Back to the Lakefront

Yesterday saw the first of the annual "Wednesday Night Worlds," which is the nearly universal term for the local training races that happen all over the country.  I'd ridden the regular Wednesday morning levee ride, and was still feeling a little dragged out from Rouge-Roubaix and an apparently insufficient amount of recovery time.  Of course that didn't stop me from rushing home at 5 pm and jumping on the bike to ride out to Lakeshore Drive for the 6 pm start. This informal catch-all training race actually constitutes a significant portion of my training program (I use the term "program" extremely loosely), since it basically substitutes for the interval workouts that I never seem to be able to make myself do.  The weather was warm, and there was a pretty good east wind blowing out on the lakefront.  There's always a pretty good wind blowing on the lakefront.  I was glad to see a good turnout of 26 riders for this first Wednesday in DST.  The race started out fast, and then just got faster.  Once we came around the old Armory (which isn't actually there any more, thanks to Katrina) and got the wind to our backs, Woody went to the front and put the hammer down for what seemed like three miles.  I was second or third wheel at that point and pretty much on the rivet the whole time just trying to stay on a wheel.  We do four laps of the 6-mile circuit and I was planning on staying in the draft until at least the half-way point.  Eventually the pace eased up a little bit, but of course there continued to be painful surges and attacks, as is the nature of such a race.  The fun thing about a training race is that there's nothing at stake and you are free to try some things that you might never be bold enough to attempt in a real race.

I was surprised that my legs didn't feel all that bad and that I was at least able to survive the attacks without incident.  The hardest part for me was the tailwind stretch where the speed was consistently ramping up into the low 30s and the draft offers relatively little comfort. I let myself drift back in the shrinking group as we got into lap number three.  At some point a break of two or three went off the front on the last lap and although there was a brief effort to chase, all hope was lost within three miles or so. When the pace really started to lag I went ahead and took some pulls in order to keep things moving, and then ended up on the front again about a mile from the finish, so my legs were really toast by the time the sprint started.  It was dark by the time I got back home. I was glad I had my little taillight with me, but wishing I'd brought the headlight too. Average speed for the race was about 25 mph with a maximum of 36.8, despite the fact that I had not contested the sprint.  Ouch.

This morning was another damp, dark and foggy ride on the levee.  Woody, who was on his TT bike, and one or two others were soon driving the pace at the front.  Let me tell you, it can be a little frightening going 30 mph in the dark in a paceline on that narrow little strip of asphalt.  The flashing headlights shining on the butts of the riders in front of me made it all that more difficult to see anything  up the road, so basically you're six inches from the wheel in front of you, and that wheel is basically all you can see.  It requires a lot of faith, somewhat more than half of the group had.  Eventually a gap opened and three riders rolled away, which finally brought our pace down by a notch or so.  After they turned around at the little dip, the rest of us continued on to Ormond.  I was really starting to feel the effects of the past five days and by the time we were headed back I was just taking occasional short pulls.  I kept telling myself it was OK, however, because I won't get to ride at all this weekend.  I'll be officiating a collegiate race which will no doubt be a little on the chaotic side.  Collegiate racing has some twists to it that really make officiating and scoring more difficult than usual.  For example, depending on category there is a required number of points primes for criteriums, and they need to be scored four-deep.  For some of the races it will probably work out to something like a sprint every third lap, making it more like a points race than a criterium.  Should be interesting.....

Dark and Foggy



Almost finished as the fog clears.

I was up late last night getting the updated version (i.e. the version with finish times) of the Rouge-Roubaix results formatted and posted to the LAMBRA website.  It usually works out that way.  Ricky, the Chief Ref., plugs in all of the finish times in the evening a day or two after the race, which he then sends to me around 10:30 pm.  Looking them over, I noticed that the Master's race was a good ten minutes faster than last year, despite the wind and slack mid-race pace.  My own time was about four minutes slower than last year, but my overall Masters placing went from 3rd to 12th, so basically some of these old guys must be getting faster!  There's a nice video taken from within the Masters race, and at about 3:15 it shows the split on the dirt road that established the front group.  I'm the last rider to make it across.  It's amazing how fast that gap opened!  If I'd hesitated another two seconds I don't think I would have made it across.

Anyway, it rained Monday morning, which was just as well because my legs were pretty sore.  Then, on Tuesday, I did the long levee ride with still-sore legs, flatted halfway back (it was wet), and rode the rest of the way pretty easy.  This morning the legs were feeling significantly better, but still had that lingering stiffness that reminds you of the weekend.  Unfortunately it was so foggy outside, and unexpectedly dark because of the fog, that I overslept a bit and missed the group by at least five minutes.  Not a big deal, though, since it's not like I don't already get enough group rides.  So I settled into a comfortable 20 mph pace and rode up the river until I saw the group on its way back.  It was a small turnout today, with everyone taking really long, steady pulls.  The only problem was the combination of darkness and fog for the first ten miles or so.

This evening is the start of the informal Wednesday Night Worlds training races out at the lakefront.  I'm hoping I'll be able to make it out there for a little hammerfest before dinner.

Travel to the Gravel - Rouge-Roubaix #14

The weather forecasts all week had been all over the map, and mostly wrong.  On Tuesday the outlook was dismal - 100% chance of rain.  Each day the forecast looked just a little bit better and by Friday a 30% chance of rain was looking quite encouraging.  Even so, the prospect of riding dirt and gravel roads in the rain, not to mention the rest of the 104 mile race, probably kept a number of people on the sidelines this year.  So naturally I signed up for the 14th annual Rouge-Roubaix along with a bunch of other club members.  The night before the race I put on my "Six Gap" 12-27 cassette, looked at the old battle-scarred Michelin Pro Race tire on my race wheel and decided to swap it out for a new, but heavier, Vredestein that I had been planning to put on my training wheel. The only other consideration was the higher than normal chance of pinch-flats.  That would require some compromise.  Rather than risk a flat, I put about 125 psi in each tire - quite a bit more than I'd normally use.  I knew it would make for some discomfort on the rough stuff, but the availability of a fast wheel change is not guaranteed in this race, especially if you're off the back.

So at 4:45 am Brian, Mignon and I headed for St. Francisville, giving ourselves just enough time to make it there before packet pickup ended at 7:00.  The weather was looking encouraging, and even though we got a little sprinkle of rain around Baton Rouge, it seemed like the tropical deluge that had predicted earlier in the week was completely out of the question.  The turnout looked pretty close to normal; perhaps down about 10% because of the weather.  I was riding the combined Master 40+, 55+, Women's group.  Although I had initially thought I'd wear arm-warmers, but the time we were ready to line up it was warm enough for just shorts and jersey.

The masters race started out fast with a moderate tailwind, and over the first fifteen miles or so I wondered who was up there driving the pace like that. I was trying to stay reasonably close to the front, but was definitely not interested in doing any more work than necessary so early in the game.  As we approached the first section of gravel road, around 25 miles into the race, I moved up closer to the front, coming around the right-hand turn off of the asphalt at about fifth wheel.  That was perfect.  The gravel was big and pretty lose at first but surprisingly the pace remained fairly steady with the speed somewhere in the low to mid-20s. After the first mile on the gravel the pace started to ratchet up a bit and I noticed the rider in front of me starting to let a little gap open.  When the gap got to about four bike lengths I knew it was time to go around, which is easier said than done on a gravel road.  I think two of us made it across that gap as the pace continued to ramp up.  Soon I could hear only one bike behind me.  Ahead was a string of about a dozen riders.  The last mile or two of this section has some hills that hurt a bit, but at that point there was no way I was going to let this group get away from me.  When we emerged back onto the asphalt I thought we would quickly organize into a nice paceline, but it wasn't happening.  I looked around and counted only about a dozen.  Behind us I could not see anybody close.  It soon became clear that about half of the group was not interested in working.  The really strong riders didn't really care if we stayed away or got caught since they were going to shatter whatever group they were with when we hit the second gravel segment at 67 miles anyway. So for the most part there were four or five in our group who were trying to keep the pace high enough to keep from getting caught by the next group. None of this was really the best-case scenario for me.  Quite the opposite, in fact.  The ideal thing for me is to be in a big group at the front and to have a couple of teams working the front trying to wear each other down.  Anyway, I did a lot more work than usual over the next 30 or 40 miles and by the time we were nearing the second gravel section I had pretty much decided I was going to get dropped on the initial 1 km climb.  I uncharacteristically let myself drift toward the back of the group, already running a little low on motivation. 


Alone at the end of the second gravel segment.

As we started the climb the front few riders exploded up the slope in search of the $100 bill waiting at the top.  I took it quite a bit easier, coming over the top about dead last, I think.  I knew that most o the group would shatter and was hoping I'd be able to get together with a couple of riders once we were back on pavement.  The one thing I wasn't counting on was a deep sand pit at the bottom of one of the downhills.  I have no idea how people were actually riding through that thing, but when I hit it my bike just basically came to a stop and I had to hike out of the deep stuff back to terra firma.  By then I could no longer see the rest of the group, so I just tried to keep up a reasonable pace.

Back on asphalt again, I passed the Pond Store made the next turn, and looked up the road.  I could see a group with a follow car about 45 seconds, maybe a minute, ahead.  If that group took a little break and slowed down, there was still a chance I might get back in the race, so I put my head down and started time-trialing.  Every now and then I'd check my progress.  For a long time I seemed to be holding the gap, but just could not seem to bring it down. After a few miles of that it seemed that suddenly the group just took off and disappeared.  I learned later that Donad Davis and I think one or two others had been off the front since the gravel section and I guess the group was not ready to throw in the towel.  Anyway, I finally had to back it down to something I could sustain since there were still nearly 30 miles left to go.  After a while I could see a lone rider up ahead.  I eventually caught him and we worked together for a couple of miles until he said he had to back off and sat up.  We were just a mile or so from the last gravel section and I was alone again.

The last gravel section has a really steep short climb right at the beginning.  By then I was running very low on motivation, so I rode most of the way up until my front wheel started to get hard to control, and then just walked up the rest of the way. There are a couple more good climbs on this section and it's actually kind fun.  The last 15 or 20 miles of this race always feel like the worst.  To make matters worse, there was now a pretty strong headwind.  I guess my speed was down to around 19 mph along here and I was already starting to feel some twinges in my right calf and left hamstring.  I guess I was around ten miles from the end when I looked back and saw a little group of three riders.  This was a good thing.  I eased up and waited for them to catch.  They were all in the 40+ race and I think had been in my original group.  I figured there were only a couple of 55+ riders ahead, and that we were probably the tail end of what was left of that original group of 12-14 riders.  I merged into the paceline with Scott Gurganus and the other two riders.  One of the guys was obviously suffering and would eventually drop off on one of the last little climbs.  With a couple of miles to go, Scott surged hard on a hill and we all came apart. As we approached the last turn, just after the 1 km to go sign, I noticed that I was suddenly gaining on the rider in front of me.  I probably could have made a big effort and passed him about 200 meters from the line, but when he looked back and saw me closing in he put his head down and accelerated and I just couldn't come around him like that.  I must be getting soft in my old age.  Anyway, I ended up 3rd in the 55+ race and 12th in the combined masters race, which I was pretty satisfied with, considering.  A bunch of photos are on the Rouge-Roubaix Facebook page.  To find out what the Cat. 1/2 race was from someone who was at the front of it the whole time, check out Brian Toone's blog.

Morning Routine

There won't be a ride for me this morning.  It's been raining off and on and I have an early meeting, so options are pretty limited. It's just as well. I don't want any hint of sore legs for Sunday's ride. So I walk the dogs, make some coffee, and sit out on the front porch to survey my little corner of the world. 

To the right, one neighbor has the garden hose out, washing off the oak flowers that have covered his car as he smokes a cigarette.  A few minutes later he hops into the car and heads off to work across the river where he's a nurse.  Across the street, the guy who moved into the lower apartment steps out, backpack, running shoes in hand, and drives off.  He's a doctor, a Resident, I'd imagine. As he's leaving a car pulls up next to the house.  There are a couple of school-age kids in it, and mom idles the car as they sit there.  I've seen them before and know they are waiting for the school bus to arrive.  Over to the left another neighbor emerges.  He's wearing scrubs and has his Timbuktu bag over his shoulder.  He hoses the oak flowers off the car and leaves shortly before his partner comes out to walk one of their two dogs.  A guy on a bike, probably a student, comes down the street and turns onto South Claiborne where traffic is starting to back up at the stoplight.  I hear the commotion next door as the neighbor loads her kids into the minivan and heads off to Lusher school. The neighbor to the left, the partner of the one who left wearing his scrubs, comes out with the boy they adopted a couple of years ago and they drive off to school and work as an RTA minivan drops off an older neighbor at her house.  Just now, a few houses down, a mom and her daughter walk to their car.  The daughter is wearing her school uniform - one of the local catholic schools.  I finally glance at my watch. The rain has stopped for the moment and I'm hopeful I'll be able to ride over to Tulane since parking will be impossible.  I'm meeting some folks from Baton Rouge (and the Netherlands) for a brief visit with a few faculty and the president about coastal and water research.  Another morning on Neron Place.....

Change

There was a big group this morning for the last long Thursday morning ride before the change to DST on Sunday plunges the 6:15 am start time back in to darkness.  It was warm and humid with a relentless east southeast wind, and I commented to someone at the start, "Best be sure to save something for the way back."  Although there was certainly adequate horsepower in the group to make for one of those really fast rides, I think some riders were holding back a bit today.  No doubt that's because of next Sunday's annual Rouge-Roubaix race through the untamed thoroughfares of the Felicianas.  The considerable threat of rain for that race has a lot of people talking; some about equipment choices; others about bailing out altogether.  Well, I'll be there one way or the other.  On the plus side, it won't be particularly cold.  On the minus side, 100+ miles on wet roads that include long unpaved stretches have me thinking about using my slightly heavier training tires rather than the Michelin Pro tires that I'd otherwise use. Frankly, the bigger consideration for me is to avoid cutting up my good tires, not whether or not I actually puncture.  At any rate, I don't think I've ever done this race when there was significant rain, and from all indications thus far, there will certainly be significant rain before the race, and probably during it as well.  It will require some compromises and probably a bit of an attitude adjustment.

Anyway, today's ride was pretty good.  The pace was fast enough without ever getting really out of hand (not that Howard didn't try), and even included some brief entertainment at the turnaround where there was some sort of "discussion" between Mike W. and Jeff, the details of which I never did quite get.  The ride out there had benefited from a fair amount of tailwind, which of course meant that the ride back suffered from an equal and opposite wind.  I had feared that most of the ride back would be in a strong crosswind, but fortunately the direction was such that there was usually some draft still to be had, even at the back where I spent a good amount of time.

Here at work I've been watching the demolition of part of the old Uptown Square shopping center, the other part of which houses my office.  Tulane doesn't own that part of the old shopping center, and it is being demolished in order to make room for an expansion of Lambeth House. It's a little sad to see it go.  Back in the mid to late 70s and even into the mid-80s Uptown Square was an interesting and unique little shopping center that housed a lot of locally owned shops.  I have a lot of fond memories of Christmas shopping there and really liked being able to avoid having to battle the holiday traffic in order to go out to the big shopping mall in Metairie.  I remember doing all of our Christmas shopping by bicycle for a few years.  Unfortunately things there started to fall apart and one by one the shops moved to other nearby locations in Carrollton and along Magazine Street and Tchoupitoulas.  Well, things change and this is one of them.

Now if that weather forecast for Sunday would just continue to change, that would be really nice!

On the Levee

I was back to the levee routine again this week, unless you count yesterday when I got out late after dropping The Wife off at the airport.  I suppose it was good for me to do a solo ride anyway, even through a stiff wind made the ride home more work than play, and the timing required a somewhat shorter ride than usual for a Tuesday morning.  It was like that again this morning -- the wind, I mean.  I arrived atop the levee on time and our small group of four headed out with a light tailwind.  It was warm enough for just shorts and a jersey, although I chose a long-sleeved jersey to help buffer those occasional blasts of river-cooled air one gets on the bike path.  The wind direction made our trip upriver feel easy, and although nobody was pushing the pace today I knew it would be harder coming back.

After the turnaround we crossed paths with a trio of Tulane riders, and then much later we saw another two up ahead.  They were going pretty hard and I figured they might be doing interval sets.  As we got a little closer Jay started pushing the pace to catch them, and when they finally eased up we caught and they latched onto the group.  A couple of minutes later they took off again and as they went past Jay stood up and accelerated. It wasn't long before they backed off again, however, and everything came back together.

So people are starting to worry about next Sunday's Rouge-Roubaix, mainly because the weather forecast is presently calling for a lot of rain, and not just on race day, but also on the day before.  That should make the dirt and gravel road sections a bit more interesting.  It's still a little early to make any decisions, but if it looks like we'll be in the rain for 100+ miles I may be going with the heavier training tires to reduce the probability of puncturing a little bit.  At least it doesn't look like it will be cold.  I can handle cold and I can handle wet, but wet and cold together can be a big problem. Some Baton Rouge guys just put a Saturday evening criterium series on the calendar.  No details yet, but that might offer something different.

Training Camp Weekend

The head cold was threatening to become a sinus infection as I packed up the car Friday evening.  At least the task at hand was distracting me from the dull ache in the right side of my head.  I met Mark, Mignon and Chuck at 6:00, and after a quick stop at Starbucks we hit the road for the drive up to Natchez State Park for the annual NOBC training camp.  I suppose it's really about half training camp and half "retreat." 

Whatever, I was looking forward to a couple of days of cycling immersion in the country.  In addition to my bike and pretty much every item of cycling clothing I owned, I had some cookies, bananas, granola bars, coffee, wine, and various other random items packed into a couple of grocery store bags.  The closer we got, the worse the weather became.  This was actually a good thing, because as long as the approaching cold front moved through overnight, I knew Saturday morning would be OK.  We drove though a few sections with horizontal rain, arriving at the cabins around 10 pm or so just before it started raining again.  I had a glass of wine and promptly fell asleep on the couch, that would be doubling as my bed, in the middle of a conversation with Pat and Mark.  It rained most of the night, but in the early hours of Saturday the temperature started dropping and the rain stopped.

We had 16 or 17 riders for Saturday's ride. Considering the fact that I'd been sick most of the week and taking into account the cloudy sky and chilly north wind, I dressed extra warmly.  I guess it was in the mid-40s when we started around 9 am.  The plan was to keep everything together for the first 15 miles or so, and then split in to two groups. After we split, the pace picked up and although I was keeping my pulls rather short, I was feeling surprisingly good.  The Natchez Trace is a very deceiving road.  The whole thing is so evenly graded that you never really feel the transition from flat to uphill or vice-versa, and although the gradients aren't very steep, they tend to be really long - much longer than one would normally encounter in that area.  Anyway, we hit the store at the turnaround for a little while and then headed back, waving to the other group that was trailing us by five or ten minutes. 

With a little tailwind for the return trip the pace kept clicking up a notch every five miles or so, and around halfway back our group split on one of those long climbs.  I guess we were down to five or so, mostly taking long pulls and keeping the pressure on. By the time we were five or six miles from the road back to the state park we were down to just Robert, Chuck and me.  My quads were starting to hurt on the climbs. 

I heard my phone ring as I was struggling to hold Chuck's wheel up one of them, and didn't answer it.  On the next climb Chuck and Robert started attacking each other and a big gap opened in front of me.  As I was contemplating whether to chase or just back off for the remaining few miles, the phone rang again.  Bad sign.  I sat up and pulled it out, and saw it was Mark calling.  He told me that they were going to need extraction because Isaac had broken his carbon steerer and crashed.  Fortunately he didn't seem to be hurt badly. 

I caught up with the others when they eased up at the turn and we hurried back the last three or four miles to the cabins so I could change shoes and jump into the car, passing the 2nd group as I left the park.  I must have driven twenty miles before I finally spotted the group walking along the shoulder.  Mignon, Isaac's mother, was carrying his broken bike.  So we threw the bike inside and I drove back with Isaac and Mignon.  The fork's steerer looked like it had broken about halfway between the stem and the crown.  Very odd. Anyway, we were lucky nobody had been seriously hurt.

That evening the Monahan's cooked up a big dinner while coach Bob gave us a presentation on coaching and training principles (lots of charts and graphs of power, heart rate, mileage, etc.).  Afterward we watched Chasing Legends once again.

So Sunday morning we had a slightly smaller group on hand for a shorter 20 mile ride down into Natchez for a coffee stop.  Isaac borrowed Bob's mountain bike for the ride, which was great since otherwise I'm not sure what he'd have done while we were out riding.  There was a pretty good headwind building up by the time we headed out, and the group split pretty quickly leaving six of us to put in a few miles of good training up front.  Brooks was taking some really long hard pulls, Robert was pushing the speed up the hills, and I was trying to take short enough pulls to keep from getting dropped.  The weather was spectacular and I was finally feeling like I was getting over the head cold.  After a long stop at the Natchez Coffee Company, we made a loop down the bluff to the river while I told stories about the old Natchez Classic stage race, most of which were true.  Then we headed back onto the trace for a tailwind enhanced ride back to the park.  Naturally the same group went off the front right away and we had a good fast ride all the way back. My legs were feeling pretty sore by the time we arrived at the cabins.  It was a really fun weekend and I was impressed how fit some of the riders are so early in the season.

Slow Recovery

This head cold has really been hanging on.  Here it is, Thursday, and my upper respiratory tract still feels kind of raw, I can't take a deep breath without opening my mouth, my eyes burn, etc., etc.  I'm sitting here debating whether to pop another couple of tabs of pseudoephedrine and Advil, which I haven't done since late last night. I guess I'm still recovering, however slowly, from this thing but it's incredible frustrating right now.  This is precisely the week when I should be adding some significant intensity to my otherwise routine training. Instead, I'll have a really low-mileage, low-intensity week.

It was warm this morning, as in shorts and jersey warm, and there was a pretty big group up on the levee for the early ride.  It's been nice being able to start the Tuesday and Thursday rides with enough light to see, but unfortunately that will all change March 11 when we move to daylight savings time.  For those of us who ride mostly in the mornings, all that saved daylight doesn't really do us much good.  It'll be dark again for those early rides.  I hate that.  Anyway, not wanting to push my luck and risk interrupting this slow recovery from whatever virus I've been fighting this week, I decided I'd just do the shorter ride out to the parish line and back today.  Riding near the end of the paceline I was kept busy dealing with the surges and slowdowns that always happen back there, all the while trying to keep a little distance between myself and the somewhat unpredictable mishmash of wheels ahead of me.  Of course, at one point the pace shot up suddenly and, of course, that was because Howard had surged up at the front.  That set up a little counter-surge that opened another gap once that one had been closed.  I just tried to keep it steady so the paceline wouldn't shatter completely since the pace hadn't gotten completely out of hand.

I was glad to find some company on the way back, first picking up David and later Mignon, which made for a nice little paceline at a respectable speed as we rode back downriver into a little headwind.  The annual NOBC training camp is this weekend, so I'm hoping I am more or less fully recovered by then because the weather is supposed to be turning a bit colder. Hopefully I can find some time today and tonight to get the Team Time Trial event permit, which is already late, all taken care of. I also need to put the Mercury logo on the LAMBRA site since they are giving us some sponsorship, in the form of expensive wheels, for our soon-to-be-announced LAMBRA Championship Series in which the upper category riders will be able to accumulate points at the road, time trial and criterium championships.

Sore

After a fairly normal, but quite windy, Giro Ride on Saturday I awoke early Sunday morning to find my legs feeling a bit sore.  It's hard to figure out sometimes why that happens.  After a particularly hard race or training ride I expect a little residual soreness the next day, at least ever since I started getting AARP solicitations in the mail.  Sometimes, though, there's just no obvious reason.  I thought that perhaps those sprints up the overpasses might have done a little damage, but at any rate it wasn't enough of a concern to keep me from the Sunday northshore ride.  I was planning on something a little different for this particular northshore ride since a few of the Tulane team riders were coming and we were going to tack on a lap of the road course they planned to use for the upcoming Green Wave Classic collegiate stage race.

The first clue that something might be amiss was that I was feeling a lot colder than I should have, considering the temperature.  It was in the low 50s with little prospect for much of an increase, but I left the full tights and extra arm covering on anyway.  From the start my legs were loading up on every hill, so I was riding very conservatively.  The plan was to stay with the regular training ride group for the first 40 miles or so, and then take a slightly shorter route back to Enon where the race would start.  Once there we could check out the parking situation at the school, talk with the shop owner where we may locate the finish line, and then head back north to do a lap of the course before riding the last twenty or so miles to the cars. I was expecting the total to be around 80 miles, which turned out to be pretty close to the 79.2 that Strava logged and the 80.something that my computer showed.

The group ride was pretty good, although I was sitting in a lot and just taking short pulls, still wondering why the hell my legs, and for that matter the rest of me, were feeling so lousy.  A little sunshine would have helped, but for the most part it was overcast all day.  By the time we got back to the cars everything was hurting.  My neck felt sore, my legs ached, and I had a dull headache.  I picked up an Americano before hitting the causeway for home, hoping that might put things back in order, but basically I was dragging arse the rest of the day and making animal noises every time I got up from the sofa.  Well, by evening I was starting to get a little sore throat and the pieces of the puzzle were coming together.  Yeah, I'm at home today with a little head cold that I'm just hoping won't turn into something worse.....

Mardi Gras Days

While the past week has been just another seven days in February for most of the country, down here in New Orleans it was the final countdown to Mardi Gras.  I'd been keeping a pretty low profile for most of it, but Saturday night was the big Endymion parade and since there's a little party at Tulane's Psychiatry Department office, which is in the Tidewater Building, which is right on the parade route down on Canal Street, that one was on my calendar.  The weather had been miserable, causing a lot of the parades to re-schedule until Monday. I'd even skipped Saturday's Giro Ride (which may or may not have actually happened) because it was raining.  A couple of hours later, however, the rain had stopped and the radar looked at least temporarily promising. I felt quite lucky to have been able to get in 34 miles on the rain bike because most of the rest of the day was very wet.  Endymion delayed its start to try and skirt the last of the rain, and so by the time it arrived downtown the rain was long gone, the crowds were thin, and the throws were plenty.  It's always a lot of fun to catch tons of beads.  The fact that they'll mostly end up in the landfill eventually does little to diminish their immediate perceived value.  So thanks to the late parade I didn't get home until pretty late, at which point I had to make a crucial decision.  Should I get up at 3 am and drive the 4.5 hours up to Monroe for the TT and Criterium where the morning temperature was going to be in the low 40s?  "Oh, what the hell......"

OFFICIATING MODE

The drive to Monroe was less than relaxing.  The whole way was in a light misty drizzle with gusty winds, but thanks to a cup of McDonalds coffee I made it there with the LAMBRA clock in time for the Time Trial.  I'd stopped for gas about mid-way and when the cold north wind and mist hit me in the face I'd decided to skip the time trial and help with officiating instead.  It was a decision I did not regret. I was assigned Starter duties, which entailed about 75 minutes of counting down riders at one-minute intervals.  Although I was absolutely freezing cold, I was still quite content not to be riding into that headwind wearing a skinsuit.  The TT went well and so I headed straight over to the criterium course.

HANGING ONTO THE BREAK

The Crit course was a pretty simple circuit -- basically a rectangle with two sweeping curves and two fairly easy corners.  I was still quite chilled from the morning TT when I lined up for the masters race.  As my first race of the year, I wasn't very motivated so I decided I'd hang out mid-pack for the first part until I got nicely warmed up.  Unfortunately a number of the other riders didn't share my approach and the attacks started immediately.  I doubt we'd finished two laps before a two-rider break was off the front.  Half of the loop was straight into a strong headwind and the pack was not chasing at all.  It didn't help that the riders in the break had teammates in the pack either.  Soon another rider attacked to bridge.  I was right there and normally would have gone with him, but I was still feeling lazy and didn't.  Big mistake.  That rider made contact pretty quickly and soon another rider went and bridged up too. 

REX CAPTAIN

I finally awoke and went to the front and worked for a number of laps on the off-chance that one or two of the breakaway riders would crack, but there were only a couple others in the pack willing to do any work, so it all became more of a training ride for me.  On the last couple of laps the teammate of one of the riders who'd been sitting in because he had another teammate in the break was sent to the front to attack a few times and string things out a bit.  Naturally his teammate then attacked with half a lap to go and naturally nobody cared, so I guess we were sprinting for 6th place or something like that.  Hard to get fired up about that.  After that race I stood around and chatted for a while, which was another mistake because I got really, really chilled.  Lining up for the Cat. 1/2/3 race about an hour later I was actually shivering. 

ROYAL RUN CROWD

The 1/2/3 race had a fairly small field, but nonetheless we started out like we'd been fired out of a cannon.  Well, actually *they* started out that way.  I'd completely flubbed clipping in and had to chase all the way to the first corner, finally getting in behind a big rider at the end of the field.  We went around the first two turns as riders at the front were attacking.  The guy in front of me was having a lot of trouble just staying in the draft but I was hoping he'd close up the little gap he'd created when we hit the headwind stretch.  No such luck.  By the time I finally went around him the gap was a good ten seconds, the headwind about 15 mph, and my chances slim to none unless the pack eased up, which it didn't. I saw 31 mph for a moment into the headwind but was still not closing the gap. I chased a couple more laps hoping for a lull that never came and then eased up a bit so the two riders behind me could catch and we could work together.  Soon it was just Ed Kendrick and me and there was no way we were going to catch, so it was looking like another training ride. 

Then, a number of laps later, I heard Jered's voice coming up from behind saying, "Come on, Randy."  He was in a three-rider break with Andrew Chocha (US Military) and Wylie Bagley (S3).  By then I'd recovered from my earlier efforts and it was easy to latch onto the break.  Now that I was lapped by a breakaway, I was not allowed to lead the break, but at least I was getting a little better workout at a much faster pace. A little while later I heard Wylie tell the other guys, "I won't sprint," which is criterium rider language for, "Please don't attack and drop me because I'm toast and just hoping to hang on to the finish."  So basically there were just Jered and Andrew doing any work with Wylie and me sitting on.  It was actually a blast and I was really wishing I could have taken a few pulls.  We caught a couple of other dropped riders who also tagged on, but never did lap the remnant of the main field, which would have been nice because that would have un-lapped me.  Anyway, it was a lot of fun even though my placing totally sucked.  The ride back home was pretty long but generally a lot easier because it was clear and dry.  I arrived back home around 10:30, and since the Chief Referee had emailed me the results en-route, and I'd had a cup of coffee, I sat down at the computer around 11:00 and was up till after midnight getting the results posted and uploaded to USA Cycling.

The next morning, Monday, I got in a quick ride on the levee and by early evening was en route to another parade on St. Charles Avenue.  By the time I got home from that one I was badly in need of sleep, especially since Tuesday was Mardi Gras.

Mardi Gras morning I got in a quick little ride on the levee and then went over to Audubon Park to see the start of the Royal Run, a little-known kick-off event for the King and Queen of Mardi Gras.  By 9 am or so I was off to St. Charles Avenue with friends to watch Rex near 2nd Street.  A little while after Rex ended we headed off on foot for our annual trek down to the French Quarter, stopping at Ralph & Kacoo's for something to eat before spending an hour or so wandering up and down Bourbon and Royal with the camera. 

It seemed fairly restrained this year, but of course it was still early afternoon. Although Kenny, Candy, Mignon and Mark were all in the vicinity, we never managed to meet up.  Even text messages are a little sketchy on Mardi Gras day since there are probably a few thousand extra people in the area, most of whom are trying to do things like send photos.  Around the time we were heading back uptown I finally noticed an email from Kenny saying that they were *still* outside of Pat O's.  I must have walked right past them at least once!  Anyway, it was a long walk back to Napoleon Avenue where we happily took the streetcar the rest of the way home.

Roller Coaster Weather

If you don't like the weather around here, just stick around a few hours.  It'll change.  This morning was cooler and featured a strong but remarkably steady northeast wind together with slightly drier air. 

There were just a few of us on hand for the 6:40 start of the Friday levee ride, which was actually a couple more than I'd expected. We started up a paceline, taking long pulls and enjoying the occasional tailwind stretches on the way out.  I had been thinking that the ride back would be nothing but work, however it turned out to be pretty nice.  Although we were riding mostly into a quartering headwind, it was one of the most consistent headwinds I've ever seen.  That kept things really smooth and made it easy to stay in the draft.  Being a Friday the pace was by no means fast, but considering the wind and the small group I'd have to say it was faster than I would have expected.  My legs were finally feeling almost normal again, so I guess the decongestants I've been taking are helping.  Then again, maybe I was just all doped up and performance-enhanced on pseudoephedrine and just lucky nobody from USADA was waiting at the end of the ride with a plastic cup.  Fortunately you have to be over a certain threshold to test positive for that, unlike clenbuterol for which they can apparently test down to the technological limits of detection ("The simple fact is that anyone who has a prohibited substance in their system is a cheat"*), or albuterol for which half of the peloton has TUEs because they all apparently suffer from asthma.  Go figure.  I stopped at Zotz for a quick cup of coffee (caffeine is also a WADA-legal performance enhancing drug up to a certain limit) and contemplated their coffee-drinking king cake baby sign that seemed to me to hint at some socially questionable pre-war ethnic stereotypes.  Considering the likely age and political tilt of the artist, I have to assume any such references were purely unintentional.
*except for those substances that we decided you could use just a little bit or for those people who we randomly decided didn't really mean to cheat.

Last night the parades braved intermittent rain and rolled as scheduled, which turned out to have been a good decision.  It's looking like tonight's parades will be fine unless things get delayed.  I guess that's why they have moved up their start times by half an hour.  Even so, with three parades running one after the other, it will be fairly late by the time the last one makes it all the way downtown.  The chance of rain goes up around 10 pm, then drops down to 10% until the early morning hours, but by 7 am tomorrow, when the Giro Ride starts, it's up to 80% with most of Saturday looking to be pretty wet.  Saturday night is the Endymion parade that we're supposed to go see downtown at Tulane's Tidewater Building. By the time they make it all the way downtown, and assuming their usual substantial delays en route, most of the rain should have moved through with the next cold front. It's a little too close to call right now.  Also too close to call is whether or not I will decide to make an early (like 4:30 am) drive up to Monroe for the TT and Criterium on Sunday.  The TT will definitely be on the cold side and likely windy too, but by criterium time in the afternoon things should be a little better.  I'll have to see how things go on Saturday night, I think.  I know a number of the Tulane riders are going.  It's one race that I rarely make because it's always so early in the season and often runs afoul of Mardi Gras parades.  Still, it would be nice.......

Dull Ache

After a really good ride Wednesday morning, I was guardedly looking forward to the long Thursday ride.  Unfortunately, the weather forecast was not being particularly cooperative.  By Wednesday night it was raining off and on, and although the temperatures remained in the mid to upper 60s, the street was quite wet when I reluctantly awoke this morning. I took some time to consider my options, one of which was definitely to pull the covers back over my head.  The night before I'd had one of my rare migraine variants, which in my case is probably not so much a migraine thing as a sinus infection thing.  Anyway, when I get that visual aura thing with the jagged lines in the periphery of my visual field I know that within an hour it will be replaced by a dull headache.  Indeed, I awoke this morning with a unilateral headache.  It wasn't really very bad, so after checking the weather radar I decided a ride on the levee probably wouldn't do much harm.  Considering the wet roads I went for the rain bike once again, mainly to reduce the chance of flatting, but also because I figured I might well be riding by myself anyway.  No point dealing with the road spray if you don't have to. 

As I started down the street and went over the first little bump in the road I felt my head throb.  That pretty much eliminated any ideas I might have been harboring about doing any sort of hard workout.  I considered turning back to seek out some Advil, but figured I could at least get in twenty miles or so before resorting to pharmaceutical support.  Up on the levee I found Jeff LeBauve who is in town for Mardi Gras, I guess, and along with a couple others we started off down the wet bike path. At 20 mph there was a fair amount of wheel spray coming from the bikes ahead and after tolerating that for a few miles I decided to just drop off the back, ratchet down my speed a notch, enjoy my fenders, and try to forget about that dull ache in my head.  Turning around at Williams Blvd. I found one of the group who had turned around early, so I had some company for the ride back.  Naturally, he flatted just before the bridge. I wonder how many other flats there were out there today.  Anyway, despite the drugs I'm not feeling too chipper today.....

Unrecovered

It was winter again last weekend, and to make matters worse, it was windy as hell too.  The Saturday Giro group was looking a little thin when I arrived for my pre-ride caffeine treatment.  Since the temperature was down in the 30s and a strong wind was blowing, I wasn't the least bit surprised.  I'd dressed warmly, expecting the worst.  After all, this was the weekend of the Herring Gas training camp, and even the National Weather Service knows that almost guarantees some sort of meterological misery will be doled out by mother nature.  Under the circumstances, I was just happy it wasn't snowing.  From the start, I knew it wasn't going to be a good weekend for me.  I don't know if it was just the cold, or if somehow I was unrecovered from the prior week's training, but for whatever reason my legs were feeling kind of dead and achy.  In fact, today is Tuesday and they still feel that way.  Anyway, it was a pretty typical Giro and once I finally got more or less warmed up I made a few brief visits to the front, despite the persistent reminders from my quads that they were not ready for prime time.  Fortunately many of the usual riders were absent, the Herrings at their training camp and some of the Tulane riders over in Tallahassee for a pre-season collegiate warmup with the Southeast Conference riders whose season started a couple of weeks ago. That kept the overall speeds down a notch, for which I was not complaining.

I'd decided to do the northshore ride on Sunday, even though the best the forecast was offering was 32F at 8 am with a strong north wind.  I figured it wouldn't be much warmer at 7 am on the southshore anyway, so why not ride in the hills with some scenery rather than another hammerfest down Chef Highway?  Driving across the causeway I looked down at the choppy waters of Lake Pontchartrain and knew there would be no hiding from the wind.  Of course the turnout over there was a little slack too.  I left the parking lot with knee-warmers underneath long tights and a wind vest over my awesome NOBC winter jacket.  Turning into the freezing cold north wind for the first four miles to Tung Road I wondered if maybe I'd made a bad decision.  It was definitely the coldest my face has been all year, in spite of the layer of Chap-stick I'd put over my cheekbones and nose.  I don't think I was the only one, either. In fact, I was probably dressed more warmly than most.  I noticed Mignon struggling to pull up her slipping knee-warmers and could tell she was uncomfortable.  Within one mile all conversation had ceased.  I guess there were only about nine of us at the start.  Mignon and Mark dropped back on Tung Road.  By the time we were 20 miles into the ride we were down to four or five, and half an hour later I think it was just four. Jorge had ridden over 100 miles alone the day before, so that was helping keep him in check, so our speeds stayed fairly low most of the day.  The strongest of the group that day was the lone triathlete whose name I inquired about and subsequently forgot due to my well-known name memory defect that must have something to do with that time hit my head on the concrete in grammar school.  But I digress. At least we managed to keep the average speed above 19 mph for the 65 miles, thanks in no small part to the triathlete who went to the front and time-trialed the final five miles of tailwind. I arrived back at the car with my base layer(s) completely soaked with sweat and generally feeling like I'd been hit by a bus.  I'd already decided that Monday would be a rest day!

So Tuesday morning I got up, still feeling kind of unrecovered, to meet the Tuesday levee ride group. I swear, taking a day off the bike just does not seem to matter for me.  I probably would have felt just the same if I'd done an easy hour and a half on Monday. It had rained in the early morning and I briefly considered taking the rain bike, mainly because of the Mr. Tuffys in the tires, but ultimately broke down and mounted up on the Orbea anyway. As I walked out the door in the dark I went to start up Strave on my phone to track the ride, only to discover that it had updated itself during the night and now wanted me to re-enter my ID and Password, neither of which were coming immediately to mind.  Not that it would have mattered anyway since there was no way I was going to be able to type them in while wearing gloves in the dark without my glasses on. It was considerably warmer but still rather windy, and I struggled all the way out to the turnaround. Soon after we started back I started feeling even worse and contemplating the possibility that I might be coming down with something I retreated to the end of the paceline for the last ten or fifteen miles.   

A Firm Grip

I rode up the levee with a firm ENE wind at my back, pleased to see that the light bulbs on the two big pumps (we call them pumps, but I presume they are more like siphons) had finally been replaced. I wondered if Big Richard had replaced them like we'd discussed or if the Sewerage & Water Board had done it. There in the shadows, hiding from the wind, was Rob with his TT bike. I suspect that Rob's TT bike might actually require some modifications were he to enter a UCI or national championship event.  If his handlebars aren't lower than the top of his front wheel, they must be pretty darned close.  Anyway, up on the unprotected levee the wind was blowing at probably 12-15 mph, and I knew it was going to be a hard one.  The only good thing about a northeast wind is that we get a few miles of semi-tailwind to start off, but once around the bend at the country club (which is about to go up for auction, BTW), the river turns abruptly to the north and most of the rest of the ride features crosswinds at best.  The group was a little on the small side today, maybe ten or so, and of those ten about half were clearly not interested in the front half of the paceline.  Woody issued early notification that he was taking an easy day today and stayed toward the back of the paceline, eventually turning around somewhere around the parish line.

My own legs were feeling just a bit better than yesterday, so I ended up in a three or four-person rotation for a long time, crouching low to get in on the tiny draft offered by Rob and his TT bike.  It felt like work the whole time, and recovery opportunities were in exceedingly short supply.  One thing about riding on a windy day is that you never feel like you can relax.  After pulling off you still have to deal with the wind and the resulting irregular lines it imposes on the riders around you.  Up on the levee, there are also pedestrians and other cyclists around whom to maneuver, which temporarily eliminates the draft on the crosswind sections. It all requires a rather firm grip on the handlebars and concentrated focus on staying close to the wheel in front of you, which explains why I have no photographs today.  To have taken my camera out of my jersey pocket and snapped a few photos would have resulted in either (a) getting dropped, or (b) causing a crash.  As it was, we had a few close calls anyway.

The ride back downriver was the hardest, as it included some long sections that seemed more or less straight into the wind, and a lot more that were just flat-out crosswind.  Although we had a pretty good paceline going, we were often struggling just to keep the speed in the 19-21 mph range.  By the time I got home my back, shoulders and neck were all hurting a bit. It was nothing a 1.5-egg cheeze omlette and cup of coffee couldn't fix, however.  Even so, I was still feeling the effort as I rode my commuter to the office, by way of Starbucks, an hour later.

Last night I engaged in a bit of NOBC archaeology, digging through an old file box of bike club stuff in search of the club's constitution and bylaws.  We're finally moving ahead with seeking official 501(c)3 status from our friends at the IRS, and that's one thing, among others, we need to submit.  Amazingly, I found it.  I had a few copies of the original from around 1972, which had been printed on mimeograph paper, and also a copy of a re-typed version that I had made some time in the 80s.  That file is probably on a 5.25 inch floppy disk in CPM format somewhere.  Anyway, while I was digging through all of that I pulled out a 1975 race calendar and an old 1972 NOBC Newsletter by Jim McFadden that included race reports from races in Lafayette, LA, Indianola, MS, Big Sandy, TX, and of course New Orleans.  Discussing the 25 mi. time trial series, Jim remarks, "Next year I predict three people will break the hour, and eight people will go below 1:05:00."  At that point I don't think anyone had gone under 1:01:00, and it would be a few more years before the hour was finally broken - I think it must have been around 1978 or 1979.  That year, however, a number of riders did it, which proved to me that much of time trialing was mental.  I myself finally posted a 0:59:59 at the state championships down on the Scarsdale, LA river road course, and promptly came down with a bad case of mononucleosis that practically put me off the bike for the better part of a year. Of course, that was in the pre-aero era when you did time trials on your regular road bike with little in the way of special equipment outside of one of those newly invented skinsuits and maybe some packing tape over your shoelaces. Nowadays an hour-flat 40km time trial is considered merely respectable for the Cat. 1-4 riders on a good day.  The glaring exception is the women's class where we still rarely see anything under a 1:01:00.  I know they can go faster.   

Riding and Tracking

The return of cooler weather, and its accompanying north wind, had me looking for the long tights Tuesday morning.  Granted, the temperature was only in the 50s, but after a week of spring-like temperatures I was looking for that cozy warm feeling to ease the transition back into February.  The levee ride seemed somewhat subdued yesterday morning, probably due to a combination of things that included lots of weekend miles and a fairly strong wind.  It didn't take long for my legs to start complaining.  Every time I'd ask them for a little power they would load up right away.  I hate when that happens.  Years ago that easy recovery ride I'd done on Monday would have been more than enough to put things right by Tuesday morning, but apparently my advanced age has been taking a toll on my ability to recover because I was feeling anything but fresh as the group headed upriver toward Destrehan.  The pace wasn't particularly out of line for a Tuesday ride, staying mostly in the mid-20s on the way out, but the paceline seemed to be getting more and more erratic the farther we went.  Each time you'd drop back after taking a pull you didn't know what you'd find.  Sometimes there would be a reasonable string of riders in the paceline, other times maybe two would go by and then there would be a big gap.  I'd think to myself, "I really don't want to have to take another pull into this wind so soon."  But of course if I didn't slide over and plug the gap it would grow a little more until someone from behind would jump past everyone.  It seemed like the whole ride went that way -- basically lots of riders not wanting to get dropped but only a few willing to work.  I guess I was somewhere in-between, myself.  As erratic as the paceline had been on the way out, it was even more so on the way back as the wind was picking up and its relative direction kept changing as we followed the curves of the river.  I was actually surprised to arrive home and find an average speed of 20 mph, considering.

So this morning I went out to meet the Wednesday morning group and, well, there wasn't one.  The north wind seemed stronger than it had been the day before, which I guess explains the paucity of riders.  On the other hand, the temperature was in the upper 50s and the sky was clear, and once the sun came up it was a beautiful day, at least as far as I could tell during those brief periods when I wasn't staring at the ground wondering why my legs were hurting so much at 18 mph. Anyway, I trudged along at a moderate effort level and sometimes shockingly slow speed, eventually picking up Taylor who latched onto the back for a little while but then quietly disappeared even though I probably never got much over 20 mph.  As I often do when I'm riding solo and slowly, I turned around a mile or so early, at Williams Blvd., picking up Taylor again. There was a little stretch of tailwind but mostly crosswind on the way back, but by then my spirit had been broken and I was kind of plodding along as the crosswind toyed with my front wheel. We passed Mike W. who was stretching at the pump as we went by, and then when I finally eased up near the bridge we noticed he had caught up with us.

Lately I've had to take a little detour on my way home because they've been replacing the streetcar tracks along Carrollton Avenue and closing down cross streets in the process.  It looks like the days of wooden cross ties are gone - these all look like they must be made from recycled milk bottles or something. The thing about the streetcar tracks is that they bury the ties so that all you see are the rails, probably just so that the neutral ground looks prettier. Naturally that's not a very good way to treat wooden ties, especially down here where the ground rarely dries out.  Anyway, I got home and saved the ride data to Strava as usual, only to discover later that the GPS or Strava, or something had gone flaky about halfway out and basically missed over half of the ride, only picking it up again when I had to stop for a truck crossing the levee near the end.  As a result, it shows a total distance of 13.9 miles instead of 23 or so, and an average speed of 10.4 mph.  I may have going slowly, but not that slowly!  Interestingly, when that happens it plots a straight line (right over the Mississippi River) from its last good position to the next and basically does the same with the speed. I guess it's losing track of the satellites or something, and then having trouble getting a fix again while I'm moving. Speaking of Strava, I see that Rouge-Roubaix this year is doing a Strava "Segment Challenge" for some of the longer gravel road climbs (a longer version of Blockhouse Hill and Woodstock Road). A Garmin rep. will apparently be there with some loaner Garmin computers and they'll have a prize for the fastest man and woman.  I won't be winning any of that!

Bottom Line

The legs were a little reluctant Sunday morning, but February temperatures in the 60s are not to be squandered, so I was out the door at dawn to meet Robert at Puccino's for the drive over to the northshore.  I wasn't sure who would be making this ride since there had also been talk about another long Giro to Slidell. I think I counted 18 riders at I rolled out of the Lee Road Junior High parking lot wearing a long-sleeve jersey and shorts.  The sky was filled with clouds and it felt chilly as we rode into a steady north wind in the general direction of Enon. Considering the number of miles I already had in my legs for the week, my plan was to take it easy for the first half of the ride just to be on the safe side.  Fortunately the pace was reasonably subdued for the first ten miles or so.  Things picked up a bit along the hills on Tullos Road, and the group was already beginning to sort itself out.  A few more miles and some of the group decided to cut the route a bit short as the rest continued north toward Highway 10 at the top of the loop. 

After a bit of a wait at the intersection, we continued on, finally starting to feel some tailwind as the route turned more to the south.  This stretch of the course is traditionally fast as it includes a couple of longish climbs that tend to split things up.  Coming over the second one, one of the guys on a TT bike surged and, since I was right there, I went with him.  For the next few miles to the intersection with Sie Jenkins Road he hammered at 27-28 mph, with me taking only a few brief pulls.  It was like being behind a motor, and despite the TT setup, he was still big enough for me to get a pretty sweet draft.  We waited for a while to regroup before heading back to the west on Hwy. 1072 where we were greated by a bit of a crosswind, softened somewhat by the roadside trees. This road always seems kind of hard because there's probably not a flat fifty yards on the whole thing, but the group stuck to a smooth rotation which made it feel a lot easier than it might have.

Finally heading back down toward Enon the road features a lot of nice rollers, smooth asphalt, and probably a net drop in elevation.  Combined with a tailwind, that made or a brisk but smooth pace down to Enon where we crossed the river and started the gradually steepening uphill to the firetower. I was thinking that someone would surely attack at some point along here, but instead it remained fairly steady at around 20 mph.  Once over the top, though, the pressure remained on and it quickly ramped up into the high 20s.  It was along here that we caught up with the rest of the group that had taken a shorter route.  It was perfect timing.  The last five miles or so of this ride are usually kind of a free-for-all where the riders who have something left blow it out while those who don't back off a bit.  Well, with a little tailwind, still-decent legs, and a couple of triathletes willing to sit on the front for extended periods, I naturally ended up near the front and ended up once again motorpacing behind one of the TT bikes.  It was a pretty good ride.  The bottom line for the week, at least for me, was about 300 miles and over 15 hours on the bike.  I'm quite sure I wasn't the only one, either, considering the great riding weather we've been having down here.  Still, that's a bit more than I would consider normal for me for the first week of February.

Slidin' to Slidell

At 6 am the weather radar looked pretty good, and since the forecast wasn't calling for rain until afternoon, I stuck an extra Powerbar into my pocket before heading out the door to the Giro Ride.  As is usually the case this time of year, there had been talk of doing a "Long Giro" out to Slidell today.  The group hanging around at Starbucks before the ride was pretty big as we started out, and I guess it eventually got up to 45 or so by the time things really got going. Right off the bat, however, before we event got off of Lakeshore Drive, VJ flatted.  Fortunately it was still early enough that everyone waited.  Once over the bridges the pace picked up to 25-28 mph as usual, but also as usual I was staying safely tucked into the draft, especially since I was planning on doing the long ride out to Slidell and back.

When we turned onto Chef Highway I was surprised to see how foggy it was.  I reached back and turned on my rear blinky light, although I doubt it was foggy enough for anyone to miss such a big group. As we continued on, the fog just got thicker and thicker, and for a while I was seriously wondering if going out to Slidell was such a good idea.

As it turned out, there were over a dozen who were up for the long ride, so I tagged along too.  After a rather long nature break, we finally got a really smooth fast paceline going.  The road was pretty wet from all the fog, and after pulling off the front at one point I did a little ice skating on the paint stripe.  I was careful to stay off of the white line after that.

The ride back was a lot like the ride out had been.  Lots of fast paceline riding all the way to the turn off of Chef Highway.  After that things were a little less organized with some fast sections and some slow sections, and then finally a couple of hard efforts to the tops of the two bridges.  My legs were pretty tired by the time I got home, but nothing too severe.

The rain didn't arrive until late afternoon, but once it passed through it somehow stayed dry for the Krewe du Vieux.  Tomorrow I'm planning on the northshore ride, and hoping my legs are up to it after today's 90+ miles.

Wet Asphalt and Flat Tires

It's that time of year when we tie our children to
the top steps of ladders where it says "do not stand."

Springtime in February continues!  I went out Thursday morning in summer wardrobe expecting a pretty fast group levee ride.  The road was wet, again, but this time it was due mainly to the night's fog rather than actual rain.  Fortunately, but ride time there was hardly any fog along the levee, although VJ said that it had been so thick at his house near the lake that he almost hadn't gotten out of bed. As we got underway we continued to pick up stray riders all along the stretch from the start to the playground.  As we passed the playground (it was still pretty dark) I looked over to see a bunch of film production trailers and tents set up next to the stable.  I guess maybe another segment for Treme?   Anyway, just as the pace finally started to pick up I heard some discussion behind me as riders started to freewheel again. We soft-pedaled for a while to wait for someone, I think maybe Donald, to come up the levee and join the group. Once everyone was finally back together, which seemed to take a particularly long time, we finally got up in to the mid-20s with an occasional visit to 27-30 mph territory.  The number of people pulling started to dwindle a bit but for the most part there was a decent steady rotation going for the next ten miles.  When we turned down the levee at The Dip, however, I could feel the unmistakable squishiness that accompanies a deflating tire, and as we climbed back up to the levee top I eased over to the right just as my front rim started to bottom out. I told everyone to go on, although Keith hung around to keep me company while I pulled a big chunk of glass out of the tire and swapped out the tube.  We continued on at an easy pace until we saw the group coming back around the bridge, then jumped back into the paceline for the return trip.  There was a bit of a southeast wind that kept the speed down, but otherwise it was good.

For some reason my phone's GPS or Strava app must have flaked out somewhere around the bridge because afterward it just showed a straight line from there to Carrollton Avenue where it picked up again.  Go figure. I think it therefore included my coffee stop in my average speed for the day too.

The Team LaS'port guys up in Shreveport seem to be getting targeted by cars this week, and I think one of them suffered some pretty serious injuries, including some broken bones, after a car pulled over into them.  There's a news report on the local station.  Be careful out there!

So this morning I looked out the window to see wet streets again.  This time it was apparent we'd had a little rain overnight. It was still warm (in the 60s), so I went ahead and took the Rain Bike out again for an easy ride, once again taking some comfort in the fact that it has both fenders and Tuffy's.  I really need to put a speedometer on that thing, though, along with a freewheel that might give me a gear big enough to get up to 25 mph without looking like a treadmill gerbil. There was a pretty brisk east southeast wind blowing, so although my speed may not have looked very recovery-zoneish, my effort level definitely was.  Out in Kenner near Williams Blvd. I caught up with Taylor who then flatted just in time for the turnaround.  The ride back was mostly into the wind, and since I was trying to at least approximate a recovery ride, I was probably spending a lot of time around 15 mph. This weekend will probably be a repeat of last weekend for me, weather permitting.  It's also the first weekend with a few of the early Mardi Gras parades, the most fun of which would have to be Krewe du Vieux on Saturday night for which the official theme this year is "Crimes Against Nature."  Should make for some interesting social commentary style costuming.