Crusty Cassette

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I'm tired.

It wasn't supposed to be this way.

Rain kept mileage low this week and Saturday I rode with Ryan, my youngest son, on our first ride together. He's inherited my Bianchi and plans to commute to work.

So I came to a Sunday ride with relatively fresh legs. Nicki changed the route I had expected from Heller Bar to Down River Road. To earn the 58 miles to mark Mike's Birthday we ended up riding all the way to Wawawai landing from the parking lot at Red Lion.

15 riders showed up including a second tandem sporting John and Carla on their longest ride of the season. In addition Jerry and Claudine, Mike and Nicki's skiing buddies, joined us for the first time on new matching Lemonds. They are returning to cycling, not beginning and we were pleased their inaugural ride was so well attended.

Lance and Janet didn't start with us but rode out to meet us. And Dan Johnson skipped the ride but did his share of the eating at El Sombrero's afterward.

On the return trip, I expected Mike and Nicki to step up the pace but that never happened. When Rory had a flat, Linda, Helen, Bill and Tamra seized the opportunity to get a head start on the rest of us. Doug had already headed and I think Chris had gone with him.

Now I found myself at Nisquallly John's riding with a tailwind but at a pace that made me impatient. I picked up my pace until my heartratte said 169 before backing off and riding in at 145. I saw Lance riding out, Jan already turned around, Helen loading her bike in Bill's pickup at about the 2mile marker. Bill got his workout riding back to Red Lion to get the pickup to resuce Helen whose efforts on White Bird yesterday left her a bit tired.

I say Linda dn Tamra for the first time as the crested the hill up to Red Wolf Bridge. When I caught up all they could talk of was food and Serveza. It had been Claudine's glowing description of Corona and Lime that had initially piqued my impatience.

At El Sombrero the service was a bit sleepy so Linda filled pitchers of water and brought out glasses. The wait staff showed up shortly, were excellent, and took no umbrage at Linda's non-unionized labor. They even provided plates for the lop-sided cake with which we topped off our dinners.

It would have been an unmatched cycling afternoon until I discovered not only were John and Carla contributing to Linda's wanderlust but Tamra begun discussing home improvement tips, techniques, and tales of crawl space adventuring.

Some people just can't seem to enjoy a ride for itself.

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Six Hours is not enough!

At Polar Bear we determined all three of us, Chris, Doug, and me, had turned in 6 hour centuries. Funny, though, Chris did his in something like 5:51, Doug in 5:56 and me--5:59:52 and I had to work to get that. Not bad for any route including the Spiral Highway. Since we rode together the rest of the day, Doug made up his time on me on the grade.

We made the loop through Moscow, took Driscoll Road off the Latah Trail and headed south to Kendrick and back on 12 Stopping at both Kendrick in the midst of Locus Blossom Festival and again at the Casino.

Chris, of course, doesn't count even though he was doing his first century of the year. He's always way out in front but Doug? Well, he pushed me up a hill two weeks in a row. I warned him I wasn't going to race up the Spiral Highway and I didn't. When my pulse hit 161 at the top of separator grade, I dialed it back and let Doug and Chris pull off.

Doug stopped at the last big bend to get a picture of me making that turn. That was all the pictures we got though. I'd forgotten my camera and Doug's developed a resistance to working so you'll just have to take my word for what happened. Trust me.

Cute is a relative term!

The day was warm enough to start off in short sleeves and cyclists took advantage of it everywhere on the Chipman trail. The warm temperatures and clear skies did not prevent the wind from blowing. But, sssh, it mostly blew in our favor. We had a nice tailwind all the way into Pullman where we crossed Bishop Blvd and stopped at the convenience for a break before riding the Chipman trail into Moscow for lunch at Quiznos. We had light tailwinds almost everywhere else today.

Chris won't ride in a pace line. Still he let me suck his wheel for almost a mile across the Chipman Trail into a head wind. We passed through the tunnel and turned directly into the wind when I heard a chain drop from bigger cog to smaller. I knew it would do me no good to try to hang on. Chris is cruel. He drops back to pace as soon as he has dropped you.

So I dropped back and rode in to Moscow with Doug. Crossing the campus I saw a cyclist standing off the bike in the shade of a tree and wanted to know if it was Chris. Turned out to be a co-ed about Chris's h eighth. Doug gave me a bad time. "She's much cuter than Chris," he said. Then thinking better of it, he added, "Not that Chris is cute." Being philosophical cyclists, we decided cute was relative. Doug pointed out that Chris, relative to a warthog, is cute. QED

Chris complained I hadn't brought my camera. He wanted to see video of himself riding. Doug suggested he looked bowlegged and Chris said it's hard to keep your knees in when you have big thighs unlike Doug's toothpick legs.

Chris is Cruel but cuter than a warthog.

Cruel is Kind

Somewhere out on the Latah trail we came to a dead stop. Would Chris stop for a riding companion dropped mercilessly? No. Chris apparently has a working relationship with a menagerie of animals. Today only one donkey and a goat were on display. Chris began waving and talking to the donkey like on old friend. The donkey trotted up to the fence and began making not quite braying noises. Trust me!This is when we discovered Doug's camera was on strike.

I guess when it comes to donkeys it takes one to know one.Draw your own conclusions.

Rain? No. Rayna!

Between Troy and the top of the Troy Grade the road ceases its long decline and throws in one more nasty climb. Chris had been puttering around behind us from Lamb Road. Turns out the little Sammies he'd eaten at Quiznos hadn't agreed with him. Worked out great for me, though. I actually got to see Chris in my mirror as I held him off on a climb. I knew something was wrong, though, when he didn't just disappear down the Troy grade. Well, I'll always have that memory of dropping Chris up a hill. Wowee.

In Kendrick the festivities seemed quiet and we headed for the grocery. Who should hail us but Dean Weyen who had a woman by the hand. "Who's this?" I asked.

"My fiance, Rayna!" So, you may have heard it here first. Nice woman. Turns out to be a teacher. I guess that's an acceptable profession though it may not speak well of her judgment but then she's holding Dean's hand!

Topping off Bike Month with a century and a Sundae!

It was Doug's idea to top of Bike Month with a century. Sort of like the cherry on top of the sundae, he said.

But it wasn't sundaes he was pushing at every opportunity today. With Doug, see, you have to go along for the ride. If he offers you pepper wine or pepper bear, you've got to drink some at least once. If he offers you a salted potato wedge, you eat one. And Chris learned that if he offers you a fig, you eat it even if it just tastes like a fig newton without the yummy cake surrounding it instead of like the cinnamon bun Doug compared its flavor to. Johnny Figseed pushed his unwanted fruit on Chris all day long. He left me alone 'cause I'd already eaten figs on the Death Valley Ride.

Finally, at Polar Bear, Chris, had to accept a fig before he could eat his yogurt. It wasn't quite a cherry, but it did top off our Bike Month.

"Don't forget to log your mileage for May. If you haven't logged at all yet, that's fine. Just total up your mileage for may and drop into the form. Find the link on the club webpage.

For the Ride of it! Corrie

My legs are tired this morning. They usually are when I've ridden a century the day before, but I'm not accustomed to riding up Wawawai Canyon at 8 to 10 mph and then holding 17 to 20 across the 12 miles to Pullman. Fortunately Doug and I dialed the pace back a bit on the return on 95 from Pullman.

The forecast hadn't bee encouraging. Good chance of rain on Saturday both in the valley and on the Paouse. Rain had fallen on me a couple of times during my weeks' rides. It had been light and I'd always been close to home. Going down to Wawawai and up to Pullman was going to be pushing my luck. But the temps, though, reported to be cold by the weather types, seemed about perfect to me. I always look forward to the temps warming to the mid sixties. That didn't sound cold to me and the winds were 'sposed to gust to 8. I cold for the Wawawai Canyon ride.

Nothing from Dave, Chris, Jim, Doug. Everyone was silent on the subject of Saturday's ride. Fair weather riders the lot of you, I say. Doug, at least, checked the weather out his window on Saturday morning and gave it a go. The sky was blue and cloudless and stayed more or less so until noon when clouds were building up around us and looking particularly dark South over the valley.

Down River Road isn't our favorite. Doug complained about the route when he road this route in reverse a few weeks ago.

We caught WSU Crew having a race.

I hadn't expected to see anyone least of all Doug. But after our stop to refuel at the Crew Boat House, we found Chris, his new grey vandyke bristling in the morning sunshine. "You're late," he complained. It was 9:30 and I had an 18 mph average. We'd had a light tail wind from Lewiston.

"Why are we waiting for him," I asked Doug as Chris took off his arm warmers. I rolled off knowing Chris wouldn't just catch us but bounce out ahead as he always does.

Doug doesn't know Chris that well and he had never climbed Wawawai Canyon. In addition, he's a bad judge of pace. Seemed like he thought he was going to catch Chris. I knew that Chris wasn't tired when he weaved out to the center of the road. Old School, he won't wear a mirror. He was checking to make sure his "companions" didn't get too close. We fell into a steady pace that kept us separated by a couple of hundred feet. I wasn't liking having to work quite this hard but I didn't want to be dropped. I managed to catch Doug just before the top.

I had the heart monitor on and think I was running in the mid 160s most of the time. That scarcely had a chance to drop on the way into Pullman. Still my average heart rate for the day was 135 so I guess I was just having a great workout. Thanks guys