Tuesday Ride.

Well, the usual riders turned out for the 12:30 Thrasher ride. I immediately knew it would be a fast ride today because Simon showed up. We were missing James, Jay, and Ray. Laurie Marshall, Bryan Burns and Tracy also joined us. We were not joined by the Mayor's entourage. It was a cloudy day, the ground was damp and contrary to my rules (I'm not supposed to ride on wet days), we all embarked on time. I chatted with Laurie for a bit, noting that this was going to be a fast ride. Well, the chatting continued with everyone and it seemed that we were going to just have an easy ride. So I rode slowly away at my own pace. I couldn't believe that everyone would want to ride that pace the whole ride. We regrouped on Seven Locks/Bradley, then again, I rode away slowly and turned up Kentsdale and up the hill. That's when things changed. The group caught me before the turn onto Newbridge. It was amazing, things went from slow to furious. We continued that pace, dropping Tracy and Bryan and Shawn somewhere along the way, before Clara Barton. Down Clara Barton, we hammered, Paul apparently did not follow us but instead rode down MacArthur Blvd. I was breathing harder than I have all winter. Some of my pulls were ineffective as I could not pass Simon or Randy. I finally dropped back and let the others rotate through. Laurie happened to do that as well, so I didn't feel too badly. I just couldn't recover. Well, Ad of course was the instigator again, pulling through above our pace. We all needed recovery, coasting back to the start. All in all a really good day. Tomorrow is the hill day, which I don't think I'll be able to make as I have a meeting at 11:30. We'll see if I can get back in time.

One last note: Rest in Peace Sheldon Brown. You've helped me over the years work on my bike. I didn't even need to buy a book on how to service my bike. I'm sure you've been an inspiration to many in the cycling community. Sheldon's Cycling site His Journal