Not Exactly High-Mileage

A nice photo by Ross Agulair

Last week was probably the lowest-mileage week I've had all year. It wasn't my fault. Honest! But I always seem to have a few of these kinds of weeks this time of year. This time it was kind of a perfect storm (pun intended). My usual Monday morning recovery ride (using the term loosely since the prior day had been rather easy as well) was followed up on Tuesday by a rain day. Tuesdays and Thursday are usually my "long ride" days on which I routinely log around 40 miles before breakfast. Luckily, on Wednesday I got in the WeMoRi before the rain resumed, but I wasn't so lucky on Thursday which turned out to be another wash-out. So I was already 80+ miles in the hole before the weekend, during which I was scheduled to officiate the LAMBRA track championships where we spend a day and a half distributing about 70 medals among about 15 riders. Not that it wasn't some good solid racing, but I just wish half of the people who I know have track bikes would show up for this event.

So anyway, on Saturday morning I picked up Gavin who was pretty much under the weather with a head cold, and made the drive up to Baton Rouge, arriving around 8 am ahead of the scheduled 9 am first race. I immediately started setting up the finish line camera and associated laptop, all of which went smoothly.

Or so I thought.

You see, a few weeks prior there had been an electrical fire at the park where the velodrome is located that resulted in cancellation of the whole weeknight series since there were no lights. As I learned on Saturday, when the park had added the rock wall and skate park and other fun things, they hadn't upgraded the electrical systems. The result was that when they turned on the lights for the BMX track, plus the lights for the Skate Park, plus the lights for the Velodrome, the main panel self-ignited. Being a municipal park, of course, getting the situation properly repaired will no doubt entail numerous sealed bids and delays and cost over-runs, with the net result being that I'm not really expecting to see lighting at the velodrome until Spring. Fortunately, all of the track events last weekend were being held during the day. Unfortunately, when I asked Dustin if the electrical outlet on the judging stand was live he confidently replied that it was. So of course I left the generator at home. So after hooking up the camera and laptop I started up the camera software and was perplexed that it didn't seem to be able to find the camera. I went around and checked all of the connections and they all looked fine. All the while I was listening to the music playing from the little p/a system that Dustin had brought. Then I finally noticed that the light on the camera transformer wasn't lit. Neither was the light on the laptop. Turned out that the p/a system had a battery, like the laptop, and that yes, the outlet was not working. Luckily, I was able to call Chris who lives in BR and he was able to bring his generator over. So after all of that, I was rather disappointed that there was never a finish that was so close that I needed the camera to resolve the winner, although there were a few sprints during the Points Race where I did go back and look at the images to confirm the placings.

Since I knew I wouldn't be able to do any of my usual long rides over the weekend, I had planned ahead and brought my track bike with me on Saturday. The plan was to get in some miles on the track during the 3-hour lunch break in the middle of the day. So when we wrapped up the first session I opened up my bag to collect my riding clothes and discovered to my dismay that although I'd brought helmet, gloves and shoes I'd neglected to bring shorts or jersey. Luckily, Elliott happened to have a spare skinsuit that fit, so my day was saved. As everyone went off to lunch I hopped onto the bike and proceeded to tick off approximately 144 laps around the track, logging around 30 miles, which somehow seemed to me to make the whole day of officiating worthwhile!

Sunday's races were concluded in the morning, so I guess I was back home around 2:30 or so. All-in-all it was a nice enough weekend. Not having electricity was still way better than having to deal with rain or cold, so no complaints there.

Change Season and Electric Pumpkins

"Ain't dere no mo!"  Saturday's northshore ride, coming over the firetower hill that doesn't have a firetower any more.

Everything seemed to be in flux last weekend. As is usually the case this time of year, which some like call "Festival Season," there was a lot going on, or not going on. Just a few of the cycling-related items on the calendar were an NOBC northshore ride, Ochsner Ironman, Tour de Jefferson, a bandit cyclocross race in the middle of nowhere, a Tulane Cycling ride, a Tulane football game, the approach of a new cold front, Halloween decorating, and a bunch of other things that didn't even make it onto my personal radar. One of the things not going on was the Sunday Giro Ride, since the Ironman course uses almost all of the Giro Ride course.

So I decided to do the NOBC northshore ride on Saturday, having mapped out a nice and reasonably hilly 75-mile route sure to find disfavor among the tri-bike crowd. I was looking forward to the terrain, but secretly hoping that the ride wouldn't turn into a hammer-fest. After all, it's almost November and time for a little change of scenery and lowering of intensity. Early that morning I stepped out the door into the warm, 100% relative humidity fog. The humidity, I had expected. The fog, not so much. Needless to say, the fog was only worse on the 24-mile long Causeway over Lake Pontchartrain. Fortunately they hadn't put restrictions on the bridge, so although it required constant attention, we didn't lose much time. Arriving at the Lee Road Ballpark we found a nice small group ready to go. Just as I'd been hoping. It was slightly cooler than mid-summer, of course, but the cold front we'd been expecting was still far away and moving at a pace that could best be described as "glacial." The ride itself was great. We had a nice steady pace, despite a few short faster segments and a brief stop at the Enon store, and we were all back to the cars before noon. That was good because I had to go to the Tulane football game at 2:00.

I'm not really a football fan. When you go through grammar school and high school as the shortest kid in the class, you don't get many opportunities to hone your football skills. In fact, you don't really get many chances to touch the football at all, and when you do get a chance, some kid twice your size slams into you. However, since we live just a few blocks from the stadium, and The Wife seems to enjoy watching the game, I just make sure my phone is fully charged before I go. So on Saturday I had just enough time to eat and shower before walking over to the stadium, which of course was when it started to rain. I think I counted 25 Tulane students in the stands. At least it wasn't hot. Up above, the long-awaited cold front was slowly approaching, kicking off a lot of rain. We didn't get through the first quarter before they stopped the game because of lightning and made everyone empty the stands and huddle underneath. The nearest lightning was at least six miles away, and I never heard so much as a single clap of thunder. Still, we were stuck there under the BigAssFan for about 45 minutes during which time I drank a hot beer. Eventually we returned to our wet seats and suffered through the game against SMU as Tulane expertly snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

Later that night I finally installed a new single-speed freewheel on the old commuter. I'd replaced the chain a few weeks ago and every time I put pressure on the pedals, like when climbing the overpass, I could feel it grinding. When I removed the old freewheel and looked at the teeth, they were worn down to the shape of shark fins, so the new freewheel was definitely over-due by a long shot.

On Sunday a lot of the regular Giro riders were planning on doing the Tour de Jefferson. I wasn't particularly interested in either paying the $50 entry fee or just crashing the 45-mile ride since it spent a fair amount of time meandering through Metairie. By then the cold front had pretty much arrived along with a steady 15-mph northeast wind. So I decided to instead do an easy 50 miles on the levee out to the Spillway and back. Mignon met me along the way as the last of the clouds moved out. The return trip was largely into an unrelenting head/crosswind, and since neither of us wanted to do much suffering, I think we averaged about fifteen miles per hour.

The rest of Sunday was earmarked for Halloween decorating. Every year Candy comes home with even more decorations, many of which require electricity, which leads to me spending a lot of time worrying about whether the twenty various contraptions are going to overload the single outlet supplying power and burn down the house. So this year I tapped into the one circuit that I installed myself (and therefore know it doesn't include any knob and tube wiring from the 20s or random other connections) and ran a new line to a new outlet in the basement from which I could run an extension cord under the front steps to power all that stuff in front of the house. I would have put the new outlet in a better location but didn't have enough wire on hand for that (but had miles of outdoor extension cords). After that I spent hours hanging plastic skeletons from trees and crawling around underneath the shrubbery with electric pumpkins and things while providing the local mosquito population with blood. It is not really something I enjoy doing, but by the end of the evening the four plastic bins in the living room were empty and you could probably see the orange glow of my front yard from the ISS. So other than the 20 mph wind, and the crawling around in the dirt with the bugs, Sunday was beautiful.

Meanwhile, over in Colorado Springs, Derek Brouchard-Hall, the COO of USA Cycling, rather suddenly announced he would be stepping down at the end of the year. Actually, he didn't announce it and neither did USAC. Velo-News announced it, much to the dismay of all of the Local Associations and members who had not been given any kind of heads-up. Rumor has it that Derek will be doing something else cycling-related, but that announcement hasn't come out yet. Of course that opened the floodgates for anyone and everyone looking to blame someone for the decline in traditional road racing. Just for the record, I think Derek did a great job under very difficult circumstances. Most people don't have a clue what USAC actually does, what its responsibilities are, and how hard it is for them make positive changes at the grassroots level where the ground is constantly shifting underfoot. I'm in contact with people at USAC on a weekly basis and as far as I can tell they work their butts off.

So now I come to this morning, Monday, October 22, which is the first morning this fall that I've pulled on the old arm-warmers. It was actually below 60F, just barely, when I stepped out the door into the dark for a much-needed recovery ride. My legs were sore from something. Perhaps cycling, perhaps something else, but at any rate I was not looking to do them any more harm. Unfortunately it was still pretty windy out there, so although it was slow, the ride wasn't quite as easy as I'd have liked. On the plus side, that new single-speed freewheel I installed on the old commuter felt incredibly smooth on the ride in to work!

Just a Hint

The Saturday Giro heads out into the rising sun.

Around the end of last week we had just a hint of Fall. It was nice while it lasted, which wasn't long. After an easy ride on Friday morning when the temperature was low enough to make me wonder where I'd put my arm-warmers the last time I used them back in March or April, I rolled out the door early on Saturday morning to meet the Giro Ride. It was still fairly cool Saturday morning. The Garmin reported 66F as I rode out to Starbucks in the dark, and by the time I got home a few hours later it was still only around 80.

If you get to Starbucks early enough, you get the
primo bike parking spot.

For some reason I had been expecting a rather thin crowd for the Saturday Giro. This time of year there are a lot of competing things going on. So I was pleasantly surprised to see lots of riders showing up, one of whom was Dan Bennett doing his last ride before heading back home to Tucson. Dan was wrapping up one of the first full weeks of riding he's been able to do in a while, and after getting dropped the prior weekend I think he was bound and determined to stay with the group on Saturday. Thanks to the large group, perfect temperature, complete lack of wind, and clear blue sky, the pace was pretty fast. At one point I think Dan came off the back when the speed-o-meter stuck on 30-something MPH for a bit, but luckily the group had to slow down a lot for a light and everyone was able to re-group. Dan was fine for the rest of the ride. He has been having an agonizingly slow recovery from rhabdomyolysis that almost put him into full-on kidney failure so actually he's probably progressing nicely. For someone who has been racing at a Cat. 1 level, however, a recovery period that can drag out to a good year or so is hard to handle. Anyway, I arrived home feeling like I'd gotten a pretty good workout even though there wasn't a drop of sweat clouding the inside of my glasses. Apparently then the humidity is low enough, sweat evaporates before it drips off you. Who knew?  I spent the afternoon sitting in the sun sanding, spot-priming, painting and re-painting the front steps and trimming bushes while the paint dried. That resulted is some very sore quads thanks to all of the contortions required.

On Sunday I drove across the lake with Frank and Mignon for the 72-mile NOBC northshore ride. Over at Abita Springs we found a big group of about 20 ready to go. In a couple of cases, perhaps a little bit too ready. Steve, Pat, Kenny, Fred, and a number of northshore riders who I know but don't know rolled out at 8:00.


We had made a last-minute route change in order to avoid some of Hwy 437 between Barker's Corner and the turnoff to Folsom that involved taking Million Dollar Road to Fitzgerald Church Road. I knew that route well. The only problem was that once we got onto Million Dollar Rd. there were a few riders at the front who didn't, but were pushing the pace anyway, so as we came up to the turn at about 25 mph the back half of the group started yelling that this was the turn. It was too late to hit the brakes too hard, so most of us passed the intersection before turning back. Unfortunately, the front of the group thought someone had flatted, not that they had missed the turn.

The Sunday Northshore Ride coming over the firetower hill before descending to Enon.

As we rolled slowly down Fitzgerald Church I kept looking back because I knew we were still missing a number of riders. I could see one small group coming, so assumed that was everyone. It wasn't. The very front of the group had stopped and they were waiting for what they thought was a flat tire to be fixed. To make a long story short, they finally got back on track and we waited for them at Enon for a few minutes. As usual, a few riders had already turned back and a few more would cut the ride short over the next few miles, but we still had a good-sized group for the return trip. The pace this whole time had been a little erratic but definitely fast enough that I knew we might have some casualties by the end. Somewhere after leaving Enon Fred rolled up alongside me and told me his Di2 battery was dying and he was stuck in his small chainring, which in his case is something like a 34. I think his maximum cadence for the ride turned out to be somewhere north of 150 rpm. After riding the out-and-back down infamous House Creek Road, the group was kind of split but we still had six or seven left with us for the final ten or fifteen miles back to Abita Springs. That was followed by a rather long wait for a table at the Abita Brewhouse, so I didn't get home until, I guess, around 3 pm. By then it was Summer again. I kind of spent the rest of the afternoon and evening eating and drinking anything that didn't try to escape.

It was a good weekend. Looking at Strava, I note that Sunday's ride put my 2018 mileage just over the 10,000 mile mark, so I guess I'll be around my usual 11-12,000 mile total by the end of the year.

Two Rides, Dan, Chickens, and a Hurricane

Brian and Dan riding into the morning sun on Saturday. Brian crashed last Sunday and broke his bike but
otherwise was surprisingly unharmed himself.

It was a needed weekend at home during which I planned to do much around the house but didn't. What I did get to do was ride a bit, so I the bushes that needed trimming and the stairs that needed painting will just have to wait another week, or two, or three.

Double paceline - needed skills

Saturday was the usual Giro Ride, which was usual only until we were halfway out when it wasn't usual. Dan Bennett had told me he'd be in town for his HS 30-year reunion, and sure enough he was already at Starbucks when I arrived well before the crack of dawn. Although there were a few of the usual riders who were riding the annual MS Tour last weekend, and therefore weren't at the Giro, the group on hand Saturday morning seemed to be about normal. Kaitlyn, one of the Tulane students, was there for her first Giro, which turned out to be a rather fast one. Fast enough that she apparently got dropped before we hit the I-10 overpass. For the past few weeks the service roads on both sides of I-310, that we use to get over to Chef Highway, have been barricaded off by the city. As far as I can tell, it's just because they got tired of picking up the illegally dumped trash there. We had been going around the barricades anyway. Well this morning I was surprised when the group turned the opposite direction and headed back over to Bullard, and from there to Chef Highway. Bullard is kind of a mess of broken-up concrete plus a couple of traffic signals, so not exactly ideal. Gavin went to look for Kaitlyn and took a shortcut, but by the time he figured out that she'd turned back, we already gone by, so he spent some time solo. Anyway, it was a reasonably fast Giro, considering. By the time I got home there were some rain clouds heading in our direction, so I scratched plans to paint the steps.

Slow speed bike handling drills

The jaw from which that tooth was pulled almost two weeks ago still hurts periodically. I'm due to return to the dentist on Wednesday. I'm not too happy about this whole thing, but I think I may have lost about a pound as a result of slightly less enthusiastic eating so perhaps there's a silver lining.

Sunday I drove over to Pontchatoula with one of the Tulane riders for their "skills and grills" ride. This was just some easy double paceline miles followed by some slow-speed bike handling skill practice on the grass and then a couple of hours in the back yard eating hamburgers, playing croquet, and chasing Dustin's chickens around. I think it was pretty good team-building. They have a couple of Spanish-speaking riders this year, a few women, and rider from China, so it's an interesting mix. Hopefully most will still be around when the racing starts. I think they have about ten loaner bikes and all of them are currently in use, so that's encouraging.

This morning Dan met me up on the levee for my easy Monday recover ride, not that I had much from which to recover in this case. We had a nice chat, though, and finished up with coffee at Zotz.

Michael blowing up off the Yucatan this morning.
Fortunately heading straight north.

Meanwhile down south of us in the Gulf of Mexico there a new tropical storm named Michael that is blowing up pretty fast. All of the track guidance is still taking it way to our east, so we aren't expecting anything much from it here in New Orleans, but the intensity models have been indicating it will be a pretty significant hurricane by the time it slams into the panhandle of Florida. For us, it means we'll be on the nicer western side, and therefore will ultimately be getting a northerly flow by late tomorrow and Wednesday which should cool things down a bit. Tomorrow will probably be wet, however. Right after that we're expecting a cool front to push through, so by Thursday we may be seeing low morning temperatures in the 60s for the first time in a long time. It's still not time to put away the summer clothes, of course, but I certainly wouldn't mind a couple of cooler morning rides.

Looking out my office window right now as preparations are being made at the Superdome for tonight's Saints game. I think we're supposed to be officially "off" at something like 3 pm today.

Feliciana Fatality Fallout

The accident scene where Buddy and Tom were hit.
The road in the upper right was the finish of Rouge-Roubaix for a number of years.

Back on June 30 two cyclists were hit from behind by a car up in West Feliciana Parish near St. Francisville. One, Buddy Amoroso, was killed. The other, Tom Clement, was seriously injured. They were riding along the right edge of La 66, during the day, wearing high-visibility jerseys, with flashing lights, and a rear-view mirror, on a clear day, on a straight stretch of road. In fact, the accident happened within sight of the finish line that had been used for Rouge-Roubaix for a number of years before it was moved into St. Francisville proper. The 22-year-old driver of the car received a slap on the wrist. He had $15k in insurance. Tom's medical costs will be in the $200-300,000 range. Buddy was a city councilman in Baton Rouge.

West Feliciana parish includes some of the nicest roads for cycling in the state. Even though I'm from New Orleans, around two hours away, I've ridden thousands of miles around there since the early 70s, and the area annually provides venues for numerous road races and charity rides. The country roads around there offer quiet, tree-lined rolling hills. The economy is supported by prisons, tourism, and the state's largest nuclear power plant, along with a tiny bit of surviving farming.

In 1999 Jon Anderson, who was living around St. Francisville and loved to ride his bike on the worst possible unpaved roads he could find, especially in the dead of winter, and preferably in the rain, organized a group ride. Over the succeeding fifteen years it slowly evolved, first into a local-level race, and ultimately into a full-blown two-day early-season 110-mile regional-level battle that included impossible gravel climbs and huge prizelists drawing Professional to entry level riders from all over the country. For most people in the cycling world, it put the little forgotten town of St. Francisville on the map. Every weekend, year-round, cyclists from all over Louisiana and Mississippi could be found riding the many well-traveled routes in the area. You would think that would be considered a positive thing for the city and parish.

So when Buddy was killed by an inattentive motorist while he and his friend were doing everything right, you might have thought the response by the parish would have been to call for better enforcement, signage, driver education, etc., if only to preserve its status as a cycling destination.

Well, you'd be wrong.

The response was headed up by one Mel Percy, one of the parish council members. The back-story I heard is that once upon a time, Mel or one of his buddies, had apparently gotten stuck behind the police-escorted Rouge-Roubaix pack. He's gotten on his cellphone and called the sheriff's office and tried to get them to let him pass since obviously he was important and couldn't wait. Of course they couldn't do that and he had to wait until they got off of the state highway where they were being escorted through the initial 3-mile neutral section until they turned off onto a parish road to begin the actual race.

So anyway, Mel picks some of his local friends to form a bicycle "safety" committee and they come up with what are probably the most insane restrictions on cyclists you can imagine, and write them up in 4th grade English to present to the Parish Council. The obvious intent was to (a) keep cyclists off of "their" roads, keep the local folks from being inconvenienced by having to look where they were going and maybe even slow down and wait, and (c) shift liability to cyclists in case of another serious accident. Of course, perhaps I'm biased, so here's what they proposed (taken from an article in The Advocate). Judge for yourself:

• Requiring cyclists to wear an outer garment with at least 400 square inches of a high-visibility, fluorescent color. Percy said he lifted the wording from the state's hunting regulations, with a modification on the color.
• Requiring lights on the rear of bikes that are visible for one mile.
• Putting a laser device at the front and rear bikes in a group ride to warn cyclists of oncoming vehicles.
• Using rear-view mirrors on bicycle handlebars or riders' helmets.
• Requiring cyclists to ride in single-file formations, within 2 feet of the right-hand pavement edge.
• Prohibiting the use of paint on the roadway to mark the routes for cycling events, and requiring event organizers to remove signs and marking tape from the roads within 24 hours. 

In case you're wondering, yes, Louisiana does have a 3-feet law. It's called the Colin Goodier Protection Act, for the Doctor who was killed on June 9, 2008 on River Road near Baton Rouge when he was run over from behind by a truck. Of course, area cyclists turned out for the hearings that appeared to be just for show. None of these requirements would have prevented the accident that precipitated all of this. Driver education and signage, and improved roads might have, but no such recommendations or actions were considered. So at the end of the day, which was a couple of days ago, we have an ordinance that includes the following:

• That cyclists "wear an outer garment above the waist of which a majority of the material must be high visibility fluorescent colors and must have a forward and rear facing light with daylight visibility a minimum of one half a mile."
• That except for when passing, cyclists "will ride single file within two feet of the right hand side of the road" and "complete their passing procedure within 1/10 of a mile."
• And that cyclists "will ride in groups of no more than 10 riders with a minimum separation between cycling groups of at least a quarter mile."

Most of that is practically unenforceable, of course, if not illegal. Needless to say, this has cast its shadow over the many cycling events held annually in the parish, not the least of which is Rouge-Roubaix. (see "How did the Rouge‐Roubaix Start" for some history on the event.) The irony in all of this, of which there is much, is that the incident that initially ticked off one of the parish people was a race (permitted events aren't really impacted by the legislation), and it was on a state highway (the cyclist requirements apply only to parish roads). I guess I should mention that the requirements don't apply to "residents" riding in their own "neighborhoods." 

So basically we now have a very hostile environment in West Feliciana Parish where we once thought we were, at least in some respects, welcome. Indeed, all of the hotels and other businesses involved with Rouge-Roubaix, are fully supportive of the event. Still, putting on an event like Rouge-Roubaix is a very difficult and taxing task that involves lots of negotiating with businesses, sheriff's offices (in more than one state), churches, residents, sponsors, etc. Trying to accomplish it in an environment where the Parish has clearly indicated cyclists are not welcome makes it just that much more difficult. 

So, not surprisingly, Rouge-Roubaix announced this morning that the 2019 race is officially cancelled. This comes on the heels of last-year's cancellation due to flooding. Lots of riders have already said that they will no longer be riding in West Feliciana Parish. Legal challenges to the ordinance may be forthcoming. It remains to be seen if the sheriff and police will be willing to actually enforce any of this. While I can think of some other options for a Rouge-Roubaix type of race just north of the parish line, much momentum has already been lost.

Far Past Six at 6-Gap

Missing Frank but everyone else ready for the start

I was on the early slopes of the roughly 6-mile Hogpen Gap climb when a rider pulled up alongside. I was plodding my way up the 7-14% grade at about 5 miles per hour, locked into the 39x29. "It gets harder every year," said Steve. I grunted something along the lines of, "No kidding! My legs are shot." Steve inched slowly ahead as my unresponsive legs refused to lift my pace by the half mph it would have taken to stay with him. My neck and back were killing me, I was sweating more than normal, and already running low on water. But I was still riding, and under the circumstances I was happy with that. The bike was shifting when needed, the new 29-tooth cog was easing the strain a bit, and the jaw from which the dentist had ripped a tooth earlier in the week wasn't bothering me at all.

This was my 11th year to ride the 6-Gap Century up in Dahlonega. I would have guessed it hadn't been quite so many years had I not gone back through the blog and checked after Debbie Milne posted about it being her 15th year. I'd driven up the day before with the Tulane group, of which there were ten this year, not counting me and Dustin. Like last year, we didn't get to roll out of New Orleans until about 8:00 am, and like last year we arrived in Dahlonega a few minutes after 6 pm, which is when packet pickup officially ends. Luckily, although the volunteers were starting to pack up, we were still able to pick up our numbers and chips and t-shirts. We had a bit of a wait before we could get a table at Manuel's, which had recently moved to a new location just across the street from the old one. With my mouth still a bit of a disaster zone, I ate carefully and sparingly, as I have had to do all week. It was pretty much the opposite of carbo-loading, I guess, and probably not exactly recommended procedure prior to what would undoubtedly be a difficult 6+ hour ride in the mountains of North Georgia. I'd be putting a lot of faith in the energy gels this year.

At Manuel's Saturday evening

For a change, we had reserved hotel rooms early enough this year to be staying at the nearby Super 8, which was only about fifteen minutes away, and conveniently next to a Waffle House. That was good. When we tried to check in, however, that was bad. As the Indian at the desk tried to explain, English not being his first language by a long shot, the credit card authorization that Tulane had used to make the reservations had apparently been lacking a phone number. So he had cancelled the charge and wanted another credit card. We tried to call Michelle at Tulane to straighten it out, but she didn't answer, so I gave him my own Tulane travel card, knowing full well it was going to cause me all kinds of grief down the road with our corporate travel system. A few minutes later, Michelle returned the call and ultimately, with some difficulty, convinced the guy to credit back the charge on my card and put it instead on her card where it had been originally. Sheesh! Anyway, we were finally all set and everyone hit the sack around 10:30 or so. Hitting the sack, in my case, did not seem to include a lot of sleeping for some reason. Maybe I should have had that beer that I didn't have at dinner.

So Sunday morning we were up well before 6 am and went over to the Waffle House for breakfast. I wasn't really willing to take a chance on anything at Waffle House, considering my mouth and all, so breakfast for me was basically a gel, a cup of hotel coffee, 500 mg of penicillin, and a 12-hour Aleve. Perfect breakfast prior to a six and a half hour ride with close to 12,000 feet of climbing. Anyway, I was rather anxious about the timing and worried that the stop at Waffle House was going to get us to the start too late to get a good parking spot, but fortunately there were lots of spots left when we arrived a bit after 6:30 am for the 7:30 am start.

I got the bike ready with two big water bottles, and put a full flask of gel and a couple of gel packs in my pockets, along with my phone. Then attached the number plate with the timing chip to my handlebar, which I hated doing but it was what it was and the extra wind resistance was unlikely to impact my climbing "speed" anyway. By the time I got down to the start I'd lost track of the other Tulane riders who were doing the full 6-Gap distance, but found Pat and Steve just behind the "6-hour" rope. The start itself was pretty fast but was also fairly uneventful, which is to say I didn't see any crashes. I think there were probably about 100-150 riders up the road ahead of me by the time we hit the first little climb that isn't one of the 6 "gaps" but probably should be. That climb is fairly short and not too steep, and I was comfortable at around 11 mph for the most part. I was already expecting to blow up after a few hours, so I wasn't pushing my luck. I found another rider who was going at just the right speed and just tagged along behind him so he could pace me. The first real climb wasn't too bad, but I remember thinking, "I really need to start working on my core!" as it started. I could tell that my back and arms were going to be causing me trouble later. Somewhere along here I shifted to that new 29-tooth cog, which basically allowed me to go a little more slowly that usual but also with a little less strain.

Somewhere on Hogpen Steve came by as I was inching my way up the mountain at four or five miles per hour. Then he stopped at the top and I didn't, so I went down Hogpen a little bit ahead of him. I didn't push the descent too much, staying in the upper 30s to upper 40s. I think my max was around 49 mph. Right at the top of Wolfpen, which is one of the timed segments, Debbie Milne came flying past. I had just enough time to give her a "Go Debbie" before she crossed the timing mat just ahead of me. Just before the start of the climb up to Wolfpen Gap I stopped for some water because I didn't think I was going to make it with what I had left. Steve apparently passed me again around there. My legs were pretty much cooked at that point and my neck was killing me, especially on the downhills, so I was spending a lot of time going 4-5 mph on the climbs after that. The final long descent, which is always one of my favorites, was even better this year with nice fresh smooth asphalt. If I'd had anything left I would have really pushed it there, but as it was I let gravity do most of the work. It was already obvious that my finishing time would be well over a half-hour longer than it was in my better years, so there wasn't much point in pushing it. The last long stretch of rolling hills was made a bit easier when a couple of riders caught me and I was able to tag along behind most of the way to the finish. My finishing time was by far the slowest ever, something like 6:38. As it turned out I was just a couple of minutes behind Steve. A couple of the Tulane riders, however, had great times, around the 5:30 and under mark, although they neglected to attach their timing chips so they'd be readable, so they don't show up in the official listing. A couple of the TUCA riders who had been planning on doing the shorter 3-gap ride decided to start in-between the official 6-gap and 3-gap start times and managed to take a wrong turn that resulted in a nice long tour of the area south of the actual ride route.

We headed back without much delay this year, stopping for a minute at the hotel again to retrieve my glasses that I had left on the night stand. Other than a couple of hours of moderate rain, the drive back was happily uneventful with Gavin doing the last stretch from Mobile into New Orleans, so I was back home I think before midnight.