Middle of the Pack

 

Central Jersey Weather

19 May 2024

What prompted me to catch up on bike blogging is that Janice has lost her hands. More about that later.

This spring has been all about trying to keep bike-fit while having neither the time nor the weather to do it properly. I've spent more hours on Rouvy than usual, climbing double-digit European hills at single-digit speeds. I've gone on short, late-afternoon, steel bike rides after 5 hours of morning glassblowing. I've led a handful of hilly Saturday rides, tossing in at least one unnecessarily steep incline each time. I've managed to get to most of the Wedsnesday Premed rides that haven't been rained out. I've been able to haul Miss Piggy to work at least once per week since March; I actually got 3 in last week. Between Rouvy and commuting and outdoor rides, I've cobbled together back-to-back-to-back-to-back days of doing something. But has it been enough to keep me in good enough shape to do two real rides in a row?

Never a B rider in the hills, I've always listed my rides as B to allow for the pace we'd reach on flat stretches. On a fast day, we'd average somewhere in the mid-14s. That's C+. This year, I decided to list my rides as C+. I get the same people, more or less, but I feel more relaxed. On my rides and with the Premeds, I'm in the middle of the pack, which is a comfortable place to be. Convinced that 14 lost Sundays have done me no good, I take the hills as if I'm on Rouvy: by myself.  The new stem adjustment seems to have put me in a good position for climbing.

I haven't taken many pictures this year. Here's what I found on my camera, dating back to March:

Pete G led an invite-only ride on a Friday morning in late March. I have vacation days to burn, so I took one. We stopped at Twin Pines for a kidney break. The soccer goals were stacked at the near end of the field.

Pete took us through neighborhoods and pedestrian paths I did not know existed. We took a short break at Mountain Lakes in Princeton.

I have this photo of a bird's nest in a budding tree from March 30. 

That would have been a Saturday. The club calendar says I led a ride that day. Maybe it's the time we went to Sergeantsville and I hauled everyone up Mine Road again because I'm an asshole.

Then we had the eclipse on April 8. On April 14, I woke up early enough to see the sun rising between the trees in our neighborhood. I stuck the sun filter on my camera and snapped a few pictures through the bedroom window.

So much for that experiment.

Then there was the April 24 Premed ride. I made two unforgiveable errors on that ride: I took some pictures, and I stopped to pee. There's no time for either of those things on a Premed ride.

In my defense, a lot of people had their phones out at the intersection of Van Sant and Pidcock Creek. My mistake was putting my phone back in its bag (if I'd had my camera, this would not have been an issue). I got left behind.

I caught up easily enough, and told the leader I needed to find a tree. I got dropped again. Fortunately, the group had stopped around the corner to intiate some new riders into the kiss-the-cows tradition started years ago by Bob and Norene. One doesn't actually kiss these cows; one feeds them grass from our side of the fence. 

I've since retrained myself to arrive at the Premed ride dehydrated.

Four Saturdays ago, I canceled a Lambertville to Flemington ride an hour before the start because of rain. Three people showed up anyway and did the ride. I'm grateful for this, because Brad reported back that the roads were good and the rest stop worthy.

Two Saturdays ago, I tried again. I like the roads on the ridge between Lambertville and Flemington because of their names. Whenever I'm leading, I aim to get to at least one goofy intersection. It's disappointing that "Rake Factory" has been shortened to "Rake." Nevertheless, Goose Island remains. There is no island and there are no geese on this road,

This was a day with little chance of rain in the morning forecast. As we rode along the ridge, I kept an eye on the clouds, not because I thought we'd get wet, but because they looked like a puffy blanket.

Most of the climbing was before the break. Factory Fuel having gone the way of most of our favorite rest stops, we tried Bread and Culture at the corner of Main and Mine. Brad had warned me that their pastries were gigantic. They were so large that some of our riders took pictures. There was a sandwich that was nearly a foot-wide round loaf of bread cut in half and stuffed with meat. I chose a sourdough cookie, two thirds of which I wrapped up and put in my pocket for later. Martin, meanwhile, staying with our bikes around the back, managed to befriend the owner, who is himself a cyclist. "Did you ask him to put up a bike rack?" we asked. He hadn't. 

Our two steepest climbs were close together as we left Flemington. The caffeine and sugar helped.

We were rolling along the ridge, somewhere above Frenchtown on Route 519, when we felt the first raindrops. By the time we got down to Lower Creek Road, it was full-on raining. Lower Creek is beautiful, even in the rain. I was nervous leading the group down Route 29 between Stockton and Lambertivlle, but we all made it back alive. Next time I lead this ride, we'll leave from Stockton.

Last Saturday it was Tom's turn to lead. He took us from Bordentown to Vincentown. The day started out partly sunny (I slept through the aurora, damnit) and clouded over by the end of the ride.

Naturally, we had to walk across a bridge that was under construction.

My back started to hurt towards the end of the ride. This was the first truly flat ride I'd been on in months. My position is different when I'm in the big ring and trying to go faster. I also had less sleep than I needed, which always makes things worse. Now I'm not so sure I'll be able to do a flat century without having to stop to stretch at regular intervals. I've stepped up my PT again. Tight hamstrings pull on my bad disc.

It rained the next day, making this the 15th Sunday in a row without a real ride. I hopped onto Rouvy, which served up some hilly Italian nonsense with a few double-digit climbs. I've spent so much time on Rowlf this winter that the gears are starting to slip already. I've pinged Plain Jim, fresh back from bike mechanic certification.

Speaking of Plain Jim, I did his ride today, breaking the Sunday absences, finally. But before I get to that, I need to describe Marty and Bobbi's Hill Slug ride yesterday.

I didn't feel like leading. The forecast had been on the cusp of iffy all week. When Marty listed a last-minute Sourlands ride out of Hopewell for 8:30 a.m. Saturday, I signed up. The ride filled shortly after that. I made sure to get plenty of sleep.

The route was 48 miles with something more than 50 feet per mile. There weren't any truly obnoxious ascents in there, just a lot of them. Having adapted the route from Tom, who adapted it from me for his book, Marty's roads were all familiar ones. 

We looped southwest out of Hopwell and got stuck at the intersection of Main and Delaware as a  Pennington Day foot race came through. I steered the group out of the morass, using my usual Tree Farm Road detour that was new to Marty. He and Bobbi decided they like that way better. There's less traffic.

We climbed Woosamonsa, and got ourselves over to Goat Hill. I was in the middle of the pack, doing my own thing. I got to the top thinking that the climb wasn't really that bad. This is what the right amount of sleep and the right attitude gets me. 

Unfortunately, it was also raining. It's been so wet around here that I watched raindrops hit a puddle that has clearly been around for a while, as Bobbi and Marty decided whether or not to cut the ride short. The road was wet.

They decided to cut the ride short. I was fine with that, having been caught in the rain once already this week during a commute home from work. "No need to be a hero," I said.

One rider replied, curtly, "Everyone can make their own decision." I took this as a retort to me, and it's been rattling around in my head all weekend. This rider continued along the planned route, along with two others.

The rest of us headed for Route 518. The rain petered out. When we got to Route 579, I suggested we could go south and back up Woosamonsa, retracing our steps, adding elevation, and getting us off the busy roads. Everyone was on board with that, save for the two fastest riders, who decided enough was enough and stuck with 518.

We got separated at the end of Woosamonsa, when I saw what I thought was Marty (it wasn't) signaling a turn onto Burd. I was in the middle of the front pack then. We turned, and, when Marty and Bobbi didn't show up at the end of Burd, I called Bobbi. She'd gone straight, realized she was making a bee-line for Route 31, and turned around. A few minutes later, we were back together again and heading for Pennington. In all this time, there was only a smattering of drizzle.

In the end, we had almost 40 miles and 50 feet per mile, a good enough distance with a typical Hill Slug ratio. I drove home in real rain. Later that afternoon, I learned from Bobbi that the three full-mileage folks had made it back dry. I regretted my choice to bail. On the other hand, I wasn't nearly as tired as I thought I ought to be.

Again, I got enough sleep and felt pretty good as I drove up to Jim's ride. 

I was setting up Janice when I noticed that both of her hands were gone. Weeks ago, I'd removed the pinwheel she'd been holding because it was no longer spinning. In the process, her left hand came loose. I'd popped it back in. That it would have fallen out again wasn't much of a surprise. But her right hand? How did that happen?

I was about to unpin her from the saddlebag when Rickety told me I shouldn't. "You have to hava a Muppet," he said. He's not wrong.

"Look, Ma! No hands!"

The thing is, though, that for the past year, I've had too many people ask me if it was Barbie I had pinned to my bag. I'm so sick of that question. 

As we rode along, I considered my options: One, pin the spare Janice to the bag (I always have a spare) and assume she'll be decripit a year from now; two, replace her with Gonzo, which is the Muppet from bike Janice displaced, but still call the bike Janice; three, find a new sort of Janice to hang from the bag; or four, "Hey, Jim. I think you need to sew me a Janice."

I went with option three, buying a pair of Janice keychains on eBay. They're less her likeness than the current model is, but they'll hew to the spirit of the thing.

As for the actual ride, again I feel as if I didn't do much, and I survived two biking days in a row. I guess all that early spring panic did its job. I'll keep at it. Nova Scotia is three months away.