6/30/2014 By: C. Kent, aka (Superman) Sometimes you just have to take it easy on a Monday ride and that is just what I had planned for this Monday. A short little ride to Cactus Valley and east to Carl’s without testing my legs any. There wasn’t a big group as we gathered at the parking lot but we were all ready for the ride by 8am. We headed south on Gilmore and west on Acacia just to get us started. I rode easily in front with Highlander, Surgeon and Newsboy behind me. Tax man, Digger and Jackal were in the rear. We turned onto Kirby and made our way to Cypress only to work our way to Johnston and Sanderson to head south again. We crossed the light at Stetson ands were quickly made it by Wally World and headed for Domenigoni.

I was surprised we all stayed together as we rode by Wally world and headed for Mustang. We were moving pretty easily as we past the high school and got ready to merge into the left turn lane. Traffic was a bit heavy so it took us a while to get over to the left lane before getting to the light at Domenigoni. As we turned east towards Searl Newsboy and Jackal picked the pace up and pulled away. I worked hard at keeping the rest of the group together so I let them go.

I kept the rest of the group together all the way past Searl and then to state Street as we watched Newsboy and Jackal fade into the distance. I wanted to see if I could do the whole ride without leg strain and a thigh cuff. We had made it past McSweeney and I felt pretty good. I pulled till we got to Newport before Surgeon came around and started up the hill. I got on his wheel and we were on Cactus Valley road when I noticed we had dropped the group. It turned out that Highlander had bonked and returned home. I took Tax Man with me and we headed for Sage and the hill on Cactus Valley to join up with the remaining group. We got to the end of the road to find them waiting.

Once we had a snack and some water we got ready to head back out Cactus Valley to State. I warned Newsboy that once Jackal reached the downhill at Sage he would make a run of it but he got caught off guard and Jackal got a good jump on the group. It looked like Newsboy had to chase him all the way to State. We rejoined them at McSweeney. Before coming back on State and heading for Chambers.

We turned onto Chambers and made our way to Buena Vista and turned onto Thornton to ride by the Golf course and make it to Santa Fe. We didn’t get that far before we lost Jackal when he cut the ride short and when we turned onto Columbia Tax Man and Surgeon didn’t follow us to Crest.

Just Newsboy, Digger and I worked our way on Crest, Thornton and over to Lake together. Digger has been riding stronger but then so has most of the rest of the group so he still lags a bit now and then. Today he was right behind us as we made the turn on Lake and then on Stetson to head for Fairview. We saw Tax Man at the corner of Fairview and Stetson but he didn’t ride with us to Wilson Mesa and was gone by the time we got back to Stetson. We never did see Surgeon but the remaining three of us ran down Fairview to Carl’s together. We only stopped long enough for coffee and then headed for the west side and home.

We rode together till we got to Devonshire where Digger headed for home and Newsboy and I headed back to the parking lot before separating and heading home ourselves. I got back feeling pretty good and with just some slight leg pain so I would say it was a successful recovery day.