Cafe Cruising

No Kevin or Bruce to play with this weekend, but my new singe-speed commuter from Nashbar arrived, so I put it together and MC and I headed out for a cruise down Terry Hershey to the coffee shop on Eldridge.
The new bike is very different to the old commuter, for one thing it's a lot lighter, and has a smaller chain ring so spinning is a necessity. It also has cyclo-cross style brakes mounted on the flat part of the handlebars, very convenient when you're used to them. When you're not, it gets a little exciting when you have to stop in a hurry and reach for non-existent brake levers.

MC hasn't been on her bike for a while but she got back into it pretty quick and we cruised along in fine style, until it started raining that is. Fortunately it was just a brief shower and the sky cleared up pretty quickly, giving us a beautiful afternoon for a ride.

We used to do this ride when she was in high school, many many years ago. Back then you had to off-road a bit to get from the trail to the coffee shop, which was interesting when it was muddy, as MC reminded me. Now they've put in a separate bridge across the Bayou and a sidewalk all the way.

Dad-Daughter Selfie!

The coffee shop has changed too. It now features a surprisingly good selection of local craft beer, including Rodeo Clown! It also appears to have become a little outpost of hipster-dom in the middle of suburbia. Where do these people come from.

Back at it for a very pleasant run home. Overall I like the new bike, it's certainly very sleek-looking, but the new riding position may take a bit of acclimatization, and the saddle doesn't appear to like me. Susan suggested getting a pro bike fit, which makes sense, except that the bike shop would charge $250, barely less than the bike cost. The commute ride isn't exactly a physical challenge so I think it will work out fine as it is.

A very pleasant interlude in my otherwise gruelling training regime, thanks for coming with MC!

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Friends don't let friends -

Whitey McWhite-Biker

what?  Drive drunk?  Vote Republican?  Ride into a screaming wind without doing all the pulling?  Actually, all of the above, but also - clap on 1 or 3.  This bit of advice was the latest offering in an infrequent series of classes on musical theory, offered by Prof.K.Crotty while flying down the freeway on the way to a bike ride.  Apparently in 4/4 time, the beat is on 2 and 4, so if you clap on 1 or 3 you will feel somewhat foolish.  To be honest the musicians I listen to mostly tend to avoid 4/4 time, or any very obvious time signature at all, but good information nonetheless.

So it was off to Wallis, Tx for the Independence Ride, a charity event supporting Disabled Vets, some of whom rode sections of the route on various modified bikes.  Paddy was there, driving SAG in his Mules-themed pickup, and we saw some other Mules too (all of the speedy variety!).

The ride started and finished at the Wallis Knights of Columbus hall, an impressive building given the size of the city (population 1,250 on the 2010 census).  For once there was no line for the indoor flush toilets, that tells you something.

Another beautiful morning in southeast Texas, although we natives were shivering a bit (mid 40's when we started!), so we were glad to get going.  We'd arrived a bit late, which meant we started with the Fanny Pack set (as opposed to the Shaved Leg set, not that we're natural members of that group either), and spent a lot of time passing people on mountain bikes wearing sneakers and anoraks.  There was a pretty sharp head wind for the first several miles, which sorted the men from the boys a bit too.

The first 15 miles or so was on roads that we had seen before, but once past Brookshire and into Pattison it was terra incognita for both of us.  We turned due west on FM1458 and immediately had a screaming tail wind.  Together with a warming, sunny morning and mostly smooth roads, this was cycling paradise and we scorched along at over 20 mph for a good 8 miles.

We crossed the Brazos near Stephen F. Austin state park (a good place to go camping!) and rode through San Felipe, the capital of the original Austin colony and a very historic site for Texans.  There was a rest stop right by the freeway and it was a good time for a break.  I took the opportunity to peel off all my cool weather gear and eat some trail mix before we headed out for the last leg, a 13 mile pull due south.

This section was pretty tough for me.  The road surface was poor and that tends to wear you down, and I was tired from the heroics earlier in the ride.  A cross-wind is almost worse than a head-wind, because it's hard to draft.  There were a few rollers to negotiate too!  So I was very glad to see the final turn coming up, not so happy though to see ambulances and fire engines, with what appeared to be a Life Flight helicopter landing.  Apparently a rider had gone down pretty hard, but we didn't find out what had happened.

Across the finish line to rapturous applause from a couple of young volunteers and then back to the car to change out of our shoes and sweaty gear, before heading back to the hall for some food.  Sadly the fare wasn't quite as good as last week's - seriously overcooked chicken, baked beans and potato salad, dirty white bread and only nasty mass-market beer.  A few minutes into lunch, a heavy metal band started up, which was the end of conversation, so we left, turning down the opportunity to buy raffle tickets (first prize - a glock, second - $300) as we did.

After a nap and an early beer we decided to check out the Unitunes offering that evening, and were very glad we did!  Unitunes is a series of concerts in Emerson Unitarian church, run by Kevin and a few of his friends.  The show was excellent (Bob Livingston and Bradley Kopp) and I managed to (mostly) hit the 2 and 4, so that lesson was learned.

Breaker one-nine (crackle)

apparently this is as much of a smile as you get from Bruce

My 2015 MS150 training campaign kicked off yesterday at the Kiwanis Sealy Fall Classic, an organized ride that starts in Sealy and follows some of the "Alpe de Sealy" route but doesn't actually cross the alps.

I haven't been out with Kevin for a couple of weeks - he was away on his annual, boys-only fishing trip to Idaho and then had friends visiting - but I got rides in regardless, none of them blog-worthy. He showed up with his "Mountain Man" beard still intact (you don't shave when you're on a river in Idaho, the fish don't like clean chins) but I imagine Barbara may have a word or two to say if it lingers.

One of my rides sans domestique was with Bruce, a colleague who is an avid water-sports guy (sailing, kayaking, surfing, if it involves water he's there). He bought a decent bike and wants to get into roadie-ing, but he lives on Galveston Bay and the roads (and drivers) are not welcoming, so he came out with me for the Parks loop and enjoyed it enough to come along today as well. Unfortunately he had to drive 83 miles in each direction for today's 46 mile bike ride, but as he says, it's Texas, you drive three hours for a bad meal.

So off we go, on a terrific morning, cool, sunny and perfect for cycling. Bruce (who is 42 years old in hexadecimal) can maintain a pretty good pace on the flat but struggles on anything that looks like a climb, and we realized pretty quickly that we would be waiting for him at the crest of every climb, but that's fine, it's early season and good just to get miles in.

About an hour in, Kevin confided that he had lost faith in the structural integrity of the Mexican Truck (or in his words "it scares me"), after inspection of the seat tube had revealed very little actual intact metal. He needs a commuter, and hasn't ruled out the possibility of another long-distance run (see "The Little Mexican Truck that could" on this blog), so is looking at a Surly Long-Distance Trucker bike (I kid you not) as a replacement. I was very tickled at the thought of Kevin the Long-distance Trucker, perhaps taking a bit part in "Convoy", the 1978 Sam Peckinpah movie inspired by C.W.McCall's 1976 ode to truckers and CB radio. Turns out that Kevin was working as a mud-logger during the CB craze and had one in his car! "Convoy" the country song was a decent hit in the UK too, and started a mini-CB frenzy there. Several of my friends installed sets in their Ford Escorts and drove around Salisbury and environs firing off CB-lingo to each other in broad Wiltshire accents. They all had handles, on-air pseudonyms inspired by "Convoy" and also arguably needed because using a CB radio in Engalnd was illegal at the time. I doubt the "Flying Squad" paid much attention to a bunch of young men who used their radios mainy to agree on which pub to go to next, but you don't know.

So what was Kevin's handle, back in his mud-logging days? Apparently he didn't really understand the concept and used a name from a Jack London novel, via a humorous radio show - Rita B. Not as much fun as "Pigpen" or "Rubber Duck" but there you go.

We rolled on, all together on the flats, minus one on the climbs, stopping at each break point for pie and a pee. I stuck with the latter as I'm not a big fan of the pies they have here, the British ones are far superior - in other words, bye-bye American Pie.

The route merged on to our normal track a few miles before the lair of the devil dog whose "silent approach" attack has come close to taking one or both of us down in the past. We got ready for a sprint as we turned the corner in front of his home but he was not to be seen, presumably either chained-up or dead.

On to Cat Spring road and the last section of the ride. Although the route doesn't go through the "Alpe de Sealy" section, it has some similar, if moderated, topography, and we took the opportunity to show Bruce how to deal with rollers. He didn't really get it though - may take a few more lessons.
We stopped at the final break point (on this route it's also the first) to regroup and for more pie (no thanks). I was actually feeling pretty good and felt comfortable all the way in, perhaps in part because Bruce was feeling the miles (this was his longest ride) and we had to keep the pace down.

This ride has excellent food and decent beer at the finish and we felt like we'd earned it. Home-made meatballs, brisket and chilli, an excellent selection of what appeared to be locally-made sausage and of course pie. We washed it down with St.Arnold's beer and a few tales of derring-do on various rivers. On to the next -

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No thanks, I brought my own

The great spoke-breaking mystery has been solved and there was a surprise ending!  Ardent fans of this blog know that Kevin has been plagued with broken spokes of late, and that the bike shop had the gall to suggest he had accidentally weakened them by proximity to noxious chemicals in his garage.  How dare you, sir?  Well it turns out that they were correct, sort of.  When he took it in for repair last time, they discovered a few other areas with unusual levels of corrosion for a new bike and concluded that Kevin suffered from a little-known but serious condition called the "death sweats".  Essentially his perspiration is so copious and saline that it had corroded not only his spokes but also part of the brake mechanism and a cable housing!  The solution to his acidic solution?  Wipe the damn bike down after the ride.  I was a little skeptical - how many miles did he have on the Mexican Truck, after all - but actually all that's holding it together at the moment is rust and rustoleum so maybe it's not such a leap.  Hopefully now he will always ride a clean bike and never break a spoke again, unless of course I spoke too soon....

Rocky Mountain High

So off we go, bicycle, wheelchair and all, to Denver and then Fort Collins for the MS Society 2014 Tour of Champions! We were flying the Peanut (aka Southwest) and that part went fine as usual, other than a 90 minute weather delay (pissing with rain in Houston). Our son James works at the airport and was good enough to greet us on the jetway and then escort us to to ground transportation. Unfortunately the bus transfer to Fort Collins wasn't quite so pleasant. Our driver appeared to be Matt Groening's inspiration for Otto, the school bus driver in The Simpsons, and the A/C on his bus (a 20-plus year old former Denver RTA vehicle) only worked in the front half. Susan was in the wheelchair area and was able to enjoy the ride in relative comfort, while I was in steerage with the peons, sweating my butt off. Fortunately my seat mates were a group from Dallas who were seeing the bright side and having fun.

All the way from Denver to Fort Collins I couldn't help noticing these bumps on the horizon to the west. Maybe they're cloud formations, or dust storms? Don't tell me that there are actual topographic features out here? I don't think we're in Texas any more, Toto....

I was planning to ride on Friday (the easier route) and take Susan, James and Sarah his girlfriend sightseeing in Rocky Mountain National Park on Saturday, but when we woke up, neither of us felt very good. Turns out altitude sickness actually is a thing, and it made poor Susan feel terrible all day. I was lucky enough to get off with a mild headache but I wasn't in mountain-riding shape for sure.
By the evening we both felt well enough to emerge from the hotel room for dinner, and James drove up from Aurora to join us, which made it more fun. We agreed on plan B - scratch the mountain sight-seeing (if we struggled at the Fort Collins altitude, crossing the Continental Divide was probably not a good idea), I would ride the Friday route and the rest of the crew would investigate Fort Collins, definitely a fun little town.

So after a suitably high-calorie mountain climbing breakfast I left Susan in the safe hands of James and Sarah, tooled up and pushed my bike out into a gorgeous, cool and sunny morning. The ToC rides are fully supported, with SAG wagons patrolling the course and frequent rest stops, but I was riding the Friday route on Saturday and wouldn't get those benefits. Whatever, I planned to take it easy and stop whenever I felt like it anyway.

I had the route loaded on my GPS but at first I couldn't find the start. The finish was in plain view and I toyed with the idea of riding it in reverse, but then had the sense to look at the map on the website and worked out where I'd gone wrong. Off I went, having wasted about 15 minutes riding around the campus of Colorado State University (very nice too!).

The first few miles were through the outskirts of the city, with some gentle rollers to get my legs warmed up. Then came a long section due north that went past some of the university buildings, including the usual impressive stadium. This leg had some bigger rollers but my workouts with Kevin got me through in good shape.

And then...I turned west and immediately hit some stiffish climbs with no real downhill breaks. I was starting to blow a bit when I came to the one big climb of the day - an 8.8% slope with a couple of curves. I dropped into my granny ring, turned on my helmet camera and dug deep. I was on the granny gear pretty quickly and then out of the saddle, grinding hard, but I made it! At the crest I stopped to admire the view, which was worth the climb - a beautiful, narrow valley stretched out in front of me, much greener than the surrounding hills which looked pretty dry.

Time for the descent, but there was a 90 degree right-hander within a few hundred feet so I couldn't let her go. Once round the corner I let off the brakes and got a pretty good head of steam running until it was time to brake for a junction. The valley was a cyclist's dream - quiet, smooth roads, lovely scenery and lots of shade trees - but it didn't last very long. The route turned east, away from the mountains and back into flat lands not very different to Waller County.

Still a few decent rollers to negotiate though! The biggest climb left was long enough to force me back into the granny gear, and to my shame right after the crest I was passed by a couple on a tandem with a baby at the back, all three looking like they were barely breathing hard. Locals of course.
Back in the outskirts of Fort Collins, I detected a familiar smell from my childhood - the slightly sickly odor of a brewery. Sure enough, there was the New Belgium Brewery, famous for its Fat Tire ale (not actually one of my favourites though). Somewhere around here the route moved onto bike paths that didn't show up on the GPS and I was lost once more. I hit a busy intersection with College Street and worked out that if I headed south on it I should hit the university, which was pretty close to the hotel. Sure enough I was in familiar territory after a mile or so, and rolled up to the hotel in good time for lunch. My ride was a few miles shorter than the planned route but who's counting anyway.

After an excellent lunch at a real hipster hangout with superb beer, I was ready for a nap! The rest of the weekend was lots of fun, with a great party that evening. Many thanks to the MS Society for giving me a chance to ride in a very beautiful spot, and for treating both of us like royalty.

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"The hills are alive, with the sound of whining"

 

Last chance for a weekend ride before the Colorado trip (still two weeks out, but the bikes are being trucked from Houston and have to be dropped off this week) and I was bold enough to suggest a hillier route option. Kevin of course was all over ths idea and proposed a combination route that included the worst sections of two tough rides - the dreaded Alpe de Sealy and the tougher option of the Pattison-Bellville run. Thanks buddy, I knew I could count on you.

So it was off to Bellville on a misty Saturday morning. There's a Valero station on the main drag in town where we usually stop for water and micturation, but it seemed anti-social to park up there and be gone for several hours, so we drove a bit further into the town proper. A Farmer's Market was setting up in the town square, so we turned down a side street and ended up outside the Bellville PD. Afficianados of the blog may recall the time when we had a brush with Bellville's finest in the form of Sheriff Buford T.Justice, who didn't take any too kindly to a bunch of city slickers on bikes wearing homosexual shorts and blocking the back road into his city. He gave Larry a stern warning out of the window of his cruiser before roaring off to the Snowflake Donut shop. This later led to a massed sprint for the Brazos River and the County line, as we tried to get out of his jurisdiction before the donut shop closed.

We geared up and lit out for the hills. Kevin's plan was to ride a loop of 529 and Coshatte road and then see how we felt. This means nothing to you unles you frequent the byways of Austin County, but it means taking on the rollers between the Brazos and Bellville out and back. Although both legs cross roughly the same terrain, 529 has road cuts taming the worst of the grades, Coshatte (a quiet, country road) does not and you can really feel the difference.

The fog hadn't really lifted and 529 is a moderately busy road, but fortunately there wasn't much traffic yet. We started out aiming to warm up at around 15mph on the flats, taking the descent and ascents as they came. At the turn I was feeling warmed up for sure and getting a bit concerned about the delights ahead - Coshatte and then Alpe de Sealy!

On Coshatte Kevin offered some coaching tips for the rollers - basically coast down the drops to get your heart rate down fter the previous climb, then start working with a high cadence as the climb bites and try to hold the cadence all the way to the top by down-shifting. I got the hang of it and was able to keep pace with him on all except the longest climbs, where I ran out of gears and had to grind out the last few yards. The final two before Bellville were the toughest and I was glad to reach the rail tracks that mark the western edge of the route.

Rather than ride into town, we crossed route 36 right there and hit a Shell station for a break. We were at about 15 miles and I was pretty tired already. At that point we had lots of route options including the original plan, but I didn't have the legs for Sealy and proposed that we ride the same loop in reverse. This would give us a total of 30 miles, not much saddle time for Kevin after driving all this way, and I felt a bit guilty about that but he was a good sport and agreed.

Back at it and all those climbs! Kevin's technique and guidance saved the day (on several climbs he actually called out the gear changes for me!) and we got to the turn for 529 without a coronary. To boost the miles a bit we turned down the road that connects the Sealy/Pattison routes, but there wasn't much too see and it was odd to ride on the flat after climbing so much, so we turned back.

What should have been a challenging but straightforward run back on 529 (part of the MS150 route so I've done it at least 12 times!) became more of a challenge when once again Kevin broke a spoke, on his front wheel this time. What is going on there? The bike shop thinks the spokes are being corroded by something toxic in his garage, but Kevin is a Unitarian and apologises to weeds when he pulls them, so that seems unlikely. He's concerned that he's pushing the weight rating but I don't see that, those wheels should be strong enough. I suspect he has a pair of badly-built wheels that need replacing, perhaps with some Zipps for bling?

The wheel was already slightly out of true so he decides to ride in at 13mph in the hope that the inevitable bumps will be less likely to taco the wheel at that speed. I roll out the descents but hold back on the climbs (where of course he passes!) and we make it in with no more drama. A quick chocolate milk outside the Cop Shop (pretty risky, Bellville probably has a city ordinance about men wearing shorts drinking milk in public) and then back home.

No training ride for me next week (Kevin offered to lend me the truck, but I refused politely), but we might take our b-bikes (my single speed, his truck) down the bayou trail he likes, just to keep in shape and look for birds.

 

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"To infinity - and beyond!"

Off to Zube at zero dark thirty for my first ride with the Mules in quite a while. Unfortunately it didn't go very well - Gene is a miserable git who dropped me like a bad habit after about a mile on the road, and Yvonne spent the rest of the ride grumbling about having to hang back with the losers. Neither of them could organize a piss-up in a brewery and I'm never ever ever getting back together with them again.

Just kidding! Actually they were both great and we had a lot of fun. With plenty of Mules in attendance, Gene wanted to have two speed groups, one at 17mph and the other "at infinity" as he put it. Looked like the only taker for the finite group was me, as the group settled into a pretty hot pace almost immediately.

It was foggy for most of the ride and that kept the temperature on the cool side. We headed north on Hegar, the new (to me anyway) route that apparently has become the standard. I hung on but about five miles in I told Kevin that I couldn't ride the full route at that pace, and suggested we break off on a slightly shorter route. He went forward to catch the rapidly disappearing peloton but Yvonne, in her role as sweeper, had already dropped back to check on me. We were too far along to turn back for my detour so we slogged on, just the three of us. A little further ahead we passed Gene who was waiting for us as well. Good to know that some of the Mules take the term "no-drop ride" seriously.

As ever Kevin did sterling work on the front, occasionally helped out by the other two as they nursed me to the break point. With the gas station in sight, Yvonne and Gene took off for a sprint, but we soon caught Gene who flatted and had to carry it in the last 50 yards.

The flat turned out to be a tear in the tyre, so Gene opted for the short route back, music to my ears after the 17+ pace so far. The speedsters wanted more miles so it was just the four of us on the way back, with Bob who gamely agreed to come along just in case.

I seemed to get a second wind, rolling fairly happily at the pace that had been hurting before the break, but as ever I was very happy to grab a wheel - Bob's for the first stretch, Kevin's for the rest. With about five miles to go we regrouped at a busy intersection, where Kevin's bike began to make a very ominous noise. Sure enough he'd broken a spoke. He took out the hub end and the stump didn't hit the stays, so it looked like he could ride it in if he was careful. The others headed out at the same pace as before while Kevin and I cruised in - except that Kevin doesn't have a cruising gear and pretty soon we were back at 18mph.

We barely made it back to Zube - Kevin's wheel was already starting to hit the brake pads, another few miles would have taco'ed it for sure. In the end we rode about 35 and I felt pretty good, presumably due to the cooler weather. But with less than a month to go until the Colorado trip, we'll need a run out to Chapel Hill or I'll be sagging all the way.

 

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