Dark Rides and Complications

Finally the sun comes up!

With the switch back to Standard Time the morning rides again descended into darkness and, as usual, photo opps became scarce. It wasn't until Wednesday of last week that the week-long cold snap finally snapped and the wind shifted back around to the south. We may have a couple more chilly mornings over the next couple of weeks but I think it is finally safe to put away most of the cold weather gear. Still, there will be the dark early morning rides for a while yet that always make it so difficult to get out of bed and onto the bike. That very fact is what makes skipping a ride even more risky than usual because the only things getting me out the door in the mornings right now are routine and the automatic pilot. I've never really enjoyed riding in the dark, but at least once the morning temperatures finally warmed up to the point at which wardrobe decisions become simple it's a little bit easier. So anyway, things were plodding along in a very routine way ... until they weren't.

It was late at night the Wednesday before last when I got a call that they were taking my father to the emergency room. As it turned out he had a bad UTI that had now become septicemia, complicated by a non-functioning ureter. I was at the hospital with my sisters until maybe 2 am by which time they had him reasonably stabilized and had started pumping him full of the serious antibiotics. He'd remain in the ER for another day and a half until there was actually a room available in the ICU where he spent the better part of a week. Fortunately they got the infection under control and later addressed the ureteral bypass situation before kidney failure, and so he was finally released back to Poydras Home a couple of days ago. 

Last weekend it was two Giro Rides for me. Saturday's ride had a good turnout and although it was fairly fast, it was nice and steady so didn't feel as hard as it might have. Josiah (Tulane Cycling) was on hand for his first ever Giro, so I was kind of keeping an eye on him, but he rode well and never seemed to be in difficulty. On the way back, at the infamous Lake Forest - Bullard corner, Barry flatted. For a change, I decided to continue on with the front of the group. I think a few people stopped with him. I know a few slowed down enough that they never made it back to the group. Back at home we have had a sudden rat and/or mouse population explosion that prompted me to reluctantly put out rat poison. There are rat droppings all over the basement and when rats started coming out of the storm drain in the middle of the day while Candy was there cutting the grass along the side of the house that kind of sealed the deal. The next day the dead rat smell started to permeate the basement and although I found one small dead rat, I know there are others down there somewhere, possibly under the concrete (or the 60+ storage bins), because the smell is still there. Not my first time dealing with this, however, and I think we will just have to wait this one out for a few days.

Sunday's Giro had a relatively low turnout for some reason. There was a pretty significant south wind blowing, but it wasn't really enough to do too much damage. When the group is small it always means that the overall individual effort will be a little higher, at least for me, because there's less time in the draft and more time in the wind. The temperature was in the upper 70s, I think, so it felt pretty warm toward the end and I was glad I'd put a little Skratch electrolyte mix into my water bottle beforehand.

The river has been starting to rise lately.

This morning I dutifully hit the road around 5:40 am to ride out to City Park for the Mellow Monday ride. It was warm and humid and a little windy, and even in the dark I could tell the sky was cloudy. I hadn't looked at the forecast, however, and was surprised to find the meetup spot at the Museum of Art completely deserted. As I started the ride alone I pulled out my phone and checked the radar and realized why nobody had been there. There was some rain heading our way, but it was obvious it wouldn't get to the city until much later in the day. I guess the timing looked different last night and people had already written the ride off. I had a nice easy Monday ride, though, where my heart rate probably never broke 120 bpm. The rain finally came through a bit before noon. At the moment they've got thunderstorms in the forecast all the way until tomorrow afternoon, so the Tuesday levee ride will be a wait-and-see situation I guess. After that the wind shifts around to north, dropping the temperature down to the upper 50s for Wednesday morning. As we are closing in on April, that might hopefully be the last chilly morning. Meanwhile, I'm still working my way though a 7-day supply of 300 mg Clindamycin capsules for the dental infection that doesn't seem to be progressing but hasn't entirely resolved either. I've also been taking a probiotic that I picked up at the drugstore since this will be my third batch of antibiotics this year. No idea if it will matter, but I don't guess it could hurt.

On the 18th the Bianchi rolled past 100,000 miles. I still think of it as my "new" bike, and rather dread the prospect of having to buy a new one. It's getting practically impossible to get a bike with rim brakes any more, not to mention mechanical shifters. That all adds up to a lot of money and basically no upgrade path from what I have now to what is currently available. While I don't hate disc brakes or electronic shifting, neither really figure into the equation that determines when and how badly I will be dropped from a race, and both make it a little more difficult to maintain a bike without frequent trips to the shop.

Road Trip

Planning, and I use the term loosely, had been both late and minimal, but by early in the week there were four of us determined to make our way up to Calhoun, GA for the Georgia Tech Calhoun Road Race on Saturday. We were too late to get a Tulane van and in fact we'd be going kind of "unofficially" which is to say we'd be paying our own way for this collegiate race that included non-collegiate categories. Samuel and Josiah would both be riding the Collegiate D race, and then following up an hour later with the Category 5 race. Neither had been in a road race before. Dustin was entered in the Pro 1-3 race that I think included Collegiate Category A, while I would be riding the Master 40 race like last year. Dustin's mother had used some of her Hilton points to get us a really nice suite at the Hampton Inn, so that was a big help. 

I'd be driving there in the Volvo and Dustin would be taking his car, so everything seemed to be falling nicely into place by Wednesday. Well, until Candy called me that afternoon to say she'd run over something in the road and slashed one of the car tires. 

Friendly Friday

Although the tires on the car probably had another ten thousand miles in them I figured I may as well bite the bullet and get all four replaced. It was looking like Sunday would be rain, so nice fresh tire tread wouldn't be a bad idea. Of course, that meant missing my usual Thursday morning ride so I could get the car to the local Firestone shop where they had tires on hand at 7 am. Fortunately, that all went pretty smoothly other than the fact that the tires they had were all-weather tires which are a little louder and less efficient than the touring type tires I usually get, but at least I'll be well-prepared for the next time it snows in New Orleans. 

I did manage to get out to the Friendly Friday ride that turned out to be a little more of a workout than I was aiming for, but at least I'd have the rest of the day to recover while sitting in the car. With three bikes on the roof we left NOLA around 1:00 pm and met up with Dustin around Slidell where Josiah switched over to his car to keep him company. The 8-hour drive went pretty smoothly and we arrived at the hotel around 10 pm after losing an hour to the time zone change.

Saturday morning was cold - around 30°F - but at least it looked like we'd have a bit of sunshine. Conditions were actually quite similar to last year with a significant northwest wind and cold (by my standards) temperatures, and I was glad that my race didn't start until 10:00. Even so, I wore thermal knickers, base layer, arm-warmers, etc. The locals were mostly in what I'd call summer kit with maybe arm-warmers. When I was hanging around prior to the start I was surprised to meet up with Dave Schreffler who used to be in NOLA many years ago but was now down in Tampa. Turned out he was on his way back from someplace and saw that there was a conveniently located race that morning and decided to do it before the next part of his trip. 

The moment the fatal gap opened on the first lap

The Masters race had 34 riders, of which 23 were "50+," including Jame Carney who is the coach of the Piedmont University team and a two-time Olympian, former Pro, etc. It was looking a lot like it would be a repeat of last year for me, which was not exactly encouraging news. Like last year there was a head/crosswind from the left on the first long northbound segment of the lollipop course that resulted in a long line of riders hugging the right edge of the road. Just before the first turn there was a little rise that the front of the group attacked really hard. By the time the back part of the group (where I was of course) got there the lead riders were already 300 meters ahead and flying down a steep grade at 35-40 mph. I was already redlined well before hitting the steepest little climb on the course that featured a bit of 10-14%, so by the time we came over the top there were gaps everywhere and riders were strung out for a quarter mile. The next few miles were full-gas for all of us in the back half of the group trying to close things back up and rejoin what was left of the group. After some really hard efforts most, but not all, of us made it back to the tail end of the main bunch. Then, as we went up a little grade before the next right turn someone a couple of riders ahead of me blew up and opened a gap. I'd already burned all my matches and hadn't quite recovered, so I just couldn't make that last crucial bridge. 

Grupetto!

I eventually responded, but it was too little, too late. That left me alone for quite a long time, but I could see a small group of three behind me so I eventually eased up to get in which them. That group turned out to include Dave. So that was kind of it for us and the next forty miles or so were basically a moderately hard paceline training ride. After a while we started picking up stragglers from the main field (there was a small break ahead of them but it looks like the main field of 17-20 riders stayed mostly together) that eventually brought our little grupetto up to around nine riders. Despite the fact that we'd be sprinting for something like 25th place overall a few of us went ahead and had a nice little sprint at the end. I felt good for that and think I was 2nd or 3rd there, but that just meant I was 18th in the 50+ age group. A little disappointing but not entirely unexpected.

The Tulane riders had a good experience in the Collegiate D race with Sam placing 5th for a podium spot and Josiah finishing a minute later for 10th. Right after my race finished they started the Pro/1-3 race and the Cat. 5 race. Not wanting to sit around and get cold I decided to ride out to the loop and do it in the reverse direction so I could see some of the action. I was happy to see the Tulane riders staying safely in the 25-rider field (they would finish 15th and 16th). I was stopped at the corner where my own race had come apart for me when Dustin's field came by and as he rolled past he yelled for me to pick up his arm-warmers that he promptly deposited on the side of the road, so at least I wasn't entirely useless. Dustin would end up finishing 14th in the Pro/1/2 category. His field also included another 16 Cat. 3 riders and, I think, also the 22 Collegiate A riders. So basically it was a great race with, for us, respectable results.

As predicted, it was raining the next morning with no hope of stopping, so we had to ditch our original plan of riding Cheahea mountain on the way home, which was a shame but at least got us home around mid-afternoon. An hour or so into the drive back the Volvo shut down cruise control and anti-lock braking. Probably all of the water eventually got to one of the wheel speed sensors. I'd forgotten how much easier road trips were with cruise control, though!

March Already

Saturday after the Bay St. Louis ride.

Tuesday was the last day of February and already the Azaleas were starting to fade and the Oak tree catkins were getting ready to fill early March with pollen. With the coolest weather all week barely below the mid-fifties and daytime temperatures pushing the 80s it was really starting to feel like Springtime. Of course I know better than to put away all of the winter clothes just yet, at least most of them. Any excursions into the frozen north, aka anything north of Lake Pontchartrain, will still be susceptible to chilly mornings for a few more weeks, but I think it's at least safe to put away the shoe covers and thermal tights. 

Tuesday's levee ride ended up with just three of us for the full distance for some reason and was just a pretty normal ride. One of the Destrehan eagles was visible, as it has been for weeks, standing guard at the top of a tree just upriver from the nest, although I didn't notice any activity in the nest itself. Wednesday's WeMoRi was warm, humid, and fairly fast with a light south wind that I don't think was quite strong enough to have split things up on Lakeshore Drive.

On Thursday we had another relatively warm 73° morning with just a light breeze. Those conditions brought out a slightly larger group, at least for the start. We picked up Steve somewhere out toward Destrehan. The pace was steady at 22-23 mph mostly, so fairly comfortable paceline with one brief stop when Charles' tubeless rear tire sprung a leak and sprayed a fair amount of sealant that seemed particularly reluctant to seal in the 90% humidity. After holding his finger over the hole like the little Dutch boy it eventually sealed itself and we were back in action. 

Saturday almost ready to ride.

Friday morning I got up as usual, rummaged through the bike clothes drawer, pulled out shorts and jersey, and then heard something unexpected. Peering through the window blinds I was surprised to see that the street was wet and there was a light rain falling that, for all practical purposes, hadn't really been in the forecast. It was a brief little rain shower that was unfortunately perfectly timed to kill my morning ride. I consoled myself by deciding to go ahead and do the Saturday ride out of Bay St. Louis that Steve and Charles had pulled together. It was looking like we'd have a nice sunny day for that. Saturday was also Rouge-Roubaix day up in St. Francisville. I have mixed feelings about doing Rouge. On the one hand, my brain says it should be interesting, competitive, and fun, assuming I survive. On the other hand, my body says, "WTF are you thinking?" I'd probably need more than a standard dose of Naproxen. With the added gravel segments, that would at least be dry this year, it would be a rough ride with my regular 25 mm tires and rapidly degenerating bones and joints, and that's assuming I didn't find myself upside-down and on the ground clutching another broken collarbone thanks to my rather undeveloped off-road skills. Later on Saturday I'd see Strava posts from Will W who crashed out and Maurizio T who had three flats.

So on Saturday I headed straight into the rising sun to meet the 8:00 am group at the Washington Street Pier in Bay St. Louis. There was a charity ride going on from our usual starting location across the bay in Pass Christian and, as it turned out, also a small footrace starting from the Pier where we parked. Turnout for this ride was pretty good with ten people. For reasons unknowable it seemed like my legs were achy the whole ride but fortunately the pace never really got out of hand, and aside from one Strava segment called "the wall" that really isn't, the low rolling hills were more about the scenery than the pain. We had a nice 68 mile ride with an average speed just under 22 mph which is what I'd call "moderate," followed by a stop at The Blind Tiger restaurant near the marina where I ordered a Coke only to get the dreaded, "Pepsi OK?" response. Anyway, I played it safe with a fairly well-done cheeseburger, which was probably a good call under the circumstances. By the time I headed back home the temperature was well into the 80s.

Sunday was a Giro Ride, and considering the prior day's Rouge-Roubaix, I wasn't surprised to find us missing some of the usual horsepower at the front. There was a bit of a northeast wind blowing and that, combined with the aforementioned paucity of horses, made for a kind of frustrating eastbound ride down Chef Highway where almost nobody seemed willing to get a nice smooth paceline going. It was one of those rides where three people take their pulls and then nobody else comes through, the pace slows down, the people who just took pulls go back and do it again, etc., etc. After the turnaround I rolled past most of the group that was stopped at the tree and soon found myself with VJ who was on his TT bike. Shortly after that Will W and Nolan showed  up so we latched onto them as they ramped up the pace to 28-30 mph. I might have taken one short pull that whole time. Then Will decided to sprint for the Goodyear sign which split everyone up for a while. As Nolan, VJ and I eventually re-grouped, Will just stayed 30 seconds ahead in TT mode, where he pretty much stayed until our lackluster chase was disrupted by traffic and red lights and he rode off into the distance on Hayne. Anyway, it was kind of a welcome bit of intensity for me. I never saw the rest of the group, although it looks like it wasn't too far behind us.

This morning's Mellow Monday ride was super humid with a light fog along the lakefront. The pace was suitably mellow, which was nice because I could definitely still feel some of the weekend in my legs.