Wind and Pain and another Year

Friday afternoon I left work a little early in order to make it over to Bayou Bicycles.  I don't think I'd been there in three or four years, but Danielle had made an appointment for a bike fit with Robert Driskill who does the Specialized Body Geometry fittings.  She has been having persistent problems with upper back and shoulder pain on longer rides and figured an independent appraisal of her position might help and I had already tried the obvious stuff like raising the bars a bit and making sure the saddle was level.  I arrived a little late, but that was fine because Robert was still trying to find a stationary trainer he could use that would accommodate her 650C wheel bike.  The system uses a few cameras that feed video to a computer where you can get a good look at the rider in action from multiple angles and then make measurements of key angles to help identify any peculiarities in position or pedaling. 

After that it becomes more art than science as changes can be made in various settings or components such as cleat position, stem length, saddle height, fore-aft setting, etc., etc.  Of course, you expect to be sold some of the Specialized equipment like saddles, shoes, insoles, etc.  Danielle wanted to get a new saddle anyway, since she was still riding the original squishy one that had come with the bike, and she also got some of the Specialized insoles which I have been using for years.  He also lowered her saddle and we will be looking into shortening her reach a bit, possibly with some different handlebars, although the fact that she rides extremely narrow bars makes it hard to just pull them off the shelf.  Anyway, it seems like the saddle change had a pretty big impact, allowing her to actually put some weight on it instead of essentially supporting most of her weight on her hands and feet. We rushed from the bike shop over to David's house for a little Tulane Cycling party.

Saturday morning was cold and very windy and from the outset I knew I wouldn't be doing the whole Giro.  I'm still getting some significant pain between the shoulder blades after half an hour to 45 minutes and at this time of the year it's just not worth the suffering for a few extra miles.  I rode out to the Giro with Danielle and figured we'd turn around at the end of Hayne Blvd.  As it turned out, the group was in easy mode that day since some were planning on doing a long Giro out to Slidell, so the speed down Hayne never got very high.  Danielle was able to stay with the group all the way to Lake Forest Blvd. where we turned right as the group turned left.  Luckily, Brett and Paige did the same thing, so we had some company, and a motor, on the way back.

Sunday morning there was a Tulane ride planned for 8:00, so first I rode out to meet the Giro at 7:00, mainly for the coffee.  Although the entire West Texas A&M equestrian team was there as it had been the day before, the turnout for the Giro was really slim.  It was cold and really, really windy, and the half-dozen riders who arrived early were sitting inside instead of outside.  I doubt there were more than twelve by the time we rolled out a bit after 7:00.  I just rode to the lakefront and then to Wisner with the group, heading back with a nice tailwind in order to stop by the house and meet Danielle before riding over to campus.  We ended up with seven for the Tulane ride. 

Kenny took us out the levee bike path and then through Kenner to the Lakefront bike path, and ultimately back to campus via Carrollton since Jeff. Davis Parkway is currently all torn up for road construction.  It was still really windy and I doubt the temperature rose more than one or two degrees, but the pace was easy so it wasn't too much of a factor.  Although my neck and back issues are improving, the rate is glacial at best.  After half an hour of so some of the muscles between my shoulder blades start getting really tight and painful.  I doubt I'll  be comfortable with a hard ride until that subsides a little more, so although I would have really liked to have done the northshore ride on Sunday, I think I made the right decision.

Sunday afternoon I spent a little time on Oak Street for the annual Po-Boy festival where I had some sort of catfish po-boy and a cup of Abita Jockamo, followed a bit later by dinner and a birthday cake.

So today was my 60th birthday.  At this point it's becoming more and more preferable to try and ignore the relentless march of time than to dwell on it, but on this particular birthday I had the funeral of a close family friend to attend.  I thought back to the other time there had been a funeral on my birthday.  That was JFK's funeral back in 1963.  Anyway, the funeral was in Slidell and by the time we were heading back the weather was getting worse and worse and it was too late to make it worthwhile to go back to the office.  I had not ridden in the morning because it was ridiculously windy and misty, and since then the conditions had been going steadily downhill.  Tomorrow morning at 6 am is looking like 54 degrees dropping to 52 by 8 am with a 100% chance of rain and a 13 mph northwest wind.  This is not encouraging.  If I'd gotten in a ride this morning it would have brought my annual total up over 11,000 miles.  It's looking like that milestone will have to wait until Wednesday.