7/18/2011
By: C. Kent, aka (Superman)


Summer is back and it seems the cooling trend is over. It seemed prudent to do a flatter ride and a few less miles today so that is just what I had planned. I left the house a bit early and took my time riding over to the parking lot. Still Surgeon was there waiting as I pulled into the parking lot. In fact just about everyone showed up early for this ride, even Double Time.


I was thinking that with a new route the group might start out a bit slower but that thought was dashed shortly after we started down Lyon as Bloodhound took off a bit quicker than I expected. In fact by time we turned onto Thornton Bloodhound and T-3 had pulled away from the group and showed no signs of slowing.

The two riders may have had a lead but the following group was all that far behind and they were closing little by little. I was feeling just a bit slow so far this morning and could only hope things would get better after we made the turn onto State Street. Looking behind me I could see nothing but determined riders and knew that today it might be the kind of day where it would take all I had just to hang on.

After we made the turn and headed for Domenigoni it was more or less as I had expected. Bloodhound and T-3 pulled away again and I held back waiting to see if anyone wanted to pass me and give chase. No one wanted to so we followed at a distance till we finally reeled them in and followed most of the way to Warren before I took the lead and held it till I had to surrender it to Highlander after the little overpass. By the time we got to Winchester I was at the back of the pack and as I had predicted just hanging on. Strangely enough all 15 riders were still in the pace line and we had been running at 22 to 24 all the way to Leon. Here the group split in two and the sprint for the top of the saddle started to shape up. Surgeon placed himself perfectly and beat us all to the top to regroup. Again we split as nine of the riders started down the saddle and six of us took a few extra minutes to recover before heading down the saddle ourselves.

Ocelot, Dura-max, Quick-sticks, Double Time, Tax man and I followed the lead group by about two miles as they made the turn onto Lindenburger just as we got back onto Newport at Antelope. Quick-sticks pulled us over to Simpson and started us towards Leon where Tax man and Double Time took over and moved us towards Winchester. I don’t know what Tax Man had for breakfast but he was riding about as strong as I have seen him ride. Double Time’s excuse was simple, he could smell the coffee.

We turned onto Winchester and made our way up to Chris’s for a much needed stop for coffee and conversation. The other group was already sitting down and waiting for us, except Cossack and T-3 who have both left to go to their respective homes. It was also good to see Rocket’s since of humor in the way he responded to Highlander’s comment on how color coordinated he always seemed by dressing like team Kenya in Red, Green, White and Black. Highlander was impressed.

Before very long it was time for us to head for home or back to Burger King. Surgeon started us out and Quick sticks broke off as we got back to Stowe while the rest of us headed for California Street. We seemed to be in different needs for getting back because we split into at least three groups on our way back east.

I ended up in the last group as we cruised down California to Stetson and then back to the Airport before catching the light at Sanderson. Rocket had continued on Stetson and Surgeon had gone ahead with Bloodhound and Vortex while Dura-max, Ocelot, Tax Man, Highlander and I made it to Lowes.

All in all it was a pretty good ride and we seemed to set a pretty good pace. When I did the map on this ride it was real close to 37 miles and by the time I got home it turned into 40 miles door to door. But as much as I enjoy the ride I believe I enjoy the group I ride with even more. Good friends, good weather and a good route are just about all a cyclist can hope for.