Almost February

I didn't really need the knee and arm-warmers this morning, but somehow it just seems wrong to be riding before dawn in January without them. Don't get me wrong.  I'm not complaining.  Anyway, it felt like I could finally see the end of the tunnel, or should I say the winter, this morning.  As I waited up on the levee at 6:15 am, I looked up at the eastern sky and could see a hint of sunlight.  It reminded me that it was the last day of January and therefore time to start at least thinking about moving farther away from "base miles" and closer to "build," whatever that means.  The bottom line was that I felt a bit less content sitting in, and a lot less content letting gaps open up ahead of me in the paceline.  That little tailwind didn't hurt either.  So after VJ finally pulled off after towing the whole group for about three miles, I put in a fair amount of work today as the group made its way out to Destrehan, where, by the way, there is now a big eagle nest in one of the trees on the batture.  It felt good. After the turnaround I started heading back at an easy pace while some of the other riders were doing whatever they do there.  Personally, I've rarely felt the need to stop in the middle of a 40 mile morning ride.  Anyway, for some reason the paceline didn't show up until I was basically all the way to The Dip.  There was an increasing wind coming out of the southeast that kept the speed down a bit all the way back home.

So I've been playing around with Strava on my smartphone lately, uploading ride data since Saturday, except for Monday when I must have somehow failed to touch the right button.  Anyway, it's kind of neat to see the speed graph for a ride, and kind of funny that the software defaults to show the elevation chart first.  One thing that's completely useless here in New Orleans is elevation tracking.  Since I don't have data from a powermeter or heart rate monitor, Strava guesstimates power based on speed, body/bike weight, and elevation change.  Of course the elevation change data that it gets from the GPS is pretty random, so I'd guess the power data is equally random.  Anyway, it's been interesting to see the data from other local riders' training rides.  Perhaps it will provide a bit of extra motivation now and then.  It's been a very long time since I've kept a training log.  I'm guessing I'll probably be a little inconsistent about actually starting the application every time I ride, but we'll see how it goes.

Back Up North

The almost-normal winter weather around here has been pretty rider-friendly lately.  Granted, the mornings have been chilly, but things have been warming up into the 60s later in the day. So Saturday morning I rode out to the Giro Ride knowing that half of what I was wearing would be coming home in jersey pockets. Hanging out at the coffee shop before the ride, Rob was busy recruiting riders for a long Giro out to Slidell.  A handful of the guys were up for it, but a number of others were already planning on doing that on Sunday instead. As we rolled out toward the lake I was glad I'd dressed so warmly.

Although there was a big group, the pace was a bit restrained, at least by Giro standards, and although there were a few fast stretches, for the most part the group stayed together pretty well, at least until the last kilometer before the turnaround. Those who were "going long" were trying to avoid doing too much work too early, and those who were planning to "go long" on Sunday were, I guess, keeping that fact in mind.

One thing about the Giro sprints that really bugs me is that there are always a few riders who are up near the front and look like they are going to go for the sprint, and then without warning just sit up in the middle of it, usually when I'm on their wheels.  So as usual I ended up behind a big gap and didn't sprint. It still feels a little too early in the year for me to be going for the sprints, but I was feeling pretty good on Saturday and had been thinking I might give it a shot.  Oh well.  It was a good ride anyway, and I finished it off with a good effort to the top of the Seabrook bridge.  My legs reminded me of that effort the next morning.

Even before starting Saturday's ride I had already decided that I was going to do the Sunday northshore ride.  It had been quite a while since I'd been able to make it "up north" for that ride, but I was getting pretty overstocked on Giro rides and really needed a ride in the country.  So Sunday morning I got up early, walked the dogs, loaded the bike into the car, stopped at Starbucks as they were opening the doors, and drove over to Puccino's to see who was going to show up. I picked up Mario and we headed across the lake right on schedule.  By the time we were ready to roll there were 23 riders, including Mike Lew and John Dias.  It felt pretty cold, probably because I had kind of compromised in the wardrobe department.  The sky was clear, and although it was quite windy I knew it was going to get a lot warmer.  Most of the group was obviously looking for a fairly easy winter ride, but as usual there were a few who were having a lot of trouble with that concept. One thing about a ride with so may people is that you know people will get dropped and there will be a lot of regrouping stops.  Just after Enon this ride has a traditional "nature stop" at Dummyline road.  A few of didn't need to stop so we just kept rolling easy.  I found myself chatting with John as we soft-pedaled along and soon realized that we were going a little too fast.  I sat up and looked back to see riders scattered all down the road.  Unfortunately, each little group was now chasing the other.  It was quite a while before everything came back together, and I think a few riders really had to chase hard. 

After a while John and a couple others rolled off the front and everyone else just let them go.  The next time we saw them was in the parking lot.  So anyway, there was a bit of stop-and-go for the next twenty miles or so, but a number of riders took shortcuts or headed back early, so eventually we ended up with around a dozen.  We'd been fighting nagging headwinds and crosswinds most of the day, and it wasn't until we were past Plainview before we finally got a little break.  Naturally the pace picked up a bit, but for the most part I'd have to classify the overall ride speed as "moderate" with a few brief forays into "fast" territory.  Anyway, that all worked out fine or me because I was dealing with achy legs for the whole ride.  Nothing very severe, just a subtle reminder that I had done a little hard riding the day before.

A Friday Morning

It was a nice morning for a ride. The temperature was comfortably in the 50s, the wind was light and the sky was clear.  If the dog hadn't awakened me at 4:30 am (I swear he's on EST) I probably would have been a little more energetic, but at least I got myself out the door more or less on time.  I pulled on some long tights and a long-sleeve jersey to cut the morning chill, although neither were stictly necessary, and made my way down Carrollton Avenue's bike lane and then Willow Street.  The streetcar barn there is still not quite empty at that time of the morning, although many of the streetcars are fired up and ready to go with their fancy new headlights and LED blinky lights.  Up on the levee there was only Scott, and as I approached he clipped in and rolled down the little hill at the pipes.  There aren't usually many riders on Fridays, and quite often it's only Scott and me for most of the ride. Today was no exception. There was a slight breeze coming out of the northwest and I tucked into Scott's draft as he started his first long easy pull at the front.  As we came to Ochsner Hospital I saw him point down the levee toward the river.  There were two coyotes trotting along the batture in the area that was cleared a couple of years ago.  I said, "I've got to get a better look" as I turned around, but Scott didn't hear me and continued on.  I considered trying to take a picture, but it was still fairly dark and they were pretty far away, so I decided it would probably just be another of those fuzzy UFO-style photos so I didn't.  I watched them for a little while, as they watched me, and then continued on, slowing down for a bit when I saw someone walking down toward the river.  I wanted to be sure he wasn't accompanied by a little off-leash dog since that would have made a nice breakfast for the coyotes.  Scott, of course, eventually figured out that I wasn't behind him any more and doubled back, so I met up with him again a little while later.

After a while we met up with Taylor, slowing down so he could make a U-turn and catch up to us.  We rolled along the rest of the way out to the turnaround at a comfortable 20 mph or so.  Heading back downriver we picked up more of a tailwind, which kept the speed closer to 22 or 23 mph which was pretty typical for a Friday morning levee ride.  So I'm hoping I might finally make it across the lake on Sunday if something doesn't come up. The temperatures are returning to seasonal normal, or just slightly above it, which means a ride-time temperature around 40 and a high of around 60.  Not too bad for the last weekend in January.  Anyway, the Tulane team just got approval to purchase a trailer.  That should be interesting.  Anyone have tips on outfitting an enclosed trailer for bike races?

Back to Normal

After a week of seasonably abnormal weather, a cold front finally limped through the area this morning, bringing with it a rain storm perfectly timed to wipe out any chance of a morning ride. Instead, I drove The Wife over to the Tulane shuttle stop, and in the process got good and wet and then spilled half a cup of coffee onto the seat of the car.  Even worse, I was sitting in said seat at the time.  It was not pretty.

Of course the clouds cleared and the sun came out when it was time to go to work.  Anyway, I guess I shouldn't be complaining about a few days of riding in summer kit in January.  For some reason, although my camera came along for practically every ride in the last week, I never managed to fish it out of my pocket to take a picture.  Uninspired, I suppose. 

One thing I did manage to accomplish was to install a new security system at the house. I still need to run the wire for the exterior siren, and I think I'll add a motion detector for the basement, but essentially it's up and running with door and window sensors, smoke detector, motion detector, remote keyfob, etc.. It even has that same British lady's voice that my Garmin does, and when it's tripped she calls me on my cellphone.  I'm still a little bit up in the air about whether or not to sign up for an alarm monitoring service.  I guess I'll eventually cave in on that, but I might wait a while so I can see how it all works first.

Change is in the air, however, and it looks like we'll be a little closer to seasonal normal by tomorrow morning. Perhaps I'll be inspired to pull that camera out of my pocket.  The Tulane team is making its new 2012 team kits available for purchase via WePay, so if you want to support the team, pick up a couple of items.

Mileage

The three-day weekend started out in the low 30s and ended in the low 70s.  Not bad for January.  I met the Giro Ride group at Starbucks and by the time we were rolling down Lakeshore Drive the group must have numbered around 50.  The pace picked up early and pretty much stayed there. I was planning on doing the northshore ride on Sunday, but couldn't seem to interest anyone else in it.  Instead, a lot of riders were talking about doing a long Giro Ride out to Slidell. I was officially on the fence about that.

The Saturday Giro was fairly fast, but the wind wasn't too much of a factor so it was easy to sit in and recover when necessary.  I had installed a new chain the night before, and as often happens, it was skipping under heavy loads on my three favorite cogs.  I made a mental note to order three replacement Miche cogs so I wouldn't have to buy a whole new cassette.  It's not something I'd do for a racing wheel, but for the cassette on my training wheel it's definitely worth it even though the Miche cogs are clearly not up to Campi specs.  Later that evening I started leaning more and more toward Sunday's long Giro.  The forecast for the northshore was calling for a morning low around 33-34F, but considerably warmer on the south shore.  When I woke up Sunday morning and checked the thermometer, it was an easy decision.  I figured I could use the extra miles anyway.  The regular Giro Ride usually nets me around 60 miles, of which maybe 30 are fairly hard.  The long Giro out to Slidell and back typically brings me in with around 95 miles, and pretty much all of the last thirty at least feel hard.

Sunday's ride started out a whole lot faster than I, or most of the other riders, would have expected.  With so many riders planning on doing the long ride, you would have thought it would temper the pace a bit.  There seemed to be a few riders at the front who were determined to keep the speed up no matter what, and they didn't exactly wait until we were halfway down Hayne Blvd. either.  I remember looking up along Lakeshore Drive and seeing just a long single-file line of riders and thinking, "what are they thinking?"  I guess the warmer temperature, clear sky, favorable wind, and upcoming racing season was responsible.  I made a decision right there to conserve my energy until at least Fort Pike because the one thing I know about the Slidell ride is that the same distance always seems to be twice as long on the way back.

There's a fairly long and high bridge over the Rigolets, just past Fort_Pike.  It's a very deceptive climb up to the top, which always seems to be quite a bit farther away than it looks. Of course a few of the guys had to race to the top, so I tried to stay smooth and keep them within reach, pushing a little bit to close it up on the long downhill.  Now typically the group will ease up and regroup after the bridge before making the left turn for the final few miles to Slidell.  That didn't exactly happen on Sunday. In fact, I had the distinct impression that I was in some kind of breakaway group as we flew through the turn in the oncoming traffic lane. I took one or two pulls in the rotation, but then decided to sit on the back and at least give the rest of the group, which was by then in full-on chase mode, a chance.  Unfortunately, taking me out of a breakaway rotation doesn't do much to slow it down.

The return trip was pretty fast as well, although I think a bit smoother and more consistent.  I think there were around fifteen that rode the full distance, and most were rotating through nicely.  I was actually quite impressed that so many riders were in such good shape this early in the year.  It seemed there were only one or two who were in trouble.  I rode back with some of the Tulane guys, stopping at the Blue Dot on Canal where I inhaled a couple of glazed donuts, eventually arriving back home with 95 on the odometer.  The long weekend wasn't over yet, though.

Since I was off on Monday I decided to join the Tulane team, at least those of them who were in town (classes don't start until Wednesday, I think), for an "easy" westbank ride.  We met up at the very civilized hour of 9 am and rode downtown to catch the Canal St. ferry over to Algiers. The original plan had been to ride the westbank bike path, but Kenny took over as tour leader, and we ended up, not surprisingly, heading directly for the General de Gaulle bridge over the intracoastal.  This bridge is a lot like the one over the Rigolets in that it's fairly long, quite new, and features a nice wide debris-strewn shoulder.  We made it over the bridge, regrouped, and headed over to the Belle Chasse ferry, crossing the river back to the eastbank side, and then heading down toward Pointe a la Hache for a few miles before turning around.  After a stop at the store in Scarsdale while waiting for the ferry (where I indulged in a Hubig's Lemon Pie) we returned more or less the way we'd come. Although I was starting to feel a little worn down, Monday's 55 miles were done mostly at a conversational pace, so I arrived home feeling a bit better than exhausted.

When I awoke this morning I debated for a moment whether to sleep in or head out for the long Tuesday levee ride.  It it had been cold, I probably would have pulled the covers back over my head for another couple of hours of sleep, but the temperature was around 60F, and although it was windy I figured I'd best do the ride because there was some possibility of rain in the forecast.  The levee ride turned out to be fairly hard, especially on the way out. There was a pretty strong wind coming from the southwest, which meant a number of long crosswind stretches.  Naturally one of those split the group. Once Woody turned back at The Dip, the pace eased up a little bit, but by then the group was down to about half it's original size.  The ride back started out pretty easy - I think there were more than a few tired legs in the group - but things got difficult again when we hit another long stretch of crosswind.  I was at the back for that, and basically had no draft at all for a few miles despite the fact that I was behind Big Richard and was doing my best to ride the outside two inches of asphalt without falling off the path.  So, a bit over 250 miles since Saturday morning. My condolences to all those riders up north who spent all weekend in basements riding trainers and watching old Tour de France videos.....

Missing Link

It was looking like this morning would be the last day of "springtime in January" for a little while.  It was already getting windy ahead of a second cold front that should be taking us down from 60F to 34F this evening, and with the morning temperature somewhere in the mid-50s I found my wardrobe decisions rather perplexing.  As I usually do in such situations, I intentionally over-dressed.  Hot I can handle; cold, not so much. 

As I rode up the levee in the dark I could see that the meeting place was deserted.  I checked my watch.  Four minutes early.  For the 6:15 am ride, four minutes is an eternity.  I rode around in little circles for a while as riders started arriving from both directions, and by 6:20 we were heading upriver and upwind in the moonlight. Brian (I think that's his name, right?) went to the front and pulled all the way to the bridge at a pretty good pace, I came through briefly, and it looked like a nice little paceline might get going.  He reached in his pocket and handed me an inner tube that Louise (I think that's her name, right?) had given him to give to me since I'd given her one the other morning when she'd double-flatted on the wet bike path. Of course, with Rob on his TT bike, and Woody and Howard near the front, I figured an all-inclusive paceline wasn't going to survive very long.  Naturally, Howard went to the front and pushed the pace up by three or four mph.  The rest, including me, were reluctant to follow.  A couple went around to bridge but with the headwind there wasn't much enthusiasm there.  Three of four rolled away and the rest of the group finally settled down into a paceline with a few sitting on a the back.

The return trip was going to feature some significant tailwind stretches. I always find tailwinds more difficult than headwinds on group rides like this.  For the first few miles the group was in conversation mode and I was starting to think we might have a fairly steady 20 miles back to civilization.  Well apparently that wasn't what everyone was thinking.  Next thing I know, I'm in a group off the front with Rob, Woody, Howard and Rolan and we're going around 28-30 mph.  OK, so I figure I'll try not to take any long pulls and see how it goes.  Howard surges at the front.  I come through behind him and take a really short pull.  Dropping back, I glance over my right shoulder as I prepare to get on the back of the paceline and there's a big gap where Howard should be.  I look under my arm and catch a glimpse of Howard coming back to the group so I back off a bit rather than fill the spot. Well, that was a mistake!  Rob's on the front so the pace up there is increasing.  Howard is accelerating up to the back of the paceline, and I'm basically coasting.  Not good.  Howard flies past me onto the last wheel and suddenly I'm gapped off the back by five bike lengths.  I accelerate up to 28 and close a little of it but they're still  hammering at the front and I'm still too far back to get the draft.  I see Woody dropping down the paceline after taking a pull and he glances back at me as he tacks onto the last wheel.  I struggle along for a couple of minutes more, but I've been out in the wind too long and I have to back off.  After that, I spent a few miles in no-mans-land, holding a sustainable pace but of course still gradually losing ground on the paceline up ahead.  Soon, I hear a wheel coming up from behind and Brian pulls alongside. Yea!  I get on his wheel for a little rest as he takes a long pull.

We worked together the rest of the way back, and for a while we were closing the gap, but in the end the best we could do was to limit our losses as we both started to fade after the Country Club bend.  We had been going 27-30 most of the way with the tailwind, but it was a little inconsistent, so the gap was probably a little over a minute by the time we finally backed off a mile or so before the bridge.  Good workout, though!

So I've been having some problems with my trusty commuting bike lately.  Some time back, after a few particularly rainy days, I'd forgotten to re-lube the chain and found it starting to rust.  This is a standard cheap single-speed chain, and that was enough to cause it to "stretch," which is what we call it when the links start to wear to the point where the chain doesn't mesh so well with the cogs.  Being a beat-up commuting bike, I didn't worry about it much, but as time went on I started having a problem with the chain coming off.  This was due to the fact that the little bit of "stretch" had made it impossible to get the chain tight enough on the old horizontal dropout bike.  Every now and then, when I'd be riding down a bumpy road, which pretty well describes all of the roads on which I normally commute, the chain would come off and I'd have to stop and get my fingers dirty.  This happened twice yesterday on my way home, and I made a mental note to pick up a new chain the next time I had a chance.  Well, as it turned out, I forgot to put my bike lock key in my pocket this morning when I went to work.  This isn't really a problem since I can easily roll the bike right into my office and lean it against the wall.  So there I am, sitting at my desk, and I glance up at the bike and notice something doesn't look right.  Upon closer inspection I realize that one of the link plates is completely broken.  It's rather amazing that the thing is still working.  I guess my next stop will be the LBS (local bike shop).  The only question is whether I'll be walking part of the way there.....

Off-Season 65 Mile Jam

It may be only January 8 elsewhere, but around here it's 76 F with a low tonight of 60.  I suppose I shouldn't have been too surprised, then, to have found somewhere in excess of 25 riders out at the Lee Road Junior High for the regular Sunday northshore ride this morning.  It has been a very long time since I'd been able to do this ride, and coming off of two weeks of minimal activity, four days of riding, and yesterday's Giro, I didn't really know what to expect -- of myself.  I did know quite well, however, what to expect of this group.  A warm-weather training ride in January with 25 riders?  Yeah, it was definitely going to get fast. Some of the guys like Woody have lately been racking up mileage like grad students at a free buffet. We weren't two miles into the ride before the speed started creeping up and the paceline started thinning out. There were a couple of people on this ride who were apparently getting famous for starting out on training rides at crazy speeds and then cracking later in dramatic fashion.  I decided right away on a simple strategy:  stay out of the wind until we were halfway through the ride.  I have to admit, it was a little bit of a challenge not to go with the flow and attack the first of the hills, but I knew this ride pretty well and there would be plenty of opportunities to inflict muscle damage farther down the road.

We lost just a few people before getting out to Highway 10, a little before the half-way point.  I was surprised by a couple of things. For one, this group was not particularly interested in taking prisoners.  For another, there was considerably less collateral damage than I would have expected, considering the pace.  For all practical purposes, the second half of this ride starts with a long climb up from a little stream.  Way up at the top, around a bend, is a sprint line painted on the road.  Fortunately, only a few went for it, so everything pretty much stayed together.  There are a couple more similar climbs along that road, and both were done pretty hard, but they weren't quite all-out efforts. Each time a few people would lose contact, and then a few of those would catch back on, so by the time we reached the next turn there were only maybe four riders off the back. We took it easy or a couple of miles after the turn so everyone could regroup.  As we rode south on Hwy. 60, I looked over at whoever was next to me and commented,  "this next stretch is going to get fast."  I could see that we were about to get a nice tailwind for the rolling five or six miles after turning west, and although a few riders were starting to fade, most still seemed to have a lot of gas in their tanks.  I was right, and the pressure stayed on all the way to the turn back onto Lee Road.  As we rounded the turn to head back south toward Enon I heard Mignon comment, "Oh...my....God!" 

The group, however, was still not ready to give in, so the pace stayed pretty fast, interrupted only by a little slowdown at Enon where a couple of riders refilled water bottles while the rest of us soft-pedaled.  The last significant little climb on this route is the Watchtower Hill, aka the Firetower Hill.  It's not really such a difficult climb, but since it always seems to come at the end of a long training ride, so it often causes a split in the group.  A few miles after that there's a turn onto Tung Road and then a long flat straight 4-mile run against the wind back to the cars. It was a really good ride - perhaps a little early for me to be jumping into the deep end under the circumstances, but most of us survived pretty well.  I guess these guys must be getting shape already. They're already talking about Rouge-Roubaix. It's time to put down the King Cake and ride.....

Rolling On

I was up a little early Saturday morning for the Giro Ride.  Jon Tenny was in town for a visit and so on Friday John Chauvin had dropped off a bike for him to borrow.  Steve Martin was also in town, so the plan was to all get together for the ride out toward the lakefront.  This sort of thing doesn't usually work out perfectly, of course, so I figured I'd get up a few minutes early so that I'd at least have my own act together.  Amazingly, though, thanks to the miracle of text messaging, the plan came together perfectly and the three of us were on the road shortly after 6 am.  Our unexpected efficiency put us at Starbucks a few minutes before 6:30, so we had plenty of time to sit and chat while the other riders filtered in.  I had been expecting more of the dense fog that has been plaguing the area recently, and had dressed a bit more warmly than usual for the very unusual upper 50s temperature.  As it turned out, there was essentially no fog, and only a light wind.

On the way out, as we climbed over the Bayou St. John bridge, someone pointed at the sky behind us.  Three of us actually stopped to try and get a photo of a rather spectacular cloud that was rolling over the city.  I hoped it didn't have much rain in it, but it certainly looked ominous anyway.

Although the turnout was pretty large for this one, a lot of the riders were planning on doing a long ride out to Ft. Pike or Slidell, and I think that helped to keep the speed down just a bit on the way out.  I was just happy to be back on the bike.  I'd been able to get out on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, but had overslept on Friday.  Anyway, the ride out to the turnaround was pretty normal - a fair amount of steady paceline with a few surges thrown in at random.  I spent a fair amount of time stuck near the back before finally biting the bullet and moving up to where there was still some rotation.  For the most part, we had a tailwind on the way out, and I was already starting to feel sorry for the guys who were doing the long ride.  It's easy to be seduced by a little tailwind, only to discover that by the time you are on your way back and fighting the headwind you don't have anything left. It was a pretty good ride.  We missed nearly all of the rain, and there was leftover King Cake waiting for us when I got home.

I think I'll try and make the northshore ride tomorrow.  It's been a really long time since I've done a ride that wasn't essentially flat as a pancake.  Hopefully the 30% chance of rain won't throw a monkey wrench into the works.

The Road Home

After saying goodbye to The Daughter and The Dogs, we rolled out of Olympia some time after breakfast and hit the road home around 9 am.  The plan for the return trip was to take a more southern route in order to avoid having to drive the rear wheel drive Jeep across the northern Rockies where the roads didn't look to be quite so good.  Besides, I'd never driven that route before, and who really  wants to do a 2,900 mile out-and-back anyway? Of course, that would add a few extra miles to the trip, so I resigned myself to a 4-day drive.  Day 1 was a long trek down I-5 through Washington, Oregon and into California, of which the first 300 miles or so was in a steady rain.  That's when I discovered that there was definitely something amiss with the brakes on the Jeep.  They had just been checked out the week before by the local Jeep dealer who turned the rear drums, installed new pads and "inspected" the front brakes, declaring them to be fine.  Well, I guess one of the rotors must have been warped because you could feel the brake pedal pulsating, and any time hard braking was required meant a shaking steering wheel and questionable stopping power.  For the rest of the trip I tried to avoid having to use the brakes - sort of like riding a criterium.

Unfortunately, as night fell we found ourselves driving over a few mountain passes, including Grants Pass and Mount Shasta, both of which were completely enveloped in dense fog. This made for some slow and cautious driving, and gave me a whole new appreciation for fog lights.  Anyway, we made it down into California safely for the night, logging somewhat fewer miles than I'd hoped, but considering the weather I couldn't really complain. 

The next day's drive had us on state highway for a long time as we dropped down through Modesto and Bakersfield, picking up I-40 for the long drive East.  The rest of the day and most of the next involved long stretches of desert interrupted by relatively short mountain crossings.  By then, though, the weather was clear and the temperatures were mild, so it was pretty easy going even though there was quite a bit of snow on the ground at the higher elevations.  Much this stretch through Arizona and New Mexico was between 3,000 and 5,000 feet which I guess I would have to call "high desert." A fair amount of the way, the interstate ran more or less parallel to, or actually replaced, historic Route 66.  For the last few hours I was battling dangerous crosswinds that were reported to be in the 35-45 mph range.  That required constant attention to the steering wheel but compared to our earlier drive over the continental divide at night in a snowstorm, it was a piece of cake.

Our final stop was in Wichita Falls, TX where we spend New Year's eve in a hotel alongside the interstate.  I was asleep by 10:30 pm.  The last day's drive down through Dallas put me finally on familiar roads and was uneventful as we cruised through Shreveport and down past Alexandria to meet up with I-10 at Lafayette.  We made good time and arrived at home around 7 pm showing 2,957 miles on the trip computer.  It was an interesting trip for sure.

Naturally a cold front came through that night and so Monday morning was cold and windy.  I didn't really give much consideration to riding on Monday.  I had a lot of stuff to take care of and needed a little recovery time anyway.  This morning, despite the cold and wind, I forced myself out the door for my first ride in a week.  I didn't expect to see anybody else up on the levee, and really didn't want to jump in the deep end, training-wise, anyway, so I was glad to come across Donald and Luke near the playground.  We kept a nice easy pace out to the parish line and back, which was just what I needed.  I guess I'll find out how much damage my nearly two weeks of sitting on my butt really did.