Sunday, November 2, 2008

Sunday Night Bike Thoughts

Not a bike picture. Maddie and I did some sewing this afternoon.

This was a good bike weekend.

On Friday I took what seemed to be an effortless 60 miler on the new bike. This is by far the finest bike I've ever owned. I don't know if it's the "small-batchness" of this bike that makes it such a pleasure to ride, or if it's the tubing or the Grand Bois Cerfs. I suspect it's a bit of all three.

I'll follow up with a more detailed post on the 747 and/or build a page for my stale site on it.

On the Friday ride I went out north to check out Rutter Parkway. I'd heard a lot about Rutter when I manned the maps at the Master Bike Plan open houses a few months back. I finally rode Rutter and really enjoyed the scenery. As many people mentioned, it's pretty tight and the twisty climbs are a bit hairy. Pretty area though.

I looped out to the Pines area for lunch at my mother-in-laws. Great home-cooked Sicilian food, hot coffee, and good company. What a life. I'm a lucky bastard.

Friday night, I stopped down at the Swamp for a beer to hang out with the FBC'ers for a bit. There were some good costumes. Check out the pics for proof.



P2P Lunch Break: Jace, Mike, Beth, Ben, John, Liza

On Saturday, Pedals2People had our annual meeting. This is our second year and we followed the same format. We do our internal come-to-Jesus meeting during the bulk of the day from 10-5, this is mostly figuring out the plan for next year. We take a lunch ride. Then at 5 pm it's a public potluck. That's fun.


Photo courtesy of Mike.

Today was my second cyclocross race. I had a great race and I feel really good about it. I came in 4th or 5th. There were a lot more racers this time: I think around 20. It was so much fun. I'm not hacking up a lung right now, so maybe I could've pushed myself harder.

I'm feeling unusually content tonight as a result of the race. Like all is well in the world. It's odd. And every time I stand up I feel light-headed. A cheap buzz. Nice.

Taylor had a good race. I think he came in 1st or 2nd in the mountain bike category.



Travis. Two weeks ago after a fall at Farragut.

Travis swooped in right before the B's raced and hemmed and hawed about racing B or Rookie. He decided at the last minute to give B's a shot. He held up, but the speed difference between Rookie and B was a big jump today. And this course was not single-speed friendly: the first 1/3 of a mile or so was a paved gentle climb straight-away. So the roadies just blasted up it.

One thing that made the race so much fun today was riding out to the race with a bunch of friends. Taylor, Derek, Jeff, Patrick, Nate, Mike and I met up at the Rocket at 10 AM and rode out to 7-mile. It was cool.

And once there, it was nice to have friends cheering.

I wish I would've taken a picture of this posse on the way out. Oh well. Jeff said he'd post some on the FBC site.

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