Sunday, October 26, 2008

Two 50-milers This Warm Weekend

Got in two good 50-mile rides this weekend as things warmed up, compared to this past week. All week long my morning rides were down in the low 40F's. Temperatures were at least 10-15 degrees warmer for the weekend.

On Saturday, I headed out at 6:30AM for a Brands route and West Hills ride. Still dark at that hour of the morning so I brought the light for the first hour of riding until the sun came up. Rain was forecast for the day but not likely until after 10:00AM. Nevertheless, about one mile into my ride, some light drizzle started and continued for the first 10 miles of the ride, just about until I reached the LIE. If the rain got any heavier, I was planning to turn back at this point. But it stopped and I continued on for the rest of the ride, albeit on wet roads.

Back home, I cleaned up the bike (it was due anyway) and relubed the chain. Getting ready for what was supposed to be a nice Sunday. There were heavey rain and winds overnight and I started to have some doubts about Sunday. Around 10:00PM, checking e-mail and watching some of the delayed World Series game 3, an e-mail popped up from Mike W. with an FYI that the Brands ride would be continuing on Sunday (instead of Saturday) and with a later start time (8:30AM). Great!

So, this morning, headed out for 15 warmup miles on the Jones Beach path (full of leaves and sticks from last night's storm) then cruised into the Brands lot at 8:30AM. We started of with a total of 9 riders but various groups broke off here and there for different reasons. Ed was staying with a new rider and quickly went out the back. Ariel, Jamie, and Scott(?) had ridden to the ride start from Babylon, so they left for home at Deer Park Ave. That left Mike, Paul, James, and I as a group of four for the last 25 miles or so. We kept an easy but steady pace, most of the time ;-}, regrouping for a few minutes with Ed and the new rider, before speeding up to the finish at Brands. Nice ride and a sunny, autumn day.

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