Jun-30: IR Youngsville-Franklinton Tour

This past Tuesday and Wednesday would have been great weather days for a double-double, a 2 x 200, back-to-back 200-km permanents.  I didn't do that.

Thursday would have been a great weather day for a 100-km permanent-populaire, and a pretty darn good day the last day of a triple-double, a 3 x 200, back-to-back-to-back permanents.  I didn't do that, either.

I did do an "errand ride" on Thursday afternoon.  2 errands -- 1 ride.  The heat was okay.  The debilitating stuff didn't arrive until Friday here.

By the way, before I go on, I was reminded, during that errand-ride, why I don't like riding in the city:  too ... many ... darn ... stop ... signs ... and ... stop ... lights.
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The heat wave, 105F for the high on Friday, 104F today, put paid to the fantasy of a 5 x 200 extravaganza. 5 x 100 might have still been doable -- but it didn't "grab me".

What to do?

When Irregular friend Paul "the Mallet" posted for a 6 am start for a tour of Youngsville and Franklinton, I concluded that riding with people, and being done with the core of the ride by 0900 or 0930 seemed a really good idea.  That's what I did.

Map of today's core route:


With one person off doing a brevet (registered for the 600 -- in this heat, I'm hoping he traded-down to a shorter ride), three lying low because they plan to do some mountains tomorrow or Monday, will still had a nice-sized group of seven for the start.  Mallet, BobH, LT, Red Rocket, me, JohnD and CathyD (John's better half).
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The closest we came to drama on the ride today were:

• LT apparently dropped a bottle in or just east of Youngsville, 
• Mallet thought I was going off-the-cues when I turned onto Cedar Creek Rd on the east edge of Y'ville, 
• the Mallet and everyone (except me) did actually go off cue, missing the turn onto College St., in Franklinton.  

There wasn't much interest in county line sprints today, even though a couple of us made faux dashes a couple times. 

There is not a single bad surface on any road of this course (other than possibly in or just east of Youngsville).  I do recall some resurfacing from a few years ago -- pre-obamulation time-period.

LT noticed the llamas at a particular corner during the return from Franklinton.  He was convinced that he'd never ridden the cross road at that corner -- Long Mill Rd.  I assured him that he had (this is just ONE example).

Red Rider Lee seemed to undertake a break-away action early on Bruce Garner Rd.  The rest of us gave him some rope, then closed that down.

That's about it, really.  We did break into two parts on Bruce Garner Rd.  John + Cathy and I finished the route at about 0915.  The others probably finished around 0900.  Mallet's time objectives were clearly achieved.

This is clearly self-serving, but ... :  somewhere on New Light Rd (or perhaps later) Cathy remarked that she had really enjoyed the course.  Nice roads; low traffic; stuff she had never seen before.  [Thanks, Cathy.  I try.]

All-in-all:  nice ride on excellent roads with pleasant company.  And we finished well before the HEAT of the day.
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Jun-30:  

 --> PUE:  Cedar Creek Cruise, aka, Youngsville-Franklinton Tour --> ; 70.9 m.; est. 4h43 in-motion; 15.0 mph.  [I have been doing some serious puzting it in on the "commutes back".  LOL.] 

Q-1 tot: _22 rides; 1,610.3 m.; 108 h, 42 m; 14.8 mph. 

A-M tot: _20 rides; 1,701.6 m.; 115 h, 24 m; 14.7 mph. 

Jun tot: __9 rides; 1,009.9 m.; _67 h, 11 m; 15.0 mph. 

YTD tot: _51 rides; 4,321.8 m.; 291 h, 29 m; 14.8 mph. 

For comparison's sake only, here is the YTD for Jun-30-2011: 
YTD tot: _53 rides; _4427.1 m.; 297 h, 27 m; 14.9 mph.  
By Jun-30-2011, I had  4,060  RUSA credit kms. 
This year: ________ 4,647  RUSA credit kms. 
The Jun-30 results seem quite similar. 

However, last year, on Jul-02/03/04, I rode  408.6-miles for  616 RUSA credit kms. 
THAT is quite unlikely, extremely unlikely, to re-occur this year.