Saturday, June 12 rides

[e.e.cummings]

Ds was on a playdate from 9am so dh and I took off for one of our rare rides together - took the Estacade (a car-free ice breaker bridge that leads to an 11 km car-free cycling route) which I had never tried before. The day turned out to be beautiful. Could not take our planned bridge back, it was closed, so we had to take a bridge that put us right into the crowd returning from the Formula One Grand Prix qualifications. The bike path was absolutely packed with Ferrari t-shirts (not hard to tell who the majority is rooting for). Got past the crowd, had a nice return home, just in time to pick up our son. Did about 70 km total, steady riding, not much resting - wish we could have had a little coffee break, but with that bridge closed, we needed to make it home on time.

Gorgeous day today, but this is a recovery day from yesterday, a week of commuting, and some heavy yoga sessions. Time to regroup. Going to the library, going to Lulu Lemon, relax and watch the race on tv (dh is a big fan, he used to be a flagger on that track in his younger days). Hope you are having a good weekend, ladies!

[Blue_Fedora]

DH and I set off yesterday on a ride we've been wanting to check out for quite a while now. We're in Southern California and headed out the westbound 126 into the town of Fillmore. Beautiful weather (started in the low 60's - 6:45am - and peaked around 90) with gorgeous sunny skies. A total of 58.5 miles with lots of rolling hills.

All-around, he's a much stronger rider than I am but he noticed how I've picked up a few mph since getting a new road bike a few weeks ago and consistently going out on group rides. Last weekend was my first half-century so at 58.5 this was my longest ride ever.

I was trying out a new saddle and shorts... not a good thing on a long-for-me ride. I believe the Canari G2 Vortex shorts were a size too big and as much as I was hoping it would be, the Terry Damselfly saddle is not a winner for me 24hrs later, parts of the girly-bits are still numb. Back to the saddle search!

[Thorn]

Finally managed to get to a Waterford factory ride. It has taken us 3 years of plotting to get there--if we haven't been busy, the rain has fallen. Rain was predicted the night before but we woke up to only a 20% chance.

So, off we rode the 25 miles to the plant in a moderate fog. The ride was supposed to be 50 miles so a century day was in the works...well, sort of.

The Waterford factory puts on a couple of rides every year. One of the local bike clubs hosts for the ride insurance. The factory gives a tour where you get to see all of the pretty bikes, both nekkid and painted versions, and Richard Schwinn provides awesome roadside SAG service from the back of his car.

The 50 mile route was bumped up to 60 miles and rerouted away from the flat farmland the area is known for and up and over every hill in the neighborhood including a gruesome 15% grade. Given that we started out way too hard, we clipped the final leg and headed home, getting in a too quick 93 miles for the day.

But, it was fun. I'd guess about 100 riders with maybe 1/2 riding Waterfords. Some really pretty machines that made my beauty almost, but not quite, look plain.

[rain]

I rode ~30 miles on beach drive, MD. I got there at 7 am with some hesitation thinking there'd be only a few folks out only to discover I could have gotten there at 6 and probably still had company next time I will!

[NbyNW]

Finally some nice weather! About 24 miles out and back through the river valley. This place has finally thawed out.

[HoosierGiant]

100 miles / 7,000 feet of climb. Except for the fact that it rained the first 30 miles, the sun never came out, and the temp never made it above 63 degrees, it was an AWESOME ride!

[Owlie]

I made a couple of nutrition mistakes Saturday morning that killed me: I ran out of milk (so no cereal ), so I had a yogurt. I also put grape gatorade in one of my bottles. It wasn't hot, maybe high 60s or low 70s, but horribly humid. I had to pull over for a while to keep from throwing up. I had a time limit as one of my friends was picking me up for a little trip to Pittsburgh, but I still got around 8 miles in with hills. I improved my average speed too.