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.....