2/14/2011
By: C. Kent, aka (Superman)


I guess the words gingerly would best describe how I anticipated my legs would react to a ride today. To my surprise I wasn’t as sore as I thought I would be even if I happened to be a bit colder than I expected. I got to Burger King not knowing who if anyone would show up after the hard weekend some of us had. Traditionally we have a rather small showing after a weekend century but I was surprised at the turnout today. Wolf, T-3, D’Artagnon, Rocket, Quicksticks, Bounty Hunter, Highlander, Tax man, Dura max and I made 10 riders on a cool morning after a big ride, not bad.


We took off down Gilmore and quickly made it to Acacia without incident. We talked about some of our fallen group members that had fallen and were injured during the TDPS and managed to cheer ourselves up by rationalizing that things could have been worse. Those of us with a spiritual bent were grateful to the Lord our friends had been protected from more serious issues. The little warmth the Sun was putting out was just enough keep the goose bumps off of those of us that were thoughtless enough to eschew arm and leg warmers.

We managed to stay in one group and one long pace line all the way to Domenigoni. The pace was pretty easy and everyone seemed comfortable with it. Once we turned onto Dominigoni we settled into our normal drive towards Winchester but without the intensity we normally had. I gave up the lead after Warren and we continued at the same pace for quite a while before the B group decided to back it down a bit to save some energy for one or two of our returning riders. Still we regrouped at the Saddle and split into three groups for the rest of the ride. Rocket, D’Artagnon and Bounty hunter took off first Followed by Highlander and Tax Man on a modified ride and then followed by Quicksticks, Dura max, Wolf, T-3 and me following the path the A group took.

We managed to hit the lights at Lindenburger and C just about right so we weren’t that far behind the A group even if we didn’t expect to see them till we got to Chris’s. We rolled easily down Menifee and passed the school and headed for the little hill half way to Scott Road. Much to my surprise I noticed that the A riders had taken mercy on us and waited at the top of the hill and allowed us to regroup so they could pull us to Scott and then to Hawn.

Scott Road seemed easier today for some reason and finally the chill was gone from their air. We ate up the distance to the Freeway and caught the A group at the stop light. We had to pick up the pace a bit to get over the overpass and there were warning signs that Hawn was supposed to be closed but for some reason it wasn’t and we turned to watch the A group getting smaller into the distance as we headed closer to Holland. We noticed that Wolf had gone with the A riders and that there was some problem just before we got back to Newport. Turns out Bounty Hunter was having trouble with his bike and we stopped to assist. Turns out we couldn’t figure what was wrong so Rocket and Bounty Hunter headed for home and we joined D’Artagnon and Wolf heading for Bradley.
Bradley to McCall was a pretty quick run with first Quicksticks and then D’Artagnon pulled us to McCall then we attacked the McCall hill and regrouped once more at the top. We took some extra time checking our tires at the top of McCall because someone had tossed out a whole six pack of empty beer bottles out on the road and it was almost impossible to ride around the glass field with running over some of it. Still we made it with only a few cuts and no flats. It was a fast ride down the hill and a quick trip through the housing track and onto Simpson as we chatted away thankful we lived in Southern California where we didn’t have to fight the snow. We stopped at Chris’s but Highlander and Tax Man had already left so we took a quick break and headed back towards Hemet.
It didn’t take long to get back up to Stowe and not much longer to get to California. We took turns pulling all the way back to the Airport and pulled away as Dura Max and T-3 headed back to Johnston while we headed towards Acacia. Wolf led us through the Lowes parking lot and back out onto Acacia towards Kirby. Quicksticks had left us at Winchester Road so it was down to Wolf, D’Artagnon and me till we got to Gilmore where D’Artagnon headed for home while Wolf and I headed back to Burger King. I left Wolf to head for home and ended up with gust over 41 miles on the computer. What a great ride we had and what a great group of people we have to ride with.