Slip 'n Fall

Thursday morning -- Nope!

Cabin fever was definitely a thing in the aftermath of the historic snowfall event earlier in the week, but with practically no frame of reference, I didn't really know when it might be possible to actually get out on the roads again. I'd skipped riding (indoors) on Wednesday, but finally relented Thursday morning, and spent a slightly miserable hour on the trainer down in the basement.

Friday on the leveee

There were still tons of snow, some of which had started to melt, by Friday, but desperate times call for desperate measures, so around noon I decided to see if I could make it out to the levee bike path, which I knew would be fine. I also knew that getting there and back would not, so I rolled out onto the wet streets on the 'Cross bike with 36mm gravel tires, hoping for the best. I stayed mostly off of Carrollton, which I new would still have some icy patches since it's entirely under the oak trees, and eventually made it to the levee. By then the sun was shining and the path was pretty dry, so I had a nice little 20-odd mile ride. The temperature was up into the upper 40s by then, so that was a nice change. The bike path was littered with abandoned gloves and socks, and a whole host of items New Orleanians had pressed into service as sleds. Those included a lot of plastic bin lids, styrofoam belly boards, inflatable pool toys, and one full-size windsurf board with the skeg removed. My training week, and for that matter practically the entire month, was already shot, so I didn't make much of an effort.

Walking to the exit after the crash on Saturday.

Saturday morning I made the fateful decision to ride out to Starbucks and see if anyone else would be foolish enough to show up. Most of the ice was gone from the regular city streets, so there was really no problem at all riding out there, except for the temperature, which was just barely above freezing. As it turned out, there were about ten of us. Lakeshore Drive and Hayne Blvd. were fine, and as we turned onto Paris Road Brett and Peyton rolled off the front without any reaction from the rest. We rode over I-10, coming down onto 510 as usual, and that's around where things started going downhill. One section between there and Lake Forest is elevated interstate, and you could see a lot of snow piled up along the concrete barriers to the right of the roadway. We were in the exit lane, almost to the Lake Forest exit when Blake, who was in front on his track bike, suddenly slid out. He's hit a long patch of ice that must have formed when melting snow re-froze overnight. Well, needless to say, everyone behind him, seven or eight in total, also crashed. Fortunately everyone seemed OK, more or less. One shifter was destroyed, and I guess everyone landed pretty hard on hips and shoulders, but all were able to get up and walk on the slip-n-slide, rather gingerly, to the exit. A passing car informed Brett and Peyton, who came back to make sure everyone was OK. 

Needless to say, everyone bailed out onto Lake Forest for an otherwise uneventful ride back where they could lick their wounds. I had landed pretty hard on my right hip, and whacked my head on the concrete, cracking my Lazer helmet (which offers a 50% discount on crash replacemets, BTW). I had a pretty significant hematoma on the hip, and I knew my neck muscles were going to be sore, but otherwise I survived in reasonably good condition.  By afternoon the temperature had warmed up into the 50s, so I once again took the cyclocross bike out to the levee to log another 22 miles. The sun was out, I spotted four bald eagles, and it was generally a nice little solo ride.

Back on Lakeshore Drive on Saturday.

On Sunday we had maybe ten on hand for the Giro. By then the road conditions were much improved, and we did a full Giro with some long sections of rotating paceline. Nobody was in any great hurry, but with so few to share the work it was still a decent workout, at least for me.

Mellow Monday

This morning there was the usual group for the Mellow Monday ride, except for Charles who was at home thinking he needed to get an x-ray to see if he's broken any ribs, and VJ who had likewise landed pretty hard on Saturday and had also gone to the doctor to check for broken bones (he was OK). It was close to 60° so we had a nice ride. Maurizio surged up the Bayou St. John bridge on the way back, as he usually does, and we lost everyone, but regrouped on Canal.

So last week was a third low-mileage week for me, thanks almost entirely to the winter weather. 

Sneaupocalypse

Yesterday's weather turned out to be even more eventful than predicted, which is saying something since the prediction was right on par with a Category 4 hurricane. 

Layers...

Considering the forecasts of imminent disaster, I was happy to see Monday's mid-day temperature creep up close enough to 40° to make a MLK Day levee ride feasible, despite the 12 mph wind. Knowing that I'd be riding both alone and slowly (it was Mellow Monday, after all), I dressed extra-warmly, and even broke out the trusty old NOBC winter jacket from back in the green Desire Title days. It was a nice spin ahead of the approaching collision between warm moist air that would be streaming out of the Gulf, and an arctic cold front that would be slamming into it some time early Tuesday morning. I brought the potted plants in from the front porch, covered some of the more vulnerable ones with a plastic tarp, and generally prepared for the worst.

Some photos from throughout the day are in my google photos album.

Having lived here all my life, I was a little skeptical about just how much actual snow we would see. Often enough, the lake protects us from the worst of the winter weather, keeping the temperature just that little bit higher than everywhere else that is outside of the lake "shadow." Turned out my skepticism was badly misplaced this time. I got up early Tuesday morning to let the dog out, noting that there was already some sleet falling. By 7 am it was snowing lightly, and I was still thinking that a light snow was probably all we'd see around here. The last time there was real legit snow was probably 1963, the night before the Sugar Bowl. We lived just five or six blocks from Tulane Stadium, and I remember playing in the snow and building a snowman as football fans walked by on their way to the game. So I guess we were due. There had been a few snow events over the intervening years, and the snow and ice storm we got around 1989 just before Christmas was significant enough to shut the city down for a few days.

Well, by noon it was clear that this was going to be way more snow than I'd expected. The snow continued non-stop from 7 am until around 5:50 pm. They had gotten a few snow plow trucks from other states where this sort of thing happens on a time scale of months rather than generations, and around 4:30 pm I saw a few of them going down S. Claiborne, which is technically a state highway. Obviously only the major roads were prioritized. Still, the streets were virtually deserted. By 4 pm there was about ten inches of snow accumulation everywhere, and of course officials were strongly urging people to stay home. As of Wednesday they are still saying that. 

Around 1:00 pm I reluctantly went down to the basement, where the temperature was hovering just under 50° and broke out the ancient wind-trainer. I spent an hour spinning on that while watching a cyclocross race on YouTube. I guess something was better than nothing. 

By 5:00 pm the stairs were unrecognizable under a blanket of snow and the neighbors were sitting out in the front yard around a fire pit. It had been 30° all day, but was now starting to drop. The low last night was in the mid-20s. Anyway, although our water pipes are all in the basement, I went out to run water from the front and rear outside faucets, by which time the one in the back of the house was already frozen despite the pipe insulation and fact that it was less than six inches from the basement plumbing. I searched around for one of the increasingly rare incandescent light bulbs in the house and set it up in a clip-on work light where the old galvanized pipe goes throught the basement wall to the faucet. By morning it was running again. 

This morning I figured I'd better at least get the foot of snow off of the front steps and car before the sun turned everything into ice. I think it may get slightly above freezing here for a couple of hours today, but then tonight will again be in the mid-20s. At the moment, S. Claiborne is a slush-fest with increasing traffic. The shoulders of essentially all roads in the city are not rideable, and the middle of the roads aren't much better, although I guess some may take a shot at it on mountain bikes. At least the sun is shining. I guess I'll be on the trainer once again today, and perhaps tomorrow too since I doubt much of this stuff is going to melt before then.

Wind, Cold, and ... Snow???

It ain't over yet. The last week wasn't exactly a great one, weather-wise. I went out Tuesday in the dark to meet the 6 am group. It was in the 40s with what is now the ever-present northeast wind, but I was happy to find a decent enough group on hand to take on Lakeshore Drive. The wind kept our speed down to the upper teens as we made our way east to the Armory loop, and then of course it was faster as we headed west. Nobody seemed in the mood to push the pace too much, though, and by the time we got to West End I was alone, everyone else having turned off to head back home. Lured by the tailwind, and trying hard not to think about the inevitable headwind awaiting my return, I cruised out to the casino on the practically deserted, and not entirely dry, lake trail. Without putting much of an effort, it was 22 mph out and 15 mph back.

Wednesday was a little warmer, so I rode out to meet the WeMoRi with high hopes. As usual, I made a U-turn on Marconi and slotted in at the back of the group, which is never a good place to be. Unfortunately, someone on the front attacked after turning onto Toussaint, gapping me off before I'd adjusted to the effort. It happens like that sometimes. Having missed the draft after coming around the corner, and looking ahead at the strung-out line of riders ahead, I knew that closing the gap was hopeless, so I eased up, cut across the park on Filmore and rode upstream on Marconi until I could get pack into the group under better circumstances. It was not an entirely wasted workout, though.

Thursday was warmer but the streets were soaking wet. There were just a few riders at the 6 am meetup, and nobody was in a hurry. Rather than get even more wet on the lake trail that I knew would still be covered with runoff from the levee, I turned off early with Charles and just called it a day. By then we were already getting dire weather forecasts for the following week. 

Friendly Friday courtesy of Dylan

It was colder again on Friday, but at least the wind was relatively light. For reasons I can't explain, I was running late and didn't realize it until I glanced at the time as I approached the park and realized I would be two minutes late, so I just continued down Wisner, picking up the group on Lakeshore Drive. Once again, nobody was pushing the pace, so it was indeed a Friendly Friday in every sense of the word. The forecast for Saturday's Giro was not looking good.

Saturday morning it was warm with a south wind, and although it was supposed to be raining, it wasn't. I looked at weather.com and it showed little chance of rain for the next few hours. Then I looked at accuweather.com which showed lots of rain. I optimistically chose the former and rode out to Starbucks where I had just enough time to get my coffee before a light rain started. By then, weather.com's forecast was updated and it was ovbious we'd be rained out. A couple of people showed up anyway, but by then it was clear that the rain wasn't going to stop for a couple of hours. I rode back home in the rain with plans to try again later. At least it wasn't cold. So the word went out that we'd try for a levee ride at noon, by which time the rain would be over and the streets not so wet. I decided to ride the 'Cross bike, and stuck the ass-saver under the saddle since I knew the roads would still be a little wet and the chances of flatting would be pretty high. It was just Charles, Jeff, and me at the pipes, but we had a nice enough ride all the way out to Ormond and back. There were some wet and messy spots here and there, and it was fairly windy, but it turned out to be a nice ride, except for the fact that both Charles and Jeff flatted and I got sprayed with sealant, again. The forecast for the following Tuesday was now calling for snow, sleet, wintery mix, and freezing temperatures.

Sunday was another aborted Giro. The temperature was in the mid-40s, which wasn't so bad, bu the wind on the lakefront was howling out of the north at 29 mph with gusts to 36. A handful of riders showed up anyway, but once we hit Lakeshore Drive, and the crosswind, we quickly bailed onto Wisner to just ride a couple of laps around City Park. Meanwhile, Steven, Charles, Will, and Apryl did a long 100+ mile ride down to Pointe a la Hache, starting at 6 am. Although I'd considered joining them, I just could not summon up whatever it would have taken to get up that early on a cold morning to battle a 20 mph north wind. Of course they all got Strava KOMs on the long southbound stretch, anyway. I did not regret skipping that one.

The much anticipated cold front came through on Sunday, and when I got up this morning it was 31°F and windy, and there was no way anyone, including me, would be showing up for the 6 am Mellow Monday ride, especially since it was MLK day and most people were off from work. The sun is out right now, and it looks like the temperature may get up to about 40 by 1:00, so I'm planning on another make-up ride on the levee. Tonight it's supposed to drop down freezing again, and stay at about 30° most of the day with (gasp) snow showers predicted starting around 7 am. We'll see how that goes. At any rate, we'll be working from home tomorrow because the entire city is treating this like an approaching Category 4 hurricane. I'll have to play Tuesday by ear, I guess. Might even have to resort to the dreaded wind trainer again.

But wait, there's more! Wednesday morning's forecast is worse, and is calling for 24° at 6 am, following a 24 hour stretch of below-freezing temperatures that are sure to burst some pipes down here. We'll have to see how all that plays out, but it could be a bit of a mess around here because we are not equipped to deal with icy roads.

Weather Impact

Sadly, we lost Scott (far left) on Saturday. This
image from the 2020 Tour de La

Well, as predicted, the weather last week was, in a word, miserable. Miserable enough, in fact, that I never even tried to fish my phone out of my pocket to take any photos. So use your imagination. 

Tuesday morning was in the 30s and windy as all hell. Remarkably, three of us showed up for the 6 am ride - Charles, William, and me. A strong NNE wind kept the pace down on the way out to the Armory on Lakeshore Drive, and a lack of motivation, together with the temperature, kept it pretty much down in the other direction as well. We all bailed out at Canal Street, each with his own reason, or excuse, as the case may be. I was cold the rest of the day. Actually, I was cold the rest of the week.

Wednesday was supposed to be WeMoRi. It was again freezing cold, and after multiple days of cold and wind and rain, I just could not drag myself out of bed onto the dark streets that morning. Apparently, I was not alone in that regard. Charles went out there to find the parking lot deserted, and ultimately found only Will, who was also out there alone. The rest of the WeMoRi never got out their respective doors. The temperature was just above freezing, with the lately usual 15 mph wind. It was not fun.

Yeah, I knew that. 

On Thursday the situation was just marginally better. The temperature was still in the 30s and the wind, which had shifted a little bit more to the NE, was strong. Once again, it was just William, Charles, and me. I think Will pulled us basically all the way out and all the way back along Lakeshore Drive - 17 mph on the way out, 28 mph on the way back. Also, once again, we all bailed at Canal. I had a staff retreat that day over at the Audubon golf club where I was freezing the entire time. It was not fun.

Mother Nature threw some rain into the mix on Friday, so I dragged out the old non-smart wind trainer and stared at the Elapsed Time on my Garmin for an hour down in the basement. It was not fun.

Saturday morning the temperature was just a bit under 40°F with the now ever-present north wind. There were enough desperate riders that we had a decent enough turnout for the Giro. The wind, however, was playing games on the group, though, coming sometimes a little from the left, and other times from the right, but not quite so strongly that the riders up at the front could tell. At one point we were just a long single file up against the left lane divider because the guys in front were, I guess, thinking there was shelter to the right, and the guys at the back weren't willing to get out in the wind to ride up there and let them know. I eventually did myself. Anyway, it was probably the least miserable ride I did all week, even though I flatted on the way home along the Greenway. It seemed like a slow leak, so Charles tried out his new electronic pocket pump, which worked fine. I then took off with Will, hoping I could make it home before it went flat again, but of course no such luck. It was flat again before we got to Tulane Avenue, so I had to stop and put in a new tube with barely functional half-frozen fingers. That was no fun.

Later that day I learned that a friend and long-time cyclist, Scott Gumina, had unexpectedly died while on his bike up on the northshore. I think he was only 52 or so, so it was quite a shock to everyone. I heard that he had started with the regular "Posse" group that morning, and then turned back early. Another rider who had turned back later, or perhaps just happened to be going the same way, found him and tried CPR, but unfortunately to no avail. I think it happened somewhere on Old Military Road. 

On Sunday I, somewhat reluctantly, drove over to Mississippi to do a 72-mile ride that Steve and Charles had cooked up. The forecast was calling for a cold, dreary morning ahead of a lot of rain. It wasn't wrong. I guess it was barely 40°F when we rolled out north into a NE wind at the relatively luxurious hour of 9:00 am, comprising a group of 7. The sky was overcast and the forecast told me that it, and the temperature, would pretty much stay that way. After so many cold mornings, I wasn't playing around with my wardrobe any more, and had full tights, shoe-covers, Gore long-sleeve base layer, summer short-sleeve jersey, long-sleeve jersey, and wind vest. I was never hot, at least. Jess and Connor showed up, and Jess started out with little more than a long-sleeve jersey and tights, and without gloves. Yeah, she was freezing for most of that ride. I knew this would be mostly a winter Long-Slow-Distance kind of pace, so I also knew that overheating would not be a factor. On the plus side, despite the dreary winter landscape, traffic was light, consisting mostly of hunters in pickups splattered with red clay, loaded up with either dogs or ATVs, or both, only one of which tried to kill  us. All-in-all I was glad I'd gone, if for no other reason that the forecast for the rest of the day, and Monday morning, was calling for nothing but rain. In fact, by the time I got home it was raining. I guess the rain eased up some time around dawn, but it was way too cold and wet at 6 am to even consider doing a ride. Another weather impact day, I'm afraid.

As expected, Monday there was still a little bit of rain falling before sunrise on Monday, so once again, I didn't ride, unless you count riding to work, since by then the rain had moved on.

Meanwhile, the City is gearing up for the February 9th Super Bowl, which will probably feature some seriously blockaded streets and airport-level security. Of course everybody is trying to get in on the action, so all forms of advertising and special events are planned. Looking out my office window I can see two giant advertisements on buildings along Poydras, and more stuff being put up on the Superdome itself. All I hope for is that it will be relatively problem-free.

Winter Week Ahead

New Year's Eve Ride

The last week of 2024 started out warm, then became chilly, then got warm again. None of which is particularly unusual around here, but the cold front that came through in the middle of Sunday night brought with it a thirty degree temperature drop and a brutal northwest wind. It's looking like we now have a solid winter week, or two, ahead of us, and won't see a morning temperature in the 50s for a while. Welcome to 2025.

Tuesday morning the streets were damp and it was quite foggy when I rode out to NOMA. On the plus side, the temperature was in the 60s and the wind was light. On the minus side, I flatted out by the Armory, but everyone waited, and I got in the full ride out to the Casino and back anyway. I was still feeling unrecovered from the prior weekend's excessive mileage, but at least the pace remained moderate enough that I didn't feel like I was doing any additional damage. We were already getting predictions of a big cold front that would be hitting the area late on Sunday. While weather forecasts can be pretty sketch when the weather is coming out of the Gulf, Winter cold fronts coming from the northwest are usuall spot on. We had a visiting rider from the frozen North, aka Minnesota, to whom the damp 62 degree weather must have felt like a summer vacation.

Holiday Giro to start the new year.

Wednesday was New Year's Day, and so we had a Holiday Giro planned. It was chilly and a little windy, but I wasn't expecting a big turnout or a super fast pace. Checking my phone, I saw that the city had sent out a notice around 5:00 am about a "mass casualty" event around Canal and Bourbon streets, and I guessed it must have been some drunk driver incident like the one that happened some years back on Esplanade Avenue. I would later learn that it was way worse than that, and most definitely not an accident. Oblivious to the seriousness of the terror attack, we had a nice enough ride, despite the 10 mph north wind, and then spent the rest of the day watching the nonstop news coverage.

Friendly Friday

Thursday was colder, and although nobody seemed too interested in a hard workout, a few of us did complete the usual full ride. I was technically back at work, but because they had postponed the Sugar Bowl until that evening because of what had happened on Bourbon Street, it didn't seem advisable to go in to the office under the circumstances. At the time it was still a little unclear if there had been other people involved in the attack, so security around the Superdome was understandably even tighter than usual.

On Friday we had a nice turnout for the Friendly Friday ride. It was warmer, and the wind was light, and although it got a little spicy in places, it was the first morning that week where I felt more or less recovered from Sunday's ride around the lake. Afterward, I rode down to Faubourg Marigny with Charles, Dan, and Will for coffee.

Looking for coffee

A little cool front blew through that evening, so the temperature on Saturday was back to the upper 40s. There was a pretty significant east wind that kept the outbound speeds down a bit. For some reason the front of the paceline kept hugging the left edge of the right lane on Chef Highway, despite the fact that for most of it the more sheltered side was also on the left. The entire group was strung out single-file for most of the way despite some loud verbal suggestions on my part about not putting all of your riding buddies into the left lane. Granted, it's tough wind direction for that segment, and toward the end the road curves enough to shift the sheltered side from left to right. Of course, it's hard to complain too much when you are sucking wheels back in the cheap seats and aren't willing to move up into the rotation. 

After getting back home I swapped my road shoes for my mountain bike shoes to take a little test ride on the 'Cross bike. I had put a new saddle on it the night before. This was a Selle Italia Novus Boost saddle, which is a fairly inexpensive and well-padded one that I thought would be better for longer gravel type rides than the super-light road racing SLR that I had on there. It was. I rode some of the neighborhood gravel and some of the Audubon Park bridle path to give it a fair test. It is wider at the nose than I'm used to, and shorter as well, but it seemed fine, so I guess I should be OK for some extended gravel riding, at least from an equipment perspective.

At the Spillway in the wind, about to head back downriver.

Sunday morning it rained, and there was a super strong south wind blowing. I knew the Giro wouldn't happen, so I waited until most of the rain blew through and the streets started to dry out a little bit, eventually rolling out to the levee around 10:00 am. I'd guess that the south wind was around 20 mph, with gusts up into the 40s, but at least it was nice and warm. The bit cold front was supposed to come through that night, so I felt like I should maybe put in a little extra saddle time, even if it was only optimistically Zone 2. Although the river winds around quite a bit, the wind going upriver was largely crosswind, with just a few brief stretches of headwind or tailwind. I wasn't in a hurry by any means, but I was still lured into extending my ride all the way out to the Spillway. Once there, I looked down at the computer and decided to continue on for a few miles so I'd have a nice round 60 miles for the day. Coming back was definitely harder, but again most of it was crosswind. It was strong enough, however, that just keeping the front wheel headed in the right direction was a challenge, and I guess the stress involved in that was making my usual upper back and neck pain all that much worse.

This morning, as predicted, the temperature was around 43° at my house, and dropping, when I rode out into the 20 mph northwest wind. I didn't know if anyone would be insane enough to be out riding in that, but as I was circling the NOMA, Charles showed up at literally the last second. Obviously this was going to be just a charcter-building ride, so I shifted down to a nice low gear for the duration. Most of Lakeshore Drive was OK until we got out past Franklin to the east. There I could see the waves crashing over the seawall, and some areas where the westbound lanes were slightly flooded. We wisely decided to return to City Park via Leon C. Simon rather than deal with the cold spray of lake water. That turned out to be much better, but of course we were just soft-pedaling anyway. I was glad I'd ridden, but it took twenty minutes after I got home for my fingers to start working normally again. The rest of the week is looking to be pretty cold and windy, so welcome to winter.