Skills

Last weekend I ventured up to Madison Mississippi for the Spooky Cross cyclocross races. This is a fairly low-key event designed as much for Rolando's flock of young kids as it is for the grownups (I use the term loosely since, you know, ... cyclists). With the combined "A" and "B" races not starting until 10:30, I didn't need to leave New Orleans until 6:30 or so, even taking into account that I-55 north from LaPlace to Ponchatoula was still closed from the horrendous superfog-caused crash almost a week earlier in which over 100 cars were involved and seven people were killed. Instead of taking the old two-lane highway 51, I took the Causeway to I-12, and then to I-55, all of which went quite smoothly at that time of the morning. Of course, I arrived way earlier than I really needed to. The weather for the weekend was clear and warm, and was probably one of the last such weekends we'll see this fall. I would be riding my Blue Norcross bike with its classic rim brakes and well-worn tires, neither of which I thought would matter much since I had no plans whatsoever of pushing my luck on this up-and-down course. My not-insignificant criterium skills do nothing but get me in trouble in a cyclocross race, and the fact that I have virtually no mountain bike or, for that matter, "gravel" skills doesn't help either. So the plan for me was to start near the back, lock up my rear wheel on every downhill, creep around the sharp turns, and power up the climbs, assuming I could remember how to shift the mechanical SRAM derailleur. At any rate, it would be a nice change of pace, and even though I'd be riding very conservatively, I knew I'd get a decent amount of intensity for 45 or 50 minutes.

I liked having both of the races starting together, especially since my highly questionable Category 3 cyclocross status put me into the "A" group where I clearly don't belong. I think that I got automatically put into Cyclocross Cat. 2 way back when they first started assigning separate CX categories, based solely on my Road category. At some point I got a downgrade to Cat. 3, but in retrospect should have gone all the way down to Cat. 4, which is certainly where I actually belong. Anyway, I started the race near the back as planned and was probably half a lap down near the end of my first lap where I had to negotiate the BMX pump track section, which I found slightly terrifying. Of course I took that part really easily and carefully and successfully kept both wheels on the ground throughout, so that was good. After a lap or two I started to feel a little more comfortable with the lack of asphalt under my apparently worn-out 33 mm clincher tires (I think I had about 35 psi in them) and started putting a little more pressure on the pedals, which rather predictably resulted in me crashing on a little downhill turn when I dropped the front wheel into a little hole that was hidden by the grass. Fortunately I was barely moving at the time, so there wasn't any significant damage. Soon enough I was lapped by a few of the lead riders like Jason, as expected. So I ended up with an average speed of under 8 mph, but an average heart rate above 150. Although I finished among the "A" race participants DFL, that was also apparently 3rd place. 

After the race I drove over to the Bike Crossing shop which is near the Natchez Trace, and rode around 40 miles along the Trace. There was a lot more traffic there than I would have expected, and I was glad I'd brought along my Garmin Varia radar tail light. I learned that riding a cyclocross bike with 35 psi in the tires for 40 miles is a lot harder than riding my regular road bike. That evening I went over my brother's place in Madison for dinner and a shower and a bed.

Sunday morning was basically a repeat of Saturday's races, except in the opposite direction on the course. That meant hitting the BMX track immediately after the start, and in the direction that presented a few places that I'd call "cliffs." Fortunately I kept it upright the whole time. There were a few more riders for the Sunday race but otherwise it went about the same as the previous day for me, which is to say I was focused mainly on improving my skills without breaking any bones. Mission accomplished. Unfortunately one rider went down pretty hard on one of the twisty sections. Hopefully he didn't break anything, but from the way he looked I couldn't be sure of that. I hit the road for home shortly after the race, so was back by mid-afternoon with nothing but a little scratch and bruise on my right leg to show for it all.

Monday was looking like it would be the last relatively warm day for a while, so I dragged myself out of bed and went out to meet the Mellow Monday group. That ride stayed fairly mellow, getting fast only briefly, which was good because despite my efforts to take it easy over the weekend I could definitely feel some soreness in my quads, and also my right shoulder that I'd landed on in Saturday's race. 

As predicted, a cold front came through on Monday evening bringing a big drop in temperature and a strong north wind. The temperature was in the mid to low 50s when I got up, but there was a light mist falling, so I pulled on arm and leg warmers plus a base layer and some wind protection. I knew turnout would be low to nonexistent, but decided to ride anyway. When I turned on my headlight I flashed its "low battery" warning. I'd failed to charge it. Of course, that was a clear message that I should skip riding. Also, of course, I ignored it, put the light into its most power-saving mode, and rolled out into the cold mist. Naturally there wasn't anyone else up on the levee, so I figured I'd fight the wind and cold and what was essentially a light rain for a while and turn back around Williams Blvd. I ended up going a bit farther. Because of the weather the levee was pretty deserted. Most of the regular walkers and riders were missing, so turned the headlight off for a long stretch on the way out to conserve whatever battery was left so I would have something for the return trip where I knew there would be more pedestrians. I did see Pat heading out on his ride somewhere around Jefferson, but other than a couple of people who were riding to work I think I saw only one other rider. So basically is was a somewhat miserable solo ride. 

By tomorrow morning's WeMoRi the temperature is supposed to be down to 46°F with a 15 mph north wind. It's doubtful there will be much of a group, but I'll probably dig out some warmer clothes and venture out anyway. After that it should start to slowly warm up, and so the weather for Saturday's Tour da Parish ride should be fine. 

Meanwhile, the Tulane cycling team's kit order site opened up and will be live until the 13th, so if you want to get a jersey or whole kit, now's the time! The site itself is a little messed up at this point (the road suit option disappeared and the prices aren't showing) but I'm sure they'll get it straightened out soon. I like the design but don't know anything about the manufacturer. From their sizing guide I may be ordering the XS versions and putting my faith in the forgiveness of Lycra.

Seasons

Fall colors in New Orleans

Technically, it's Fall, and my Strava feed is full of beautiful images of winding roads and colorful foliage, none of which is here. As with gravel riding, we live in a fall foliage desert down here where the months of September through November offer only brief samples of windy arm-warmer weather interspersed with foggy humid mornings that morph into 80° days. There are a few imported trees that actually change color, although not usually until November, but mostly Fall just means that the Live Oaks drop a lot of leaves while those that remain just turn a slightly darker shade of green. All of which is kind of irrelevant since the weekday morning rides right now are completed almost entirely in the dark and photos are mainly of peoples' butts illuminated by headlights or a bunch of dark silhouettes partly obscured by bright red tail lights. 

Last weekend Danielle was in town for her high school reunion. We went to the soirée in the school courtyard Friday evening, which was surprisingly nice, but otherwise the weekend consisted of two Giro Rides interspersed with lunches and dinners with friends and neighbors.

Speaking of the Giro, Saturday's was a pretty fast one that featured some heavy smoke along Chef Highway due to a persistent marsh fire. We haven't had any significant rain around here for much of the summer and fall (I think we are something like 23 inches below normal), so the fire has been smoldering mainly underground in the dried out peat, which makes it almost impossible to extinguish. They are now pumping water *into* the marsh in an effort to control it. Anyway, we all got back without noticeable symptoms of smoke inhalation, and by Sunday the wind had shifted a bit so it wasn't an issue. Monday, however, was another story.

I went out Monday morning to meet up with the Mellow Monday ride. Although there was a dense fog advisory, there was none to speak of on the way out to City Park, but as our small group - I think only four or five showed up - the fog got heavier. Then, toward the eastern end of Lakeshore Drive, it went rather quickly from heavy to impenetrable. I was glad that we all had lights and that there was practically no traffic. I think maybe two cars passed us along the lake. Meanwhile, out to the west on I-55, there was a horrendous multi-vehicle pile-up thanks to the same "Superfog" that formed from the combination of regular fog and another marsh fire in that area. Over 100 vehicles were involved, eight people died, tanker trailers exploded, etc. Complete disaster. As I write, that part of the interstate is still closed as they finish cleaning up the mess and then inspect the bridge for structural damage caused by the crashes and the fire.

So Monday's ride was quite windy, but otherwise fairly mellow, but for some reason Tuesday's levee ride seemed kind of hard. Rich is back in town so we had three doing the full ride, which should have made it seem easier, but the wind direction that morning made it feel like most of the ride was either crosswind or headwind, mainly the latter. By the time we were halfway home my back hurt, my neck hurt, and my legs hurt, even though we weren't really pushing it. On the plus side, my new computer arrived at the house later that day. On the minus side, now I will have to spend hours getting it set up, installing software, setting up passwords, transferring files, etc. It's Wednesday now and I haven't even turned it on because I know that once I do I'll get sucked down that rabbit hole and won't want to stop until I have at least the most critical things working the way I want. That will include some software from the 90s (actually one from the 80s, I think) plus numerous online applications like Box, Teams, Dropbox, Slack, Quorum, Airtable, Zoom, etc. 

Next weekend there are some small cyclocross races up in Ridgeland MS. I'm thinking I might go do those just for a change of pace, although there might be a little push-back on my absconding with the car for most of the weekend since Halloween is Tuesday and Candy has already been sorting out about fifty pounds of candy into little packages for the neighborhood kids. 

Wind and Arm Warmers

Saturday Giro cool-down on a wet Lakeshore Drive thanks to that north wind.

Well, I guess we are getting our first hint of Fall. Most of the regular rides last week were merely warm as opposed to miserably hot, but even as early as Monday the meteorological handwriting was on the wall for the weekend. On Tuesday there were only a few there for the morning levee ride, and by the time I was past Williams Blvd. I was on my own. There was a not insignificant tailwind that kept me going out to Ormond, but I knew it would be a long ride back, which of course it was. As often happens this time of year my training motivation was a little lacking, and every now and then I'd just sit up and coast or soft-pedal before slowly and somewhat reluctantly getting back up to a more respectable speed. I didn't feel guilty about it, though, because y'know, there's always WeMoRi. Granted, my WeMoRi the next day wasn't any thing to write home about, but in terms of actual training it was at least notable for a few moments of high intensity, mostly when I was about to be dropped. Thursday's levee ride was at least not a solo one. Charles and Jeff both did the whole ride with me. The nagging east wind was still there, though, so the ride back was a lot longer than the ride out had been. Along the way we saw an eagle fly right across the bike path ahead of us, having just grabbed some unfortunate creature off of the levee batture. A bit later, near the Jefferson playground, we saw a bunch of pipe that we surmised must be for the parish's plan to run a fresh water pipeline up the river a few miles to alleviate the predicted saltwater intrusion. Later that day the Corps of Engineers pushed their forecasts for the dates that saltwater might affect the city's drinking water - the levee ride starts from the "new" Orleans parish water intake. The bottom line was that it was probably not going to be a problem after all, leading the city and the university to put their mitigation plans on hold.

So an actual cold front came through Friday night, bringing a mostly north wind and dropping the morning temperature down to around 70°F. Not enough to justify arm-warmers or anything quite yet since the temperature drop wouldn't really be until that night. Saturday's Giro turned out to be a pretty fast one despite the wind that was probably ranging between 10 and 20 mph. I never put my face into that wind but felt like I got a pretty good workout just staying in the draft and not getting dropped! The thing about windy days like that is the constant level of concentration required, especially near the tail end of the paceline, as riders are moving around more than usual and the wind makes the pace more uneven. As bad as it was on the way out, I knew it would be worse on the way back, which of course it was.

Indeed, Sunday morning it was down to 60° which led me to pull on a base layer and hunt briefly but unsuccessfully hunt in the dark through my "winter stuff" drawer for real arm-warmers. I ended up using just my thin sunscreen arm-warmers that were more readily available since 60° isn't really what you'd call "cold." Still, I was happy to have the extra layers as I rode out to Starbucks in the dark. Speaking of the dark, more and more of the morning rides are going to be in the dark until we change back to Standard Time on November 5. I'd been thinking that Sunday wouldn't be as windy as Saturday had been, but didn't seem to turn out that way. At least the pace was a little more forgiving.

Back at home it was Halloween decorating weekend and the usual battle between Candy, who wants to put a bunch of things out in front that require electricity, and me who wants to not overload the extension cords that are all plugged into the same outlet so as to avoid burning down the house. Along the way I put back the old garden border that the roadwork people had removed (and of course not replaced) when they replaced the sidewalk. I then went out and got some plastic border to finish off the section where it was missing entirely. While I was at Lowes I picked up a couple of Azaleas to plant in front of the house to replace some of the plants we've lost over the past year and especially during the drought.

Speaking of the drought, it looks like we will be getting some significant rain around Wednesday as a system that crossed over Mexico from the Pacific is now in the Gulf. It's heading straight north so we won't get much of it, but the current forecast for Wednesday is looking like a 100% chance of rain and 17-20 mph east wind. I guess the timing of the rain will determine the fate of this week's WeMoRi.

Backpedaling

Sunday TUCA Northshore Ride - La Tung Road

After returning from Six Gap I figured it was time for an easy week that might allow for a bit of recovery. While a 250 mile week might not seem like an easy one, it is really never about mileage as much as it is about intensity, and if anyone is an expert in minimizing intensity, it's I. After the long drive back from Dahlonega that had me back home around midnight I made the easy decision to skip my usual Monday morning ride altogether. Besides, I had an early meeting that day and was going to be a little sleep-deprived anyway, and of course my bike was still in Six Gap mode with the race wheels and 11-32 and everything. Yeah, I could have ridden the Orbea, but it just didn't seem worth the effort under the circumstances. Also my legs still hurt. 

As expected, I was not very "high-functioning" on Monday, but by Tuesday morning I was more or less good to go, so I headed out to the levee for the 6 am ride, only to find that nobody else was there. Just as well, I thought, since that way I could moderate my effort and help the recovery process along rather than possibly derail it by trying to stay with a fast group. Since I was solo and slow and had yet another morning meeting, I turned back at the Little Dip rather than go for the usual 40+ miles. Then, on Wednesday, I boldly went out to meet the WeMoRi. My legs were a lot better but still not 100% so I was definitely not going to be anywhere near the front. Of course sucking wheels at the back of the group does have its own risks. I jumped into the back of the group along Toussant and hung on with the hope that there would be enough of a lull on Wisner that I could recover from the acceleration, but wasn't quite that lucky. Subway was ahead of me and tried to close a gap when it accelerated but kind of blew up. I looked up and knew there was no way I was going to close that gap by myself, so I just sat on his wheel as we slowed down and discussed where to cut the course. So we got back in on the other side of the park and then somewhere on Lakeshore Drive the exact same scenario repeated itself and we rolled in probably half a minute behind the front group. On the plus side, I was able to pat myself on the back for not going too deep trying to chase.

Thursday morning we had some of the usual suspects up on the levee but as it turned out they all needed to turn back early for one reason or another, so once I was past Williams Blvd. I was on my own. I went ahead and did the full ride anyway, cruising at a moderate steady pace that might be described as Zone two. On Friday, instead of doing the 6 am Friendly Friday ride, which sometimes gets fast, I instead met the Tulane group for an easy 6:30 am levee ride. So with five fairly easy days behind me I figured I'd go ahead and ride the Saturday Giro.

Saturday Giro heading over the still partially closed Seabrook bridge.

Saturday's 6:30 am Giro turned out to be a pretty fast one, but the group was large so despite the fast pace I was mostly able to remain sheltered and keep my efforts short. I was still intent on doing a full week at lower than normal intensity, and felt like I was doing pretty well with that. Part of that strategy was to put together a Tulane Cycling northshore ride for Sunday. I knew we would have one or two riders who didn't have the volume to easily handle the 53 mile route I'd mapped out, even though it was not a particularly hilly one.

We rolled out of Headquarters at University Square about half an hour later than planned, but it didn't really matter since we weren't meeting anyone. I'd forgotten to put my third bike carrier on the roof, so I had two on the roof and one inside the car along with lots of wheels since the other car could just fit two bikes without front wheels. The weather was great and the air actually felt fairly cool for the first hour even though we hadn't started until 8:00. Abita Springs had most of the usual parking spaces along the fence blocked off for their weekly Farmers' Market, so we parked along the bike path where there were "business parking only" signs. Fortunately that didn't turn out to be a problem. 

The ride went pretty smoothly. Sean would up the pace when he'd come to the front which left one or two of the others struggling a bit on the little climbs. After the store stop at Enon we let Sean go on the Firetower climb in order to try and keep the rest of the group together. There were a couple of times when we  had to ease up a bit for one rider who was at that point where every little climb starts to feel like a mountain, but in general we were staying in the 18-20 mph range which was appropriate for this group. Afterward we had an early lunch at the Abita Brewpub before heading back across the lake. That afternoon I went over to Lowes and picked up (literally) a couple of sacks of concrete, once again straining my lower back, and finally finished patching up some of that broken concrete between the house and garage. It isn't very pretty, but it will suffice. Ever since the road work people tore up and subsequently replaced the road and sidewalk on the Pine Street side of the house we've had rats burrowing under the concrete in a few places. I tried this electronic rat trap that basically electrocutes rats a couple of weeks ago, and although I think one rat got zapped pretty well he unfortunately limped off to die someplace under, or in, the basement, resulting in four days of dead rat smell. I searched for the body but could never find it. Yesterday I put out rat poison in those little cat-resistant boxes, one outside the side door and the other in the garage. Hopefully the next fatalities will happen outside the house, but there are really no guarantees on that based on prior experience.

Monday Morning

This morning I went out to the Mellow Monday ride. It was fairly windy and I was feeling a little sluggish, so I mostly just followed wheels. A couple of guys were doing some work on the front but the speed was fairly controlled anyway.

Six Gap - Lucky 13?

I think I've ridden Six Gap thirteen times. Some years it was chilly, some years it rained the whole time, some years it was hot, some years it was foggy, some years it was some combination of the above. This year, though, was about as close as you can come to ideal weather. OK, so I was a little chilly for the first hour, and wore my thin sunscreen arm-warmers, and had my antique DeFeet UnDeFlector under my jersey, but had I been so inclined I could have gone with just a regular summer kit and been a little colder for the first 45 minutes, which is how long it takes to get to the first actual climb that isn't even counted as one of the official six "gaps."

This year I drove up to Dahlonega on Saturday with Tulane riders Joey, Josiah, and Sean. Joey and Josiah were registered for the 3-Gap ride and Sean and I for the full 104-mile 6-Gap ride. We left nice and early in one of the big vans after removing the rear seats to make room for the bikes. A few days before I had set the bike up in its special "Six Gap Mode," which this year meant an 11-32 cassette and a Wolf Link derailleur extender so my short-cage derailleur would clear that big cog. This would be the first year I'd done the ride with anything bigger than a 29 on the back, and although I wasn't expecting it to make me any faster, I was hoping it would make the steeper parts of the climbs a little easier. It seems that every few years as I age I add a couple of teeth to my cassette. I haven't yet gone to compact chainrings, so I'm still using the old standard 39 - 53 combination. 

I had recently installed a new handlebar after finding my aluminum 3T Ergonova, that is no longer being produced, had corroded near the right shifter clamp pretty badly. I searched around for some carbon bars that were both narrow and compact and found not all that many in-stock options. I really, really liked the Ergonova bend, and might have bought the 3T carbon version that was 38 cm at the hoods and 40 at the drops, but they weren't available from most of the places I looked. Then I looked at the Black Inc ones but then when I went to purchase them from Black Inc I got some sort of error and eventually gave up on that. I ended up settling on some FSA bars that were a little cheaper and less aero but were available in a 36 - 38 width. Naturally nothing is as simple as it seems and the slightly narrower bars meant I  had to shorten the brake cable housings since I have absolutely no wiggle room due to the short head tube on my 50 cm frame. I should have also shortened the derailleur cable housings but they insert farther down on the down tube and I was too lazy to pull those cables and then have to re-route them through the frame and all. Anyway, I got everything sorted out, put the race wheels and brake pads on the bike, and rode it on the Thursday levee ride to make sure everything was working.

For reasons I cannot fathom, Six Gap closes Saturday packet pickup at 4 pm nowadays, and even with an early departure from New Orleans, we didn't arrive in Dahlonega until closer to 4:30. We checked into the Days Inn and then drove into town so we could to a short loop before dark to get the drive out of our legs. That turned out to be a pretty hilly 25 miles with 1,800 feet of elevation during which I was doing everything in my power to minimize my effort. On the plus side, it did provide the opportunity to fully test each and every gear combination on the bike. We ended up eating dinner at a Mo's near the hotel since it was getting late enough that other options would have required a long wait. 

Sunday morning we were up early and stopped quickly at a McDonald's on the way to the High School. That was so quick, in fact, that we got to the parking lot earlier than ever which put us really close to the school building. Registration was really fast and bathroom availability was great since we were so early. As we got back to the van a car pulled into the parking space next to us. That turned out to be Kent Bostick. What are the odds? I pinned on the back number and made my usual modifications to the stupid handlebar number plate so it would clear my computer and cables, and headed down to the start 15 or 20 minutes before 7:30. People were already starting to pack themselves into the starting area as the announcer mentioned there would be a ten minute delay. This year I started with two small water bottles, one with Skratch in it, a full flask of HammerGel, and a couple of emergency gel packs. I planned to stop to refill water bottles at the rest stop on top of the third Gap, Unicoi, which was roughly half-way into the ride.

The ride started fairly calmly. I guess there were about a hundred people in front of me at the start, and probably five hundred behind. There were a lot of riders from New Orleans this year, and although I never did see Pat or Steve, I did see most of the others at some point or another. As it has been for the past couple of years, the route does the northeast loop in the opposite direction from earlier years, which means you go up the steeper, but slightly shorter, side of Hogpen Gap as the second big climb of the day. Also as usual, the predominant language was Spanish. For some reason this ride attracts a lot of riders from Florida and, apparently, Colombia. This year my climbing felt very controlled, using the 39x28 much of the time, and then the 39x32 for the steeper sections. As a result, I don't think I ever pushed my heart rate past 160 bpm for more than a few seconds. As I did the last time I rode this course, I didn't push the big descents at all, and although I was braking more than usual for the first couple, I eventually got more comfortable with them. Even so, I never quite hit 50 mph anywhere this year.

There were a couple of really nice things about this year's ride. One was that I found a nice group that was staying together early in the ride and climbing at a solid but comfortable pace. I was probably with that same group for 50 or 60% of the entire ride, losing them at times and then finding them again later. The other nice thing, which was surprising considering the nice weather, was that I never got stuck behind slow-moving cars on any of the downhills. That was surprising because I don't think I've ever done this ride and seen quite so many cars and motorcycles on the route.

So my climbs were going smoothly and with the temperature mostly in the 60s for the first half of the ride my water bottles were still half-full when I finally stopped to refill them 56 miles into the ride. I picked up a couple of gel packs while I was there that I never ended up needing, and in retrospect could have easily done the whole ride on just the two water bottles I'd started with thanks to the spectacular weather and I guess also the fact that I wasn't pushing myself too much.

I came over the top of Wolfpen and then Woody feeling reasonably good, and as usual really enjoyed the long swoopy descent down to the infamous traffic circle of death. That's where there's a steep downhill 180° right turn that riders always misjudge. There are always crashes there, and even though I've done it many times now I still come into it a little too hot and have to switch to Criterium mode to make it through without going over the edge of the road.

So at that point you're around 13 miles from the finish and into a nice farmland area that is a continuous stretch of rolling hills, some a little steep. I soon found myself again with that same group I'd been with a few times earlier, and then a little later was with a group that was being towed by Chris M. We were maybe eight miles from the finish when Chris suddenly accelerated and opened a gap on the rest. He later told me that he had been looking at his ride time and knew he had to pick it  up a bit to make it in under the six-hour mark, which he did. Anyway, a little bit later the group started to disintegrate and I found myself a little ahead of them on my own. We were only about six miles from the end at that point. As I was rolling down a hill at about 30 mph I saw a car ahead of me put his left turn signal on. He was far enough ahead that I figured he'd make his turn well ahead of me, but then he pulled over to the right edge of the road and practically came to a stop. I couldn't figure out what he was doing, and his heavily tinted windows kept me from being able to see if he was looking at me or what. I guessed that he was waiting for me to go past on his left before making his turn onto a little dirt road. 

My luck was about to run out. Suddenly he turned left just as I got there. I grabbed two handfuls of brakes and slid/turned left with the car, bumping into the back door with my side and kind of tumbling down as the car continued. I didn't have a scratch on me and my head never hit the ground since I'd almost, but not quite, gotten it stopped in time. The driver jumped out in a panic and was very apologetic (my guess is he was looking at his map to make sure that was the dirt road he was supposed to go down). I picked myself up and put the chain back on and told him I was fine and jumped back on the bike. That's when I noticed that one knee kept hitting the top tube. Looking down, I realized that the seat had been turned about 5°. It was only about 5 miles to the finish, and right about then a nice little group came past, so I jumped on the back of that for the last stretch, finishing  up with a chip time of 6:20, which I was very happy with under the circumstances. Sean finished up with a chip time of 6:58 but he spent a lot of time at rest stops and his actual ride time was 5:56. The fastest La/Ms rider was Elliott P with a 5:26.

I later found that I'd cracked the screen on my phone that had been in my pocket. The bike had landed on the derailleur side, so the derailleur was a little scratched up. It was also shifting a little poorly after I fell and I thought I must have bent the derailleur hanger, but it turned out that the rear wheel had shifted just a bit in the dropout which was causing the misalignment, and the hanger was fine.

After eating in the cafeteria (tacos instead of pasta this year) we finally hit the road for home in the early afternoon. Joey drove for the first couple of hours and then I drove the rest of the way. The drive back went smoothly and we arrived in New Orleans around 11:30 pm. I dropped myself off at home and left the others to go back to HQ and re-install the rear seats and then drop the van off on campus. My neck and shoulder were just a little bit sore, presumably from hitting the car, and as usual my quads were pretty sore, but in general I was in better shape than I was in some prior years. I ended up not riding at all on Monday, unless you count commuting to and from work, because I had an early meeting for work. 

That was probably a good thing.

Asphalt

A Mellow Monday

Back to the usual routine now, although not without thinking about the upcoming road trip to Dahlonega for Six Gap at the end of the month. The plan is to go up with three of the Tulane riders, who of whom were doing just the 50-mile ride. Amazingly, Tulane's travel service got us a room at the hotel right in Dahlonega, so that will be convenient. Getting the van, however, is still a little up in the air since a couple of them still need to get approved for driving. Every few years, as I get older, I get cassettes with lower gearing. I recently got an 11-32 cassette, along with a Wolf Tooth Roadlink that will hopefully allow me to use the 32 with my short-cage derailleur. I think it will work with the new chain I installed last Saturday. If I need a couple more links I have a backup chain I can use, although adding two more links will definitely make the sag in the 39x11 or 12, not that I am likely to need those particular gears. I'll just have to remember not to go there if that's the case. Anyway, I haven't installed the Roadlink yet, but I did put the cassette onto my good wheels to confirm that there is enough chain even in the 53x32. The only question is whether adding the Roadlink will be the straw that broke the camel's back. I'll put all that together next week and I'm sure I can make it work one way or the other. 

Friendly Friday - regrouping along Canal Blvd.

After a couple of months that definitely qualified as a drought, we finally started getting a little rain here and there, fortunately not at times that had interfered with my usual rides. 

On Labor Day we did a nice little "Holiday Giro" that was followed by some significant rainfall that afternoon. At the time, Pine Street alongside the house was a dirt road about eight inches lower than the adjoining asphalt, which turned it into a nice little pond for a while. That evening Adam was having a little 60th birthday party down at Barrel Proof, so I decided to go to that for a while. Dan Bennett was in town, so I knew he'd be there as well. It was kind of a meeting of the cycling dinosaurs with Dan, Adam, Mike Lew, Russ Broussard (who was playing drums for the band), Wendy, and a number of others. 

What a difference a day can make ... when they actually show up

The next day the roadwork crew showed up and by the time I got home from work they had fresh asphalt on most of the street. Of course the sidewalk is still torn up so getting the bike, or the garbage can, out the basement door is still a chore. The sidewalk work has been abandoned since they tore it up on August 17th, so almost a month ago now.

Adam and Dan at Adam's 60th

We've been kind of back into drought mode for the past week, but on the plus side the mornings have felt a little cooler. It's kind of amazing when you step outside and it's 78° and it feels cool. The good news is that the hurricanes are still staying away from the Gulf, at least for the moment. On Saturday I did the usual Giro, which on Saturdays has apparently shifted to a 6:30 am start from West End. This is both good and bad. The good part is that it's nice and cool, relatively speaking, for the first hour of the ride. The bad part is that I don't get my morning coffee even though I have to leave the house at the same time. The Sunday Giro hasn't been affected, so at least there's that.

As it turned out, though, I didn't get my Sunday morning coffee either. Charles and Steve had cooked up a 75 mile ride in Mississippi for Sunday and I figured I should probably do that since it at least wouldn't be flat and would give me a little more saddle time. With Six Gap looming on the horizon, a longer and slightly hillier ride wasn't such a bad idea. 

The day before I had finally decided to address some deferred bike maintenance. I needed to change out the cables, one of which was hanging up somewhere and often keeping the front derailleur from shifting into the small ring - not something I wanted to deal with in Georgia. Also, my rear shifter was so worn out that I had to remember to push the shift lever all the way to the outside before shifting or it would kind of lock up. It's happened to every Campi shifter I've ever had. I'd replaced both shifters back around the end of 2017, so they had accumulated well over 70,000 miles since then. Fortunately you can buy just the "shifter body" which includes basically all of the mechanicals for the shifter, so it's just a matter of transferring the brake lever, clamp, and brake hood. I'd ordered one that arrived a couple of days prior. I also had some new handlebar tape and a new chain ready to go. That all went smoothly except that I found the aluminum handlebar to be pretty well corroded on the right side where I guess the brake lever clamp had scratched through the anodization. I cleaned it up but definitely need to replace it. I happen to have a counterfeit 3T handlebar on hand, so I'll probably just put that one on until I decide if I want to bite the bullet on a carbon bar. I don't think 3T even sells aluminum handlebars any more but I really like the feel of the Ergonova. If I go with carbon I may get the Black Inc one since I can get that in the 38 cm (end to end) width which would be a bit narrower than what I have now and might suit me better. We'll see.

So Sunday morning I walked next door where we've been parking the car and drove it around to the side of the house to put my bag and bike into it. It was a bit before 6 am and dark, and as usual I looked up at the sky for Jupiter and Venus. It was a little more clear than usual, so it was easy to make out the Orion constellation and all. Just then I noticed something moving more or less west to east. It was a string of those Starlink satellites! I just happened to look up at the right time on the right day to see them. I've stumbled across the ISS a couple of times like that. Anyway, I made the hour-long drive to the ride and soon our little group of six hit the road, heading mostly north into a light headwind for the first half of the ride. It felt cool for the first hour or so, even though we didn't start until 7:30. One thing I can say about the back roads in that area is that they sure have some nice smooth asphalt. The pace was mostly Zone 2 stuff, although for some reason my legs were kind of achy from the start. Maybe I'd done a little unintentional damage during Saturday's Giro. Whatever the reason, I just compensated by taking relatively shorter pulls than most, just in case. The route eventually took us back to where we started, but there was another 10-mile loop after that to get us up to the advertised 75 miles. Only Charles, Peter, and I did that. The others called it a day with 65 miles. It was probably around 90° by the end, but even so I hadn't even gone through two water bottles, although I'd had a Coke when we stopped at a store along the way.

Again to Augusta

It's never simple. I'd taken the car to the collision repair shop over two weeks earlier to repair the damage done when some hit-and-run driver broke the passenger side mirror and scraped up the door panels in the process. What should have been a 3-day repair dragged on for the better part of two weeks thanks to the shop receiving the wrong part. When it was finally ready on a Friday I rode the bike down Tulane Avenue in 100° afternoon heat to retrieve it. The next day we discovered that neither of the keyless entry door handle buttons on that side of the car worked, so it went back to the shop where I thought they would find something that hadn't been plugged in. Two days later I was told, "We can't figure out what is wrong." So they were going to bring it to a mechanic to check out. It was almost a week later that they finally got it fixed after finding a broken wire and having to order a replacement. I'd been kind of sweating the whole thing out because I was scheduled to hit the road early Thursday morning to drive up to Augusta, Georgia for Masters Road Nationals. I got the car back Wednesday afternoon. That was close.

So early Thursday I threw the bike into the car along with my race bag and a few other things and headed out for the 9-hour drive. I'd been thinking that Candy and perhaps the dog too would come along, but Candy didn't want to have to deal with the dog and decided not to go. On the plus side, I had already reserved a nice room at the Homewood Suites with a kitchen and sofa and everything. Oh well. The drive went fine and although I could have tried to do a quick lap around the road course at Fort Gordon, I ultimately decided to go for an early dinner at Olive Garden instead. I'd selected the hotel mainly because of all of the nearby food and coffee options! Also I was hungry. I had already gotten my approved visitor pass into the base where the road race would be. It was the first day that I hadn't ridden since June 5th.

I was riding in the 70-74 age group, combined with all of the other dinosaurs who ranged up to 90 years old. Thankfully our race was the first of the day, starting at 7:30 am when the temperature was still in the upper 70s. By afternoon it would be around 100°. I had no idea what to expect of this race, but at least I was reasonably familiar with the course, having ridden it at masters nationals back in 1994, and then again when I was there helping out for Collegiate Nationals about a year earlier. Just to be on the safe side I had put the 11-28 cassette that I normally use only for Six Gap on so I wouldn't, hopefully, have to make a front chainring shift on the finishing hill where I'd come to grief back in '94. My main goal for this race was to not get dropped on the first climb and then hopefully stay with the front group. The finish of this course features a reasonably steep 1 km climb that tops out around 300 meters from the finish. In the field we had a couple of people I knew, one because he was basically famous in cycling circles, and the other because I'd raced with him numerous times, including there in '94. One was Kent Bostick, and ex-Olympian, ex-Pro, ex-national champion in multiple disciplines, etc., etc. The other was Tom Bain who has been beating me since at least the 90s in various races.

Road Race

I got to the road race about an hour before my start time just as the sun was coming up. Naturally I took a wrong turn somewhere on the base and went around in circles a couple of times before finding my way. In my defense, it was dark and I was counting on my memory from the prior year to guide me. Although ours was the first race of the day, I was surprised how may people were already there. I found a parking spot on the grass that happened to be right next to Lonnie Kennedy, who wasn't racing but was there with his team from St. Louis. What are the odds?  I had not seen Lonnie in years, so it was great to catch up with him and reminisce about the old Natchez Classic and other races that he would do with us. 

Eddie was in a break for a while. This was the feed zone near the top of the climb.

The course at Ft. Gordon has three significant climbs on the first half of the loop. Then it eases to nice rolling hills until the final climb around 2 km from the finish. From the start I was expecting a big surge or attack on the first climb, which comes very early, but surprisingly it didn't happen. Over the course of the next few miles I found it easy to stay near the front, occasionally even rolling off the front on the climbs. 

Tom and Kent off the front starting lap 2. Me chasing far right.

In general the pace was slower than I'd expected. Tom put in a couple of attacks on the first lap but with the pace being otherwise pretty easy they got pulled back quickly and then there would be another lull. Of course I think everyone was dreading the attack that we knew would come at the end of the first of our two laps. Sure enough, Tom and/or Kent attacked hard as that climb steepened, which was about where I started to blow up and had to back off a bit. As we came over the top the duo had a clear gap and I was thinking we'd be racing for 3rd. The rest of the field was pretty much scattered all over the place, but a little group of about six came together as we started the second lap. Looking up the road I could see that the break didn't seem to be gaining much ground on us, and after chasing for a mile or two our group caught. This is where someone should have kept the pace going, but instead everyone slowed down and nobody counter-attacked. 

Eddie reaching for a bottle in the feed zone

Over the next five or six miles a number of riders who had been dropped caught. I was feeling pretty good, but based on the prior lap I didn't have much confidence that I would make it all the way to the top of the final climb in a position to sprint. I didn't. Again, I got about 2/3 of the way up the climb before the "Check Engine" light came on. Once the road levelled out I was able to put in another little surge before the finish, coming across in 7th place, which I was pretty happy with. Eddie Corcoran was racing in the 60-64 race that followed mine, so I hung around with his wife and Sam in the feed zone to watch. They were doing four laps, and by then it was much, much warmer. It was a bigger field, which probably only meant it would be faster. Eddie was doing well, coming  up the hill in good position each lap. By the last lap it was hot enough that the wax on my chain was glistening in the sun, having melted into a thin liquid. As it turned out Eddie had cramps in both inner quads near the finish, so he ended up coming across solo in 23rd spot which was still impressive given the very competitive field.

My criterium wasn't until Sunday, so I basically had Saturday off. I ended up doing an easy 20 miles or so, starting from a nice little park along the canal. Saturday afternoon I was checking the results and discovered that Lisa Houser had not only shown up, but won her 35-39 road race. Naturally that meant I had to go to the evening's awards ceremony that was held at the Savannah River Brewing Company. Also, Debbie Milne had won her road race, so it would be nice to see that as well. Also, there would be beer.

The women champions from Saturday's road races. Lisa on the right. Debbie in the middle.

As it turned out, Lisa had jumped in the car that morning, driven the 9 hours straight to the road race, raced with one shoe closure held together with a rubber band, and won. She had planned on driving right back home, but when you win you have to attend the awards, and those weren't until 7 pm. At the awards I also saw Will Wherritt who had also raced earlier and was planning on racing the criterium the following day as well. Lisa couldn't stay for the criterium since she had to get back to New Orleans and be ready for work early Monday morning. Anyway, it was fun to see all of the day's winners getting their championship jerseys and medals and all.

Criterium

The 70-74 criterium start had been moved a week or so prior to 7:00 am! I think sunrise was around 6:45 am. Anyway, that meant a very early departure from the hotel. I got to the course and found a parking spot nearby a bit after 6 am, which gave me time for a nice 30-minute warmup. As they had for the  road race, they called up riders one by one, mostly I guess in random order since I'd been one of the first at the road race but was closer to the end at the criterium. I was expecting this race to be faster and more aggressive than the road race, and it was, although I'd guess that half of the field was just following wheels and hoping for a group sprint. At the start Tom attacked pretty hard, taking Kent with him. I'd been expecting something like that so I was on to them quickly. 

The first couple of laps were therefore pretty fast - 27-28 mph for this group - which I hoped would continue. It didn't and the pace settled down again.  As expected, there were a number of attacks during this 45 minute race, and I was kept busy near the front. I knew that with a field like this I couldn't really count on other people or teams to close gaps or anything, so being near, or occasionally at, the front would be critical in case there was a split. Somewhere toward the last half of the race a small break went off the front with Kent in it, but without Tom. The rest of the field was kind of looking at each other and I was thinking, "Are they really going to let that go?" I was over on the right side on the back side of the course and about to launch myself when I saw Tom go flying past on the left. I immediately took off and went pretty deep, not catching his draft until we had made the bridge. As in the road race, I was thinking that this would split the pack and therefore increase my odds, but also as in the road race they inexplicably eased up and although I guess we dropped a few  riders, it all came back together again. 

At that point I knew it was going to end up as a field sprint, so I just concentrated on staying near the front. With two laps to go riders I hadn't seen the whole race started crowding the front, which made things a little sketchy. I came around the last corner a couple of wheels farther back than I'd have liked but still maybe 6th or 7th I guess. Finish sprints are always a little blurry for me! Fifty meters from the line I made another surge to try and get past one more rider but he saw me coming and I ended up finishing 5th overall. Surprisingly, one of the riders ahead of me was in the 75-79 age group, so my official placing was 4th. 

Either way, I was very happy to have made it onto the podium, and it was kind of cool that I'd be on the podium again, in the same place, at masters nationals, with Tom almost twenty years later. So I hung around for the first awards ceremony around 10:30, collected one of the big medals, and hit the road for home. I was maybe twenty minutes out when I suddenly realized that I did not remember putting my tablet computer into my bag that morning. I pulled off at the next exit and searched my bags but it wasn't there. Then I tried to call the hotel and for some reason my call would not go through. I turned around and headed back, calling Candy en route to ask her to try calling. A few minutes later she called me back and said that they had the tablet in the manager's office. What a relief! So that cost me about an hour, but with the time change I still got home just after dark without having to resort to more than one cup of coffee.

In other races, Norman Zellers who occasionally comes over from Biloxi for the Giro had a good finish in the very competitive 45-49 road race. Mat Davis looked pretty cooked after his road race but finished 20th in the criterium. Will Wherritt finished an impressive 14th in the 35-39 criterium, which was probably one of the fastest and most competitive. All of the LAMBRA riders who were at M-Nats as far as I know:

Cars, Bikes, and the Weather

I mean, what else is there? Last week was just one day after the other of suffocating humidity with pre-dawn temperatures in the mid-80s and apparent temperatures over 110°F. The complete lack of rain just made things that much worse. Every morning when I'd turn on the Garmin to ride I'd get yet another heat advisory warning. I even resorted to putting a little electrolyte mix in my weekday water bottles. Still, that didn't stop me from getting in the usual rides, although I think the general intensity levels were perhaps a bit lacking. The weekend Giro Rides had really small groups. Lots of the regular Giro riders have been doing the 6:30 am SaMoRi on Saturdays instead, just to avoid those last 30 minutes in the sun, I guess. Indeed, both Giro Rides, while quite fast on the way out to Venetian Isles, were slower than usual on the return trips, no doubt due to the combined effects of the heat and the small group size.

Yesterday, on the morning levee ride, our little group almost got taken out by someone in a car coming across the levee from one of the grain elevator docks. Luckily he saw us (probably finally looked up from his phone) at the last second and hit the brakes halfway across the bike path.

The miserable weather continued all the way until yesterday evening when a little cool front finally came through, bringing with it a little bit of badly needed rain. At least two plants in front of the house have succumbed to the heat and dryness already.

This morning the 80° temperature felt positively refreshing thanks to the much-lowered humidity level. Of course one doesn't get cooler weather around here without paying for it, in this case by having a 12 mph north wind. As north winds often do, the group had already been shattered along Lakeshore Drive by the time I jumped into what was left of the front group on Marconi. As usual, I was nearly redlined all the way down Wisner, barely hanging onto the back. Then on City Park Avenue a gap opened ahead of Joe Paul and when he put his head down to chase I just hung on to his wheel for dear life. We came around the corner onto Marconi and then when he stood up to accelerate his right foot unclipped and my life briefly flashed before my eyes. Fortunately we both remained upright and eventually closed the little gap. He later told me that he had been having trouble clipping into that particular pedal, which is a Giant-branded Look by all appearances. He thought that he hadn't fully clipped in after he had had to put a foot down at a stop light a bit earlier.

On the plus side, I got the replacement cassette body for my Campi Scirocco training wheels, so I put everything back together and was happy to find that it solved the problem. I had ordered replacement hub bearings but everything seems fine at the moment so I'll  hold off on replacing those since that will require a trip to the shop in order to remove the old ones and press in the new ones (not that I haven't pressed in new bearings before using a socket, block of wood, and a hammer). The shifters are kind of on their last legs but I'll just live with that at least through nationals since fixing them will probably require rebuilding them and that's assuming I can actually get the parts for shifters that were superseded in 2014. Candy's Fitbit watch died a couple of weeks ago and after trying all of the suggested ways to fix it I finally called tech support, went through everything I'd tried, and got them to ship a replacement. We'll see how long this one lasts. Candy has a way of destroying electronic equipment that unparalleled. I've replaced the screen protector on her iPhone about four times and each time the old one has been practically shattered.

So the car. After going about ten days without a car I was happy to get a call from the collision center last Thursday that it was finally ready for pick-up. Of course that meant riding down Tulane Avenue again in the middle of the day in street clothes when it was close to 100° but I didn't want to be without a car for yet another day. Then on Saturday we discovered that neither of the keyless entry door handle buttons on the right side of the car, where the body panels had been repaired, would work. All the other doors worked fine, and those two doors would lock and unlock using the key fob, but the buttons on the handles were dead. So I brought it back in on Monday expecting it to be a quick fix on the assumption that somebody had just forgotten to plug some connector back in. I wasn't terribly surprised not to have received a call about it that day, but by late afternoon yesterday when I still hadn't heard anything I called. Turns out they can't figure out what the problem is and want to have their mechanic (i.e. no the body shop person) look at it. I suspect that there is some corrosion on the connector terminals, but I guess we'll see. I'll bet they want to replace both door handles and will try to come up with a way to make it my fault. 

Speaking of things that need to be fixed, my block of Pine Street that they tore up a couple of weeks ago has again been abandoned leaving us with a dirt road and clouds of dust. They poured the concrete for the curbs on August 1, then disappeared. It's now August 16. 

Wish I could say I was surprised.

Hotting UP

Monday morning haze thanks to the marsh fire out in the east

It's been nothing but hot and dry around here lately, and the outlook for the rest of this week isn't offering much else. Most of the rides can be described pretty much the same. Things start off briskly with the pre-dawn temperature in the 81-84° range. Then the number of people working the front begins to dwindle along with the water levels in the bottles. Eventually the speed drops and the number of people hanging on for dear life grows. I get home and walk into the 75° air-conditioning and quickly peel off the soaking wet jersey before I get chilled, hanging it on a rod in the hamper so it doesn't grow mold down with the rest of the laundry. The bike's top tube is spotted with sweat, and the glasses are practically opaque. August. Situation Normal.

The week started out with a nice enough Mellow Monday ride that didn't get too much out of hand as sometimes happens. Back at the Museum of Art in City Park I noticed that the little green plastic frog that had been underneath the statue of bacon (actually it's supposed to be brush strokes but I guess my imagination isn't artistic enough for that) had moved and was now atop a lily pad. It's been kind of like Elf on a Shelf - appearing in a different place every few days. Anyway, since Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday were all just more of the same hot rides I'll skip ahead to Saturday. 

With the unusually, even for New Orleans in August, hot mornings we've been having lately a lot of the regular Giro riders have been doing the SaMoRi that has shifted to a 6:30 am start. Of course the difference between starting a ride at 6:30 compared to 7:00 is entirely academic but nobody ever said cyclists weren't like sheep. So the Saturday Giro turnout was quite small. Then to make matters worse, a few of those who started announced they would be turning back with the SaMoRi group, effectively shortening their ride by ten miles or so. If any of those riders were on the fence about turning back early, their doubts were put to rest after Will and a couple others kept the Hayne Blvd. speed between 28 and 32 mph all the way out to Paris Road. Even with the light tailwind, it was pretty intense. So halfway out on Chef all but I think four of us turned back. In a way is was a relief because the pace slacked off a little bit, especially after the turnaround when that tailwind turned into a headwind. So we're cruising back, mostly just sitting in Will's ample draft when, after turning onto the Interstate Will's rear tire erupts into a volcano of sealant. I was two bikes back and still got pretty well sprayed. We took inventory on the shoulder and put in a tube, which got Will back to the Bayou St. John overpass where it went flat again. Another tube and a boot got him home.

Long Giro

So after the practically unavoidable dehydration event of Saturday you would have thought I'd have been smart enough to decline the invitation for a Long Giro out to Fort Pike on Sunday. Of course I wasn't. 

Knowing it was going to be a hot and possibly miserable 78 miles despite the store stop at the marina, I put a partially filled large water bottle in the freezer the night before. That morning I headed out with one big bottle of ice and water, a small bottle with electrolyte, a couple of gels, and a couple of bucks for a cold Coke. Once again we had a bit of a tailwind on the way out and when we got to Venetian Isles I was surprised how many people decided do the long ride. I think we had nine. Once we crossed Chef Menteur Pass the pace, which had already been pretty fast thanks largely to Brett and Will, picked up so that the average speed for that whole stretch was a bit over 28 mph. The whole time I'm sitting at the back wondering if they're saving anything for the ride back into the gradually increasing west wind. All I knew was that my own survival was going to depend on staying the hell off the front. I think everybody in the group ended up at the top of the Strava "Chef to Rigolets" segment. Indeed, the ride back was considerably slower. Despite the store stop rehydration and cool-down, I the speed on the way back was more in the 23-25 mph range as everyone was starting to get overheated and dehydrated. I finally limped back home from the lakefront at 15 mph and proceeded to down about half a gallon of cold fluids, after which I was still a couple of pounds low on the bathroom scale.

In addition to this being the time of year when rides get hot and brutal, it's also the time of year when equipment starts to fail, and my own equipment has been no exception. I'd been noticing some unusual drag and noise that, as is almost always does, sounded like it was coming from the bottom bracket area, which, as is almost always the case, wasn't. I moved the chain out of the way and the cranks spun as smoothly as ever. So then I swapped rear wheels, which confirmed that the problem was the rear hub that has over 30k miles on it and had recently weathered a few long rides in the rain. I found the cassette body to be kind of wobbly which pointed to the freewheel bearing, which I then found to be orange and rusty and generally a big old mess. I just threw up my hands, stuck an old wheel in there, and order an whole new cassette body which cost about what the entire wheel was actually worth. I badly need to change out all of the shifter cables, which I'll probably do some time this week. The shifters themselves are also about at the end of their lives but the Campi 11-speed system I have on there is like four generations old now and it's questionable whether it's worth replacing at this point.

Meanwhile, we've been without the car for, I think, ten days now thanks to some hit-and-run person who crushed the side-view mirror into the door. The car should have been ready last Friday but they were sent the wrong mirror, so now I'm hoping maybe late Tuesday or Wednesday. Of course, since the street alongside the house is still completely torn up, which is to say it is just dirt, the car would be covered in dust anyway. The roadwork crew put in new curbs last week, built forms for some of the sidewalks but not all of them, and then ghosted us ... again. When will they return to finish the job?  Your guess is as good as mine. It's like they have a weekly Wheel of Fortune wheel that they spin and every now and then the pointer lands on your street, or Bankrupt. The electricity bill last month was almost $500, and every time I hear the a/c unit kick off, which isn't often, I wonder if it has broken.