I’m not riding all that badly; 27:50 for the climb up Kings, for mid-May, isn’t atypical for me. Everybody else though? They’re definitely going faster. Today we had Karl, Karen, Eric, Marcus, Kevin (not the pilot), Todd & Jon, and it didn’t take long for me to completely lose sight of them. I thought that maybe Kevin (my son) would be riding a bit slower, since he’d missed several rides last week due to a kidney issue resurfacing (his epilepsy meds like to create kidney stones), but no, he made it up the hill in a “clean” 26 minutes (meaning 26 flat, not 26:59). Of course I wasn’t there to see it, but Strava seems to confirm his claim.

Strava. I could post the Strava thingee here, but at the bottom it would say “There are no accomplishments on this ride.” Strava, you could learn a thing or two about salesmanship! Why not just come out and say it? “You suck!” And why am I so addicted to the darned thing?

Overall I’m looking at numbers for my rides that really aren’t that bad. What’s changed is Kevin, who, at this time last year, had yet to get under 30 minutes up Kings, and two months later was at 26:30, and this past month has hit 25:30. I’m still better on the flats, and I’m still better if the ride is long enough (over 60 miles).

But what will happen in France? I’ll tell you one thing, it won’t be me carrying all the extra stuff up the hills this time!