Wet Asphalt

Strange name.....

It's been raining off-and-on almost all day.  It started early in the morning, and when I heard it at 6 am I rolled over and went back to sleep for a few more minutes.  But soon enough curiosity got the better of me and I checked the hourly weather forecast and radar.  You know, if you ride bikes long enough you eventually become an amateur meteorologist.  You also get pretty good at identifying roadkill and birds, but that's another story.  So I stared at the radar and figured I would have about a two-hour window when it wouldn't be raining.  Of course, the asphalt would still be wet, but at least the water wouldn't be coming from both above and below.  On the plus side, the temperature was in the low 70s, so getting wet would not be the deal-breaker it would on a colder day.  I decided to head out, around 9:30, on the old Orbea rather than subject the Bianchi's bearings and chain to what I knew would be a wet and gritty couple of hours. Things were going pretty well on the way out.  There was a bit of wind to deal with, but the levee bike path was pretty good and although there were a few really wet places, for the most part it was fine. I figured I'd ride out to the "big dip" at St. Rose, which would give me a 2-hour round-trip of around 35 miles.  Well, I was just about a mile from my turn-around when, of course, the rear tire started going flat. I wasn't surprised.  Riding on wet roads increases the chances of flatting exponentially. So out at the Dip I stopped to change the tube. I easily found the shard of rock that had caused the puncture.  Then, when I tried to put the new tube in I discovered it was one of Danielle's 650C tubes.  Luckily, I had another spare tube. After a couple hundred strokes of my trusty Silca mini-pump (this was my back-up seat bag, not my regular one) I was back on the road.

Turning around, I picked up a little tailwind and was cruising along nicely when a pretty good little rain shower passed over me and got me good and wet. Pretty much exactly what I was expecting - a flat tire and wet feet.  I got back home in precisely two hours, so at least that worked out.  I was feeling pretty proud of myself just for getting in a ride on such a day when, an hour later, the sun came out and the streets dried up.  If I'd waited until like 1 pm I would have had a much more dry ride, but a few hours later we were back to non-stop rain.  Ben stopped by to pick up the key to the Tulane cycling facility because the card-swipe lock was malfunctioning again.  It seems to do that every six months or so when the battery dies and I have to put in a service request to get it fixed.

Well, tomorrow it's back to work.