By: C. Kent, aka (Superman) It had rained Tuesday when it was still close to 100 degrees and again early in the morning on Wednesday so I was pretty sure it would be humid for our club ride. What I didn’t know was how hot it might be and who would be riding with me. I dressed lightly and headed for the parking lot. We I arrived Digger and Dragon Slayer were already there. They were followed by Gambler, Bulldozer, Bandit and Shooter. To my surprise Cossack showed up to ride. I don’t think I have seen Cossack in more than a year. Huntress drove us and lastly ME-109 rode up and we were ready to leave. We rode out onto Gilmore and headed to Acacia before making our way to Kirby and South towards Cypress.

Once we turned west I was both pleased and surprised to see Digger near the front and pushing himself to stay near the front and we worked our way to Johnston. Digger was the first to turn the corner and stop at the light at Sanderson to wait till we could cross the street and head to Industrial to continue west and back to Stetson. As we got to Cawston Digger picked up the pace and made a run for Warren. Some of us knew it wouldn’t last with the power of the riders behind him but we were all impressed that he would give it a try. Cossack was the one that pulled us up to Digger just as we got to Warren and headed towards California.

Because Bulldozer was recovering from a bad crash over the weekend I thought we were just out to cruise this ride. But shortly after we got halfway between Warren and California Cossack, Shooter and Bandit took off. They were followed by Bulldozer, Gambler and Dragon Slayer and finally ME-109. I was going to let them go and stay with Huntress and Digger but Huntress insisted I go after them so I did. I managed to close on them till we got to Stowe and then they simply pulled away from me and I ended up following them all the way to Winchester Farms where we sat and watched Huntress ride by and head south on Winchester.

I took up the chase and pulled the group down to the dump road to try and close on Huntress. As we turned onto the Dump road and headed west again I noticed Bulldozer trailing the pack and fell back to see how he was doing. He said he was feeling human and couldn’t get enough air so I rode with him till we caught Huntress and Dragon Slayer. The rest of the group simply pulled away from us. The four of us made our way to Leon and then headed towards Menifee and saw we were actually closing on ME-109. He had been off of the bike for two weeks and it was showing. He made it to the light at McCall just before the four of us and headed for the back side of Hospital hill. I followed him over the top and headed down to Hill Point to find the rest of the group waiting for us. We had lost Digger so I waited for him while everyone else headed for Jack in the Box where we were to regroup. As we got there the big dogs were ready to leave so Digger, Huntress, Dragon Slayer and I decided to take a coffee break and cool down after they left.

Once we were back on our way I pulled us over the hill past Holland and Dragon Slayer took us to Garbani and back east towards Briggs. I will freely admit it was pretty humid and we rolled by Menifee and headed up to little grade towards Briggs. But as long as we were moving we were a bit like a swamp cooler and it was rather comfortable. Still it was warm when we stopped so we tried not to stop unless we had to. We had to as we came out onto Domenigoni and got ready to go to Lindenburger . We wanted to form a pace line that would get us all to Simpson at the same time. We did pretty good with Huntress starting the pull and Dragon Slayer taking over. I took my turn after the trees when we rolled by Leon and took us to the last stand of trees just before Winchester. Once again Dragon Slayer took the lead and took us to Winchester Farms to refill our water bottles before heading for home on Stowe.

All four of us made our way to California and then north to Stetson to turn back towards Warren for the second time today. Dragon slayer pulled to Warren and I pulled to Cawston and then Industrial to get us back to Sanderson. Once on Sanderson Dragon Slayer and I pulled north to get to Lowes so we could cut through the parking lot and make our way to Acacia.

There seemed to be a lot of traffic on Acacia so we had to be careful getting back to Kirby and we had to follow in single file behind Dragon Slayer. He took us back to Gilmore and then led us back to the parking lot before they loaded up their vehicles and Digger and I rode home. I was a good day and a lot cooler than I had thought it was going to be.