Mar-9: Warm weather is nice

Mar-8:

PUE: Act 1: 8:40 Dalton's Touring group marina route; 35.8 m.; 2hrs, 14min; 15.9 mph;
- - - - Act 2: 11:50 Lake + Northside Loop w/ Dave-ntW; warm, SSW wind; 40.1 miles; 2hrs, 33min; 15.6 mph;
- - - - - Total: 75.9 miles; 4hrs, 48min (incl 1 min for total "dropped time"); 15.8 mph.

Jan tot: 2 rides, 96.0 m.; 6 hrs, 5 min, 15.8 mph.
Feb tot: 11 rides, 350.4 m.; 21 hrs, 53 min, 16.0 mph.
Mar tot: 2 rides, 139.2 m.; 8 hrs, 45 min, 15.9 mph.
YTD: 15 rides, 585.6 m.; 36 hrs, 43 min, 15.9 mph (totals checked and corrected).

I intended on doing a solo 50-miler Sunday morning. I was at PUE just after 8 am when I remembered to turn on my cell phone for the first time since before 8 pm the previous evening; there was a call from Dave-not-the-Wave telling me he had gotten back from scraping barnacles in New Bern earlier than anticipated and wondered if I wanted to join him for a ride around noon. I didn't want to wait four hours to ride, thought it over, and made a decision.

I called Dave, and told him he would have to lead because my legs were hurtin' from Saturday (which was perfectly true) and that I didn't think I could more than 40 miles or so. Appointment made.

Then I got the bike and me ready, and rode to meet up with the Gyros Touring Ride, led by Mike D. Mike rides with the "A"'s, but certainly puts his ego in his back pocket when leading / instructing / advising the Tourist ride, so I have done that ride twice before Sunday. Talked with Mike as we pedaled on Pleasant Union Ch Rd, told him I would join the ride, but would do MVC & Old Creedmoor to Carpenter Pond rather than Melvin Arnold and Shooting Club & Old Creedmoor to Carpenter Pond in order to avoid those extra hills while I tried to warm up my very tired legs.

By making that diversion, I was the only one in that Tourist ride other than Mike that had done any pulling as - from what I can tell - everyone always sits in for the initial stages, so somewhere on Carpenter Pond, I went up to pull for a mile or two and give Mike a break. Blah, blah, blah. Nearing the end of the Tourist ride, two other guys (one a 12-year-old weighing 70 lbs. that lives on Gela Rd, which is about 40 miles into the Virginia Border Raid route) and I rode Kemp pretty hard (but I was spinning "hard" because I needed legs for later). 12-year-old Tim left me far behind on the final Kemp climb up to Carpenter Pond.

I left the Tourist ride @ PUE after 35.8 miles @ an average 15.9 mph @ approx 11:10 am.

I had some food and drinks in the car; enough to make a decent lunch. Re-prepped bike, and went to sit on the curb in the sunshine. I think I was almost dozing sitting with my arms around my knees when Dave arrived at approx 11:50 am. We immediately started looping the lake (with an extra small loop to be added to get to 40 miles).

Dave was doing the pace-setting, at just the perfect warm-up pace that I usually like at the beginning of a ride. I was trying to stay behind and out of the wind, but unless we had ridden eschelon formation we were doomed to each of us having to cut a fresh path through the air for much of the distance on Carpenter Pond. Luckily, there are quite a few trees to break the wind, and the general slope from MVC to Kemp helps protect one from a SSW wind. It was much welcome to each of us when we got to DocNichols, OliveBranch, and Patterson.

We paused at that church near the Patterson / Cheek corner, and I told Dave that I felt bad about fibbing to him, and told him I was at PUE when I got his message and called him and . . . "Did you ride this morning?"

"Yes, but I wasn't going to tell you if I was riding poorly. But since I am still riding reasonably well, I decided to tell you now."

We were averaging 16.0 when we turned from Cash onto OldWeaverTrail headed for NewLight. By the time we got to NewLight, my avg was down to 15.7.

Interestingly, Ghoston, Peed, and MVC took almost nothing more out of us and I finished the 40.1 miles averaging 15.6 mph. Even more interesing is that my speed on the steep of Peed never fell below 8 (and some tenths - which I couldn't read) mph. As I told Dave when I caught back up to him on the Peed false flat, I can't remember the last time, other than my single speed incident, that my speed on Peed hasn't gone below 8 or even below 7 mph.

Perhaps with the legs being tired, I was forced to properly pull up and over on the pedals without recourse to stomping. Or maybe, the legs were too tired to notice any additional pain / effort, so I could just keep the cadence and keep going.

My legs, especially my right leg, feels better today than at any time the entire previous week. Maybe the muscle bands (that give me the troubles) hadn't been exercised enough and had been tightening up from non-use.