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.