A Ride with Hector

I was reminded this morning that I'd never logged anything here about our ride with Hector Picard last week. I was surprised, but I guess with everything that was happening I never got past posting some photos to Facebook.

So it was a few weeks ago that I got an email, or Facebook message, or text, or something (it was all so much simpler when there were just phone calls and emails) from Hector. He was doing a tour (Tour to Inspire) of sorts, passing through a bunch of cities, and was asking about local group rides that he might get in on. People contact me all the time about that sort of thing, and I never really know what to tell them unless they let me know that they're a Cat. 2 or something. He was going to be in town on a Tuesday and was looking for a ride in the morning, so I told him about the regular early morning ride on the lakefront and lake trail bike path. As I often do, I sent him links to a recent Strava page for the ride so he could see the route and, more importantly, the speeds. A while later he replied and said he'd be there. Ordinarily, that wouldn't have caused me any concern, but it turns out that Hector lost all of one arm and most of the other in an accident, and so I naturally wondered about his ability to deal with a fast group ride on unfamiliar roads. Turns out he's the guy in the video that made the rounds a while back where he is shown changing a flat, arguably faster and better than a lot of riders I know. It also turns out he's done a bunch of triathlons, including Hawaii. So I rode out to meet the group early on that Tuesday and Hector's right there in the paceline without the slightest problem. He's a better bike-handler than some riders I know, and somehow manages being in a paceline at 28 mph, shifting with his chin and braking with his knee. I was worried about how he'd deal with the section where we have to ride in the grass, up the concrete levee apron, over a curb, underneath the Causeway bridge, and back down on the other side. I assumed he'd  have to stop and get off to do that.  He didn't.  Somebody else fell, but Hector rode it just like everyone else. I think we were all pretty impressed and humbled.

This weekend is the Mississippi Gran Prix stage race up in Brookhaven. Looking at the list of pre-registered riders for the Master 40+ race, I'm pretty sure I'll be getting my ass kicked pretty badly. I've apparently achieved that age where all those fast guys who you were avoiding by rider Masters are now old enough to be themselves avoiding all those even faster guys in the Cat. 1/2/3 race by riding Masters. So the age, and for that matter ability, gap for me is pretty much the same as it would have been if I'd been riding the Cat. 1/2/3 race a few years ago. I'm scheduled to officiate the Friday night Cat. 1/2/3 criterium, which should be interesting since there will be at least fifty riders in that one and it finishes in the dark. On the plus side, it probably won't be raining.  On the minus side, it probably will be raining Saturday and Sunday. The Weather Channel is showing 60% and 90% chance of rain for Saturday and Sunday respectively.