All posts by Mike

First “rain” ride a LOT harder than it should have been!

OK, let’s face it, middle of September, we shouldn’t be talking about rain anyway! But a good excuse to make sure the rain bikes, literally “ridden hard and put away wet”, were in working order. Fortunately a day or two warning (for the rain) let me catch the dead Di2 battery, but it didn’t spot the damaged tire on Kevin’s bike. No biggie, got it taken care of before the ride.

Not heavy rain, not really cold, but still felt really miserable. Maybe because it seemed like it shouldn’t have been very challenging, but somehow still was? VERY short ride, just up Old LaHonda, down the other side, and then back into Woodside descending 84. The original plan was for a longer ride, and the revised plan still had us heading north on Skyline and then down Kings, adding some mileage and climbing. But by the time we got back up to Skyline (after descending West Old LaHonda), we were feeling really hungry, again, for no good reason.

No mishaps along the way, nothing terribly exciting. And the chip seal on West Old LaHonda didn’t seem nearly as bad as we expected; it shouldn’t be an issue for our “real” bikes on Tuesday morning.

From the frying pan to the fridge. Back to leg warmers, base layers and winter gloves.

Just a few days ago we were at risk of running out of water on our Tuesday/Thursday-morning rides, having to make a stop at Sky Londa. Today, fog up on top, cold (to me, about 50F) and, well, hot or cool doesn’t seem to make much difference in speed. There isn’t any.

Kevin (younger Kevin) is off at Disneyworld with his sister, so today, just Kevin (ex-pilot) with me. Thursday, maybe nobody? Ex-pilot flew off to Slovenia shortly after our ride this morning! Speed was, as I said, slow. I can still punch a few watts for a short period of time, but nothing sustained. The hoped-for rise in my hematocrit will occur pretty slowly; even though my meds were reduced all at once, not tapered, red blood cells take a while to produce. Oh. My. I just looked it up. Red blood cells live for 115 days, so it might take a much longer time than I thought for my level to come back up. Replacement time is 4 to 6 weeks.

I’d really hoped to get in at least one Santa Cruz ride this year, but time is running out. It won’t be pretty if/when it happens, but I really don’t want this to be my first year in a while without a single century. But hey, at least no broken bones, 14 months and counting! Doesn’t sound too impressive when I put it that way.