened to them.

Long Giro

I clipped on an extra tail light before heading out to the Saturday Giro this morning.  We've had a lot of morning fog lately and there was a pretty good chance we would run into some during the ride.  The fact that there was not the slightest trace of fog as I rode out to Starbucks offered little comfort.  There was barely any wind and the temperature was around 60F under a clear blue sky today.  Great riding weather, to say the least.  I hadn't been planning on doing the long ride out to Slidell, but it was sounding like a lot of the riders were.  When we got to the turnaround and nobody around me turned around I figured, "Why not?" and continued on over the Chef bridge.  It was right about that time that I remember we were supposed to be having an NOBC meeting after the Giro to discuss the new team kit.  Damn.  It was already way too late to get back to the group that had turned around.  Fortunately, the "long" group numbered over 20 riders today, so at least I'd have some shelter.  As it turned out, the ride was fast but steady.

We were halfway back along Hayne Blvd. when something caught my eye.  It was Rob's Shimano Di2 battery hanging below his bottom bracket, suspended by only its wires.  The bolt holding it on had come loose, so ater fishing around for the right Allen wrench, we finally got going again.  Basically it was a very enjoyable ride

More Wet Than Rain

It was still quite foggy way up the river at Ormond this morning.

It seemed darker than usual at 6 am when I left for the levee.  Of course the days are still getting shorter and it just takes a few clouds in the east to make a big difference right now. The thermometer was reading 60F, but I'd pulled on the arm-warmers more out of habit than anything else.  The one thing I hadn't been expecting was fog.  There had been none at the house, but as I neared river and all of its millions of gallons of icy northern water, I started to notice the fog.  By the time I'd met the group up on the levee I knew it was going to be one of those foggy rides that gets you more wet than a light rain.  Indeed, we rode through a fairly heavy fog for most of the long morning ride.  By the time we were five miles out I'd already taken my clear glasses off and stuck them into the holes of my helmet.  Every now and then a couple of drops of water would drip off of the front of my helmet onto my nose.  My fronts of my arm-warmers, which by then I was quite glad to have worn, were accumulating a layer of water droplets, and I was glad I had picked the ones with the brushed lining. On the plus side, the group was a little on the small side and the pace was moderate.  Right after the turnaround, though, Howard and Robert rolled off the front undetected by me and disappeared into the mist.  We didn't see them again until the playground.

Remodeling

Monday they started tearing my kitchen apart.  Literally. We have started down that long dark road of renovation.  These things never go quite as planned, nor under budget.  After ripping out one wall I was glad to see that other than some old termite damage there wasn't any evidence of rotten wood.  There were surprises, of course.  When we took out an old cypress pantry that had clearly been added to the kitchen a very long time ago, we found a sheet of newspaper from 1940 on top of it.  The house dates from 1920, so I guess it took 20 years for the first remodeling job. There are all sorts of other little surprises, such as walls that don't line up with each other. We are hoping to salvage the original pine floor, which was hidden under three strata of renovations.  First, there was sheet linoleum glued to the original floor. 

On top of that was that particle board stuff, and glued on top of that was the rubber or vinyl tile that we've been living with for the past twenty-five years.  Since the relatively porous particle board was sandwiched between two basically waterproof layers, and since you knew water was going to find its way into it, I wasn't too surprised to find a fair amount of mold growing in there.  Anyway, I'm sure there will be more surprises to come.

So this morning the sky was cloudy and there was rain slowly approaching the city.  After missing so many miles last week, I was in no mood to throw in the towel too quickly today, so I aired up the tires on the rain bike, put on my old shoes with the old Look cleats on them, and headed off for the levee in the thick 65-degree morning air.  It had been raining for much of the night and the streets were damp which resulted in a fairly deserted bike path.  Without a speedometer I felt a little lost, and was running a little late, but I got in a good 22 miles anyway.  It's looking like the rest of the week should be fairly nice with mild temperatures and low chances of rain.

On the new bike front, I'm waiting for a couple of things to arrive before starting to build up the Bianchi, and just picked up a pair of Mavic wheels from Dwight so I will be able to leave my regular training wheels on the Orbea. 

I had my final collarbone followup appointment at TISM this afternoon. Although I have been feeling rather frustrated with the rate at which things have been healing, Dr. Savoie seemed pleased with the x-rays and commented that the callus looked good.  He said I was basically good to go and that it would probably be the better part of a year before everything was fully, totally healed.

Rough Week

It's been a rough week for riding thus far, having started out with two rainy mornings.  I went out into the humid chill on Monday with every expectation of doing a normal recovery ride.  It was overcast and therefore darker than usual, but I'd checked the forecast the night before and rain wasn't expected until later in the day.  I should have checked the radar.  I was only four miles from home when I felt the first light droplets hitting my cheeks.  By five miles I knew it was here to stay and I circled back toward home.  By then it was a steady but light drizzle.  I wanted nothing to do with getting soaked, being cold, or sliding around on slick streets, and was happy enough to make it home before getting truly wet. The next morning was even worse and I didn't even consider trying.  By Wednesday the front had passed and it was cooler and drier. I had two full days of meetings on my dance card, however, and would have to improvise.  On Wednesday that meant a short early morning ride that was mostly in the dark, but at least it was something. I'd normally have accumulated around 85 miles by the end of Wednesday's ride.  This week it was a mere 30.  I had an extra half-hour on Thursday, so I met the 6:15 group and was able to ride out to the little dip with it before turning around and coming back with Woody and Mignon and Daniel.  That one netted me 30 miles and even though I had to rush to get downtown in time for the first meeting, it was worth it. Today it was just Scott and me, ticking off the regular 26 mile ride at a steady 21-22 mph.  I'd received an interesting "gift card" from my sister-in-law for coffee at Zotz.  They don't actually *have* gift cards there, so she gave me this handwritten thing that said "Absolutely Legit" at the top.  Anyway, they did indeed have a little tab set up for me so I had a nice little Americano this morning after the ride.  Tomorrow I should be able to do the regular Giro Ride, but then on Sunday I have to go up to Brookhaven for the annual LAMBRA meeting.  As usual, a number of clubs are backing out of sending anyone there, claiming it's too far or that nobody can make it.  I'm about ready to just do away with the meeting and make up the rules and settle the schedule all by myself -  take it or leave it. Later, they will be complaining about the schedule or the LCCS rules or something else that happened in their absence. The fact that I will be giving up my first good opportunity this Fall for a long ride in the country is just another twist of the knife.  On Monday our contractor is going to start tearing up our kitchen, which I'm sure is going to present all sorts of unexpected challenges and expenditures, none of which I am looking forward to.  On the plus side, I bought a Bianchi Sempre frame (used, of course, and Celeste, of course) on Monday and am waiting for a few little bits and pieces to arrive before starting to build it up.  The geometry is extremely close to that of my Orbea, so I'm not expecting any big surprises and had originally planned on transferring stem, bars, seatpost, etc. from that bike to the new one, but late one night after a couple of glasses of wine, and considering the effects of the impending renovation project, christmas, and property taxes, I decided I deserved some new stuff instead.

The Long Weekend

It all started Thanksgiving morning.  Earlier in the week Mignon had innocently sent out an email suggesting a 7 am start time for a Thanksgiving Day ride.  We will often put together these "holiday" rides when a lot of people are off work on a weekday.  Of course, I was thinking this would be a nice smooth little group ride with some light conversation and just a sprinkling of actual training.  Apparently a number of others, however, were thinking of a long hammerfest race simulation to atone for the gluttony in which they were planning to indulge later in the day.  The group soft-pedaled for a while as it waited for a couple of late arrivals to catch up from the Playground, but as soon as they arrived the speed went up to 26 mph and pretty much stayed there. We lost a number of riders right off the bat.  The return trip felt more and more like a race the farther we went and when yet another surge took it up to 29 mph somewhere around the country club I decided it was time to dial it back a bit and let them go. The front group was basically sprinting for the bridge, I guess, because we caught up to them around the playground as most were heading for their cars. My daughter flew in that afternoon and we had a big Thanksgiving dinner that night, so I was more than happy to do a nice easy ride Friday morning.  Riding alone, I was able to enjoy the scenery and spotted a bald eagle near the bend in the river at the country club.  This is the time of year when I always seem to see eagles around here.

So on Saturday morning Joey D stopped by the house and joined me for the ride out to meet the Giro.  There was a pretty big group that included some of the LSU riders.  Apparently a few of the riders had deicded amongst themselves that the traditional warmup section of the Giro was too slow and decided to make it faster. Normally, riders roll out from Starbucks in a long disorganized string with lots of big gaps because they know that the group will be going slowly and everything will come back together halfway down Lakeshore Drive.  Well this time it didn't because the riders at the front were pushing the pace way above "normal."  Some riders had to chase hard to catch.  Others got dropped for good in the strong crosswind.  There was even a crash that I'm sure nobody at the front even knew about.  The rest of the Giro that day seemed like a windy road race in south Florida. There was a pretty strong northwest wind that kept the speed low but the effort level high. When the speed ramped up about a mile before the Venetian Isles sprint I backed off as the group started to shatter.  A moment later I saw the group coming back.  They had turned around way, way early for some reason.  In the process, they had left Brett Regan and Mike Williams, who had raced all the way to the usual turnaround, behind.  They ended up chasing all the way back and were not too happy about it, either. 

It was deep in Lakeview after Katrina

The return trip got pretty fast as well, especially when the route took us westward with the tailwind, and we spent a lot of time in the 26-30 mph range. It wasn't an easy ride, nor a very civilized one.  Afterward I stopped at NOLA Beans on Harrison Avenue for a club meeting to discuss our 2013-14 team kit and didn't get home and out of my own team kit until nearly noon.  A little brass plaque on the wall near the bathroom noted the Katrina water level.

Sunday morning I had to take The Daughter to the airport, so I missed the Giro, which was probably a good thing under the circumstances.  It was pretty cold in the morning, so I waited until around 10:30 and set off for a long solo ride on the river bike path, staying mostly in the 18-20 mph range and enjoying some pretty great weather.  I was still feeling guilty about all of the pecan pie, lemon merangue, turkey, turkey soup, stuffing, and wine I'd consumed when I went out this morning for what I expected to be 25 miles at a moderate pace. It was cloudy but the last weather forecast I'd seen had put the chance of rain at around 10% until later in the day.  It was wrong.  Five mile in I started to feel the drizzle and promptly made a u-turn for home, arriving rather damp but not yet drenched or cold.

Two Hundred Fifty

Two Hundred Fifty miles a week has always seemed to be the point at which, for me, I feel like I'm actually making progress. If I can string together two or three weeks at around that mileage I start to feel like I'm getting in shape. Of course there are some weeks during the racing season during which I might not hit that mark, but those are usually weeks in which I make up for lower mileage with higher intensity, otherwise known as "racing."  So anyway, last week I finally got back up to a 250 mile week for the first time since mid-September.  Although it should last, it probably won't if the weather and my unreasonable fear of cold have anything to say about it.

The wind that had been plaguing us around here for the better part of a week finally started to die down yesterday, and that, combined with the aforementioned 250-mile week, had me feeling particularly frisky on yesterday's long levee ride.  This morning the wind was nearly calm, and for some reason we had a rather large group of ten or twelve when we started.  With the slack wind and the traditional steady 22 mph Wednesday pace, it was an enjoyable ride. The temperature was in the mid-50s, riding to maybe 60, the sky was clear, and there was a light fog hugging the ground here and there.  Since the bike path is now closed downriver of the Orleans/Jefferson parish line to the Corps of Engineers Building, everyone dropped down onto River Road at Dakin Street with me today. Unfortunately, we got caught by a particularly long train.

Things are pretty quiet here in the office today. Faculty and students are both in short supply ahead of the holiday weekend, so I'm just hoping against hope that one or two of my emails will actually generate replies.  We have some consultant meetings next week and scheduling for them has been particularly difficult.  The annual LAMBRA meeting is scheduled for a week from next Sunday and as usual practically none of the clubs has put its race dates on the planning calendar.  I'll send out a reminder tonight and see if we can get some action on that. 

Tomorrow we have a 7 am  holiday ride up on the levee that should be nice.  We'll have a bunch of people over for Thanksgiving dinner tomorrow evening so I know I'd better get my ride in early since the rest of the day will probably involve vacuum cleaners and trips to the grocery store.

So I should be working on building up a new (to me) bike soon. I'm guessing it will be a couple of weeks before I have everything together, assuming neither time nor money runs out first.  Yeah, I know.  The suspense is killing you, right?

Fair Weather and Festivals

November is always an interesting month around here.  One weekend the weather can be spectacular; the next it can be absolutely miserable.  Last weekend was a prime example of the former.  While our more latitude-challenged brethren to the north are busy selecting new snow shovels and expensive high-tech outerwear, we're just adding arm-warmers and full-finger gloves to our wardrobes and, when mother nature cooperates, enjoying brisk group rides under blue skies and feasting at Po-boy festivals.  I suppose there must be some benefits that come with living in places where the average winter temperature is below that in my refrigerator, but for the most part they escape me.

I had been expecting, perhaps hoping, that the Sunday Giro Ride would be a relatively civilized affair with speeds just above the training-effect threshold and well below the hypoxia threshold.  Some of it actually was, but as usual there were complications.  It was still pretty windy.  I was getting pretty damned tired of that wind which had been with us relentlessly for nearly a week, and as the pace ramped up along Hayne Boulevard I could tell it was going to be a factor. Sheltered in mid-pack, my effort level was merely moderate as the riders up front busted a hole through the chilly headwind.  I knew, however, that as soon as we turned south the speed would go up dramatically.  We went from 23 mph to 28 mph right away, slowing briefly as we turned east underneath I-510, and then surging right back up to 28 as we again turned south on the service road. Near the end of that road I heard some loud voices behind me that had been precipitated by Kenny slamming over a big chunk of concrete in the road at about 30 mph and pinch-flatting both tires. I think I'd hit the same thing on Saturday. He knew it would take a while to fix, so he told people to go ahead without him, but a number of us had already circled back to assist.  As it turned out, he'd actually managed to pinch-flat a tubeless tire on one wheel and a regular tube on the other.  One of the spare tubes was leaking at the stem, so it took about ten minutes, three tubes and four people to get him going again.  On the plus side, that meant a few miles of smooth easy paceline as we made our way down Chef Highway looking for the group on its return trip.

The first two or three riders we first saw were way out in front of the group and hammering away with the tailwind.  Nobody even considered turning around to latch onto them.  Instead we turned ahead of the main group that, at least for the moment, was going around 24 mph.  Soon, that 24 mph became 26, 29, 31 mph, but it was for only a few miles and there was a strong tailwind.  There was another section like that when we got onto Hayne Blvd., again with a tailwind.  That tailwind, however, wasn't much help with getting me over the two overpasses, however.  It still hurts to pull hard on the handlebars, so riders were passing me like I was standing still on the uphill sections.  After riding back home I went right back out to meet a few of the Tulane riders to do a few easy laps around Audubon Park, which at least let me make up for the miles I missed while criticizing Kenny's tire-changing technique.  Later that afternoon I walked over to Oak Street for a brief visit to the Po-Boy Festival that included a Shrimp Remolade Po-boy and a frozen Nectar cream soda, neither of which you are likely to find elsewhere.

The Small Group

All indications were that it would be an awesome day for riding. The 40F morning temperature would be climbing up to around 70, there wasn't a cloud in the sky, and the wind was relatively light.  As riders began filtering in to the Starbucks patio where the Giro Ride starts, it became clear that almost everyone was planning on "going long" today.  The winter Giro Rides, particularly on Saturdays, usually have a group that goes past the usual turnaround point at Venetian Isles and continues all the way to Slidell. I guess that works out to around 40 miles each way, so for those who ride out to meet the group and ride home afterwards, that can mean a 100-110 mile ride.  Of course, it's dead flat and there's a group to ride with, but still, it can be a hard ride, especially if you have to deal with a lot of wind out there where there's water on both sides of the road.  And there's always a lot of wind out there.  I'd decided to give it another week before venturing out on a long group ride like that.  I'm still getting home with some soreness around my neck and shoulder.

Long shadows as the Giro rolls out along Lakeshore Drive

Since so many people were planning on going long, the pace out to Venetian Isles remained mostly moderate.  Mostly.  There were a couple of surges into the upper 20s, but for the most part we were rolling along in the 22-26 mph range.  When I finally turned around at the usual spot I was surprised how few other riders did likewise. I guess there were only ten or so who didn't continue out to Slidell today. As we started to get rolling again Jeff came up and said there were a few others chasing, so we eased up to let them catch.  In the meantime, Brian had gone off on his own, and when the gap went out to thirty seconds or so a couple of other riders took off to bridge up to him.  The rest of the group just kept rolling along at 24 or so. I contemplated going after them for a while because the gap wasn't really growing very fast.  When we had to stop for traffic at an intersection, though, they pretty much disappeared up the road and we didn't see them again.  I arrived back home with about 60 miles on the computer, as usual.

Little Jorge

It was easy recovery ride day today, so I decided to go meet the Tulane riders over at the nearby Reily Center for their 6:30 am ride. The early morning temperatures are still hovering about the 48-50 degree mark down here on the south side of Lake Pontchartrain, and I'm still dressing as if they were in the 42-45 degree range.  Since I knew we would riding easy and that there was still a significant north wind, I was pretty sure I wouldn't have to deal with any heatstroke-related issues anyway. I had been over at the LBS the night before for a "fit party" and was glad to see a couple of new faces there.  Likewise, the Friday ride included one rider on a brand-new Giant. The ride was pretty mellow, as planned, but still separated on the way back into the headwind.  My right hand kept going numb and the shoulder felt particularly achy today, and I guess it will be another week or so before all those muscles and tendons stop complaining. Pat, who was coming from the Ormond end of the levee bike path, met us on the way out and then stayed with us all the way back where the two of us stopped at Zotz for coffee.  I was already running late but couldn't resist the offer. 

Jorge, some time in the 80s

While we were sitting there a rider in full team kit pulled up and I was surprised to recognize him as Jorge Cardona.  I think he's been up in Massachusetts where he works as a bike mechanic, as I recall.  Jorge (everyone uses the English "George" version) is from New Orleans and did a lot of racing here in the 80's.  He was always really strong and, since he is hearing-impaired, we used to say that he just couldn't hear his legs complaining.  At the time, there was another Jorge, namely Jorge Merle, racing here.  We called the former Jorge "Little Jorge" and latter "Big Jorge."  Jorge Merle is still a very active racer in Houston, and Jorge Cardona, judging by his Facebook page, seems to do a lot of travelling and shows up in New Orleans every now and then.  Anyway, he picked up a drink and stopped to shake hands before riding off down Oak Street.  I'm sure that one of the things that lured him down here is the Oak Street Po-Boy Festival coming up this Sunday. A few minutes later I followed suit, already running forty-five minutes behind schedule.

Strava

Almost a year's worth of Strava

A long, long time ago, back in the days when the only things that were wireless were AM radio stations, bike racers kept training diaries.  Every year around Christmas I'd buy a new one.  They were usually intended for runners, as those were the most readily available.  Occasionally I'd plan ahead enough to order one from Velo-News, and once in a while I'd get the ones Joe Friel was selling.  I'd start the year enthusiastically, determined to log valuable information after each ride -- distance, time, effort level, ride type, terrain, wind, etc.  There were even a few years when I actually managed to do that for almost the whole season.  It was extremely valuable information, and I'd often find myself looking back at prior years to see how my training and racing compared to a particular year during which I raced well.  Usually, however, the consistent half-page diary entries of February would sputter down to a handful of characters by June.  Often, I'd just write down the number of miles I'd ridden and perhaps a note along the lines of "felt terrible" or "cold and rainy." The one thing that I usually managed to salvage, however, was the mileage number.  When I started using a bike computer that was actually reliable enough to survive an entire season, around the late 80s or early 90s, I could at least keep track of my annual mileage without writing it down and adding it up.  By then I had a pretty good feel for what worked and what didn't and keeping up a detailed log seemed redundant. In addition to the many little nuances regarding intensity vs. recovery, a couple of very consistent things emerged from those twenty or twenty-five years of records.  I learned that I don't start to feel like I'm really in shape until late April or May, and only when I have been able to string together a few 250 mile weeks.  I also discovered that in a typical year I consistently, without ever setting it as a goal, logged something very close to 11,000 miles.  These are not remarkable numbers for a mid-level bike racer.  So I went maybe ten years without keeping any sort of daily log, training by feel and prior experience, riding those 11,000 miles over and over again.

So at the end of January of this year, having recently acquired a nice Samsung smartphone, I downloaded Strava and decided to track all of my rides with it.  So far, so good.  So for the first time in a decade or so, I can look back on the season and get some glimpse of how it all went.  The first surprise was finding three months in the early season during which I rode exactly the same number of hours.  Indeed, of the nine full months I've tracked so far, seven had between 48 and 54 hours of training.  I can see where, except for the Tour de Louisiane weekend when I officiated, May and June were very solid months, and I remember going into the Vuelta de Acadiana on the last weekend of June feeling pretty good, at least until I crashed and broke a couple of ribs.  So July suffered a bit for that, and also because I spent three or four weekend days at the velodrome.  August brought a reasonably good race despite having spent much of July at low-intensity because of the broken ribs, but mileage suffered because of another weekend of officiating.  So I started September with some consistent mileage and a few decent races, but never got back to that fitness I'd been approaching way back at the end of May, so I was looking forward to my now-traditional trip to the 6-Gap Century at the end of the month to put a decent bookend on the season. I was feeling pretty good for that, having been careful to allow for some recovery time the week before, and for the first fifty miles I was feeling confident I'd be able to post a good time. Well, we all know how that ended up. I would have been a lot happier if I'd crashed and broken a collarbone *after* the Hogpen climb rather than before it!  So the broken collarbone basically eliminated the entire month of October.  I did a little riding, mostly alone and never really worthy of the term "training," and then spent another week off the bike entirely with travel.  It was the second week of November before I did anything that I would call training, and by then I'd gained weight and lost a lot of fitness, and with no races on the calendar I've already resolved myself to a couple of months of long, slow distance base training.  Even so, it's been great to be able to look back at my training miles with Strava, and would probably be even more enlightening if I had power meter data as well.  It has certainly been a lot easier to maintain than those old training diaries were.  So thanks, Strava!  On the down side, I can clearly see that I'll end the year maybe 800 miles short. Of course I shouldn't be surprised under the circumstances, but still.....

All the Wrong Places

It was 49F this morning when I took off in search of the Wednesday morning levee ride, and it still feels really cold to me.  At least it's not dark at 6:30 am right now.  I can't really imagine making my way out to the WeMoRi ride that starts at, I think, 5:45 near the lakefront.  Like yesterday, there were just a few of us on hand, but fortunately the wind has finally started to die down a bit, allowing for a far smoother little paceline out to the parish line and back. Although there is always this mild dull ache over the place where my collarbone broke, the things that were really bothering me today were the stiffness all the way from elbow to wrist from the tennis elbow and a fair amount of soreness all around my right shoulder.  I guess I've been kind of pushing the range-of-motion envelope lately, and between that and the cold air and the weaker than normal musculature, and perhaps the somewhat altered shoulder geometry, I shouldn't be too surprised.  I just hope it all resolves itself over the next couple of weeks because I would really like to make some of the winter northshore rides without being too miserable, or too off-the-back.

So now that I am getting back into a more regular training routine I'm starting to think again about the bike.  It's clearly time to look into finding a new frame and building it up with that Campi 11-speed stuff I got from Matt, but which way to go?  The choices are (a) a nice used frame, (b) a new brand-name frame, or (c) a "generic" frame.  It goes without saying that a, b and c would be carbon-fiber, although I might still consider something along the lines of the aluminum Cannondale Caad-10.  Each choice, however, has it's drawbacks.  Finding a nice used frame in my size with race geometry is difficult, and of course a little risky.  The brand-name route is great, but of course it gets really expensive really fast.  Frames like the Bianchi Sempre would fall into that category. A lot of the frames in the right price category have those ridiculous long-head-tube "comfort" geometries that make no sense at all for the type of riding I do, especially considering my somewhat abnormal handlebar height preference. The "generic" frame category would include frames like the ones Neuvation sells.  Those are usually rather plain looking but still tempting.

Winter Wind

Ten miles in and my shoulder muscles were already screaming. Granted, the muscles in my shoulder, especially the right one, are used primarily to deliver food and wine from table to mouth. I'd pushed myself out the door this morning into a cold, gusty north wind, with no plan other than to ride the bike. Along with the wind, the night's cold front had also brought a morning temperature in the upper 40s.  It was the coldest it's been so far this fall, and as a result it felt about ten degrees colder than it was.  I dressed extra-warmly, which I never regretted.

The turnout was predictably sparse up on the levee, but it worked out nicely since five is the maximum number of riders that constitutes a functional eschelon on one of these severe crosswind days on the narrow bike path.  Fortunately for me they all knew how to control their bikes. Even so, the ride felt like a massive struggle with my own front wheel, trying on the one hand to keep it in the draft, and on the other to keep it out of the wheel of the rider ahead.  I use the term "ahead" loosely of course, because there were lots of times when the best drafting location had my front wheel even with the bottom bracket of the rider ahead of me. There was no chance to relax, and we were only halfway out when I could feel all of the muscles around my right shoulder and neck starting to tighten up and hurt.  The extra work of keeping the bike pointed forward and staying in the paceline was taking a toll on a shoulder that had not been exercised in six weeks, and although the pace was only moderate at best, I was hurting.  After we crossed the parish line upriver of Jefferson, I came alongside Woody to tell him I was going to sit up and relax for a while.  It helped.  Soon enough, however, I turned around and merged back into the paceline, taking only an occasional pull and mostly just surfing the wheels at the back.

Yesterday evening I'd had a followup visit at TISM, the upshot of which was that the collarbone was healing normally, the callus formation looked good, and try as he might, Dr. Savoie couldn't detect any bone movement at the break.  So with a slightly more-sore collarbone thanks to the manipulation, and directions to "come back in about a month for a final x-ray," I had headed home as the temperature was dropping, knowing already that Tuesday's ride would be a tough one.