Sixty Long Ones

Saturday's Giro turnout was pretty thin.

Saturday morning was, I guess, the coldest we'd had this winter. It was around 38F when I headed out -- not exactly arctic conditions temperature-wise.  The kicker, though, was the wind, which was still blowing in the 20-25 mph range from the north-northwest.  I figured the combination of cold and wind would keep a lot of the usual Giro riders in bed, at least until later in the day.  I was right.  I got to Starbucks around 6:30 as usual. There were no other bikes around. I got my coffee and sad down inside.  Fifteen minutes later I was still the only rider in sight and I started wondering if I would actually be the only rider to show up. Eventually, though, a few others arrived. Very few.  We headed out with seven riders, and it was still up in the air as to whether we'd be doing the full Giro route. After turning off of Hayne Blvd. Matt and the two Brians turned off to head back, leaving Taco, Adrian, Stephanie and me.  Taco went to the front, set his cruise control to something like 22.5 mph and stayed there.  Somewhere along Chef Highway I was sitting behind Adrian, who was on Taco's wheel. There was a patch of gravel and dirt in the right lane, so Taco eased over to the left. I was escheloned against the crosswind to Adrian's right and was surprised that he didn't follow Taco, but instead rode straight through the messy patch, slowing down as he did.  Stephanie went left and rode up to Taco's wheel. I was surprised when Adrian didn't speed up to get back up to Taco.  Then he suddenly stopped pedaling and swung right across the rumble strip and stopped, leaving me out in the wind and by then hopelessly far from Taco and Stephanie.  Apparently he was having some kind of wardrobe malfunction.  Anyway, I ended up riding solo the rest of the way out to the turnaround.  The ride back was, essentially, non-stop motorpacing behind Taco. He wasn't really killing it or anything, but for some reason I'd been feeling lousy since the start, so it was a very long ride for me. I guess maybe I was a little bonky by the time I got home, so I probably should have had something to eat. Anyway, despite sucking wheels for most of the 60 mile ride, I was pretty trashed.

So Saturday night was going to be even colder than Friday's had been. I was determined to do another Giro Ride anyway, even if I had to do it alone. Some time well after dinner I got a message from Woody suggesting a late 9 am start for the Giro.  I jumped on that immediately and sent messages about it out to both the NOBC email list and the NOBC Facebook group. It has always been a mystery to me why the Giro continues to start at 7 am all winter rather than pushing it back an hour like most places do.  Anyway, we had a pretty good group out there for the 9 am start. It was still a bit under 40 degrees, but the wind had died way down and the sun was out, so it was looking a lot better than Saturday.  There was just a handful of riders wanting to go hard today, and they pretty much rode off the front on Hayne Blvd. Behind, the group never really got a full paceline going.  There were maybe four or five willing to pull, but everyone else seemed content to sit in.  After the turnaround Taco and I rolled down the road a bit while the rest of the group stopped at the little tree to do whatever they do there. After a mile or two we looked back and could see a few people riding across to us from the pack, so when they caught we latched on. It was a nice smooth, fast group of five or six.  I took a few brief pulls when the speed wasn't too high, but wasn't bashful about sitting at the back when it got faster. As a result I had a really nice ride.  That morning I'd checked my tires and found that I'd ridden Saturday's ride with something like 50 psi. Maybe that had something to do with how lousy I'd felt. Anyway, in contrast to the day before, I felt great today. Go figure.