Showed up in a very wet humid morning to this ride which starts from Cleburne high school and goes to Glen Rose and back.  It's basically the goatneck ride with some niceness thrown in.  And by nice ness I mean giant honking hills.  I have no idea what the elevation gain is on this but it must have been 4500 feet at the least.  If I had remembered how hilly that area was I'd have probably skipped it, but I'm glad I didn't.
 
I stayed with the hammerheads until about mile 20.  I had to pee and they weren't stopping.  Until then, I had them constantly checking behind them to see if I was still there.  Yeah buddy, I'm still on your 6, and you can't outfly me.  Callsign:  Maverick  
 
After I shed layers and had a nature break, I slowed and caught Vicky (riding with a broken arm!!) and Jerry and others who were on the 70 miler as well.  There were a LOT of people who knew me and Bud from LSR and from FWBA rides, and a guy who does the Tues/Thurs Joe Pool lake ride.  One guy on a Pinarello talked about what a great rider you were Bud, and how great a guy you are and how sorry he was that you couldn't make it out there today.
 
I was able to do well on the hills.  I was the first one up radio tower hill and a couple of the other big ones.  My feet felt good since I bouight (another) pair of new shoes - some vittorias that didn't seem to bother my toes, but were really loose in the heel, unfortunately.  Gonna try a smaller size and see if I can fix that.  I also tried out a new set of nashbar look clones and was shock at how easy it was to clip in, though clipout was more difficult.  The less float didn't seem to bother me at all either, which is good.  We stopped often enough to let me feet have a rest after that, whcih helped me make it up goatneck hill ( the hard way) and all the others reasonably well.
 
We stopped at mile 30 or 33 in Glen Rose at a little gas station/bakery that had the MOST AMAZING SAUSAGE KOLACHES anywhere.   I took a page out of Mark Metcalf's book and had one of those with a "gooey chocolate banana bar."  Heaven is a gut-bomb.  Everyone kept telling me what a strong fast rider I was and etc etc.  meanwhile I felt like a weak little wuss, but I did RBENT proud as best I could.    
 
It was honestly some of the best scenery I've had on a ride, coupled with probably the nicest group I've ever ridden with outside of thhis bunch.   Definitely some great hill training.  I had to ice down the knees when I got home.   Quite an easy route to ride and very low traffic.
I got to do some real strong comparisons of the Caero to the tica as well.  Those big wheels without a dought saved me some headache.  They really just soak up the bumps in a tremendous way.  Exactly what I've been needing.  I was however surprised to find that at speed, the bike is much less stable than the tica.  48 screaming downhill on the tica feels rock solid and steady.  One the Caero the bars are twitchy and the wind resistance tugs at them.    Still, I'm very pleased with the bike and I'll consider my performance as  a win.  Now I just need to find a practice 200k before the April 26th one in Cleburne.
 
 
 
 
 

Club rides are often hit or miss - just depends on the characters involved I suppose.   But most of the fwba stuff has been decent.  They're trying to get more distamce rides going as well.  I looked at my computer last night and ended with a 15.76 average, which was much faster than I thought I'd be, since I spent a lot of time coasting and waiting for folks to catch up.  I'm also a lot less sore than I expected to be given the length and difficulty of the ride.   Must have been the tortellini, breadsticks, and salad I downed at Olive Garden before going to see "Run Fatboy Run" at the movies.   Not having had a tv to turn on in the last 3 weeks made it quite an event!
 
The big funny today though is one of my students came ripping into my room this morning:  "Oh man I saw you riding down nolan river road in cleburne yesterday.  You were flying!"  

Oh no!  I hope he recovers quickly.  Was it while it was wet in the morning?

Yes,what a shame. Our prayers & wishes go out to Daniel for a healthy recovery. I won't say quick ,because 6 months of recovery & rehab can't pass quick enough for him ,I'm sure.
 
This just underscores how potentially dangerous cycling can be. This was re-enforced at the TTTT's when a cyclist was hit during the event by a car.  
 

That was one of the injuries from my wreck that I had the worst time with. Not because of the actual injury, because of the strip and cavity searches when I had to drag all that hardware through a security checkpoint and I would set off the metal detectors, especially the first couple of months after 9/11 when I was still driving the walker. You think that the huge scars next to the hip would give them a clue but we are talking government emplyoees here.
 
Opus