It' not been a good couple weeks for me.  I've tried to do a bunch of rides and had bad bouts of insomnia, horrific dreams when I do sleep, and the like that have made me bug out on rides I REALLY wanted, like the new year's 200k.  It's happened a few times, but seems to be getting worse.  Since I was actually capable of waking up before 11am today, I did this ride.  Thankfully I had a sleep study done and while I still need to see the doc for a follow up, it appears that a cpap machine might help cure me of this crap.
 
This is an FWBA ride that leaves from Willow Park and goes on a Northerly loop.  Options range from 38 to 68 miles.   Unfortunately the website said 9am, and when I showed up no one was there.  Jim Burrow came and said the ride had been moved to 10, so I had to wait an hour for the ride to start.  Ah well, I have audiobooks in the car.  It was bright and sunny at 9, cloudy when we started at 10.  As soon as you felt the breeze, you were cold instantly.  There is stll a bit of snow on the ground.  I wanted to do the 68 but with the hour delay and my afternoon plans I stuck with the 38.  Only one guy wanted to do the long route anyway and he wasn't fast enough for me to have a chance of getting done.  I could have ridden it alone, but I could have done that from home - I wanted to ride with a group.
 
I was wearing wool socks, shoe covers, pearl izumi amfib bib tights that have a windproof front, my wool baselayer, a regular jersey, jacket, long gloves, and a balaclava.  My fingers quickly went frigid - my gloves are not up to the task.  
 
You start out going along the I-20 service road then turn onto farmer road 1082, going mostly downhill.  Nice shoulder until it suddenly runs out and you're stuck on a BUSY road.  Not fun, but it only lasted a few miles.  I figured the rest of the ride was better.  Yes and no.  Once we turned off we had great smooth fast rollers.  Jim and another guy bailed and sagged from there - the cold got 'em.  The pace was a blistering 12mph.  Usually these these have some different speed groups - I get spolied riding with LSR I guewss.  Thankfully from this turnoff Debbie, a sometime randonneur apparently, knew the route and she and I forged ahead, with Shari (I never get her name spelled right) close behind.  We'd go faster and wait for the group to catch up.
 
Everything was good until we turned onto Silver Creek, when some redneck who had to wait a whole minute and a half to get around us yelled "you mfers shouldn't be on the road.  I hope someone hits you and you die."  And other such kind, enlightened words.  Cattlebaron road was nice - all hills with a good 13-15%er towards the end.  Then we turn onto White settlement road, again with no shoulder and high speed traffic, all of which want to blast past you at 70 at the top of a blind hill, or , at one point, gun past your whole group even though there was VERY close oncoming traffic who had to stop.
 
The rest of the ride was uneventful.  Would have been a great route except for a couple unfortunate incidents and the traffic.  Unfortunately, all the routes take these roads, so I don't see myself doing this one again.  Still, if I hadn't been trying real hard to do a group ride I would have stayed at home and done nothing, so this was a good alternative.
 
Here's the map:
http://www.fwbaclub.org/ride/maps/dill-road1.pdf

I'm pretty sure that was her - we talked about ultra racing but not about raam specifically.  She had mentioned she was just getting back into things after a long absence.  If that's the case she'll certainly shame most of us when she's in godo condition, because she was putting out some serious wattage getting up those hills.  It's always fun doing these sorts of rides - you never know who's going to show up!
 
Thanks for the support - I hope it helps because I'm pretty sick of it and it's not doing my kids any good to be taught by a zombie.