Well, Saturday saw me getting up early again to head out for another ride. This week is the Tour de Cure, benefiting the American Diabetes Association. This is a single day ride with riders of varying ability levels, though, much like the Tour de Pink, they are taking on infrastructure similar to the MS150, as if they wanted to get to be a huge ride.
One of the really positive aspects of the ride was a staggered start. The century ride kicked off at 7am, the 64 mile ride at 8am and everyone else started at 9am. As a result, The century riders didn’t have to compete for space on the roadways with the faster riders on the “metric century” route (100km ~= 62 miles). Yes, much like last week, I chose the 100 mile route (really 95 miles, but I get ahead of myself). When will I learn.
The ride started at Champion Nissan, right next to Katy Mills Mall, and much like last week’s ride, I got off to a start just a hair late (about 5minutes). However, I was soon passing people to remove the dreaded “DAL” tag from my back. Actually, there were a lot of people still in the parking lot getting ready, so there was no way I was DAL. Out of the dealership, we immediately headed up-and-over an overpass over I-10 (Houston being so devoid of hills, we have to construct them to remind people what they look like), and then out into Katy and the Katy prairie.
After getting rained on last week and feeling my drivetrain getting gummed up with road grit, I had sent it off to the shop while I was in New York for a cleaning and some new bar tape (the stuff that gets wrapped around the handle bars — a casualty of my dalliance with Pinkness). While at the shop, I saw that a set of cranks were on super deep discount that I had been thinking about, so I bought them and had the shop convert my bike from a “triple” (three rings on the front gear set) to a “compact double” (two rings on the front gear set). The advantage of this is that it provides gear ratios better suited to my ability level (burgeoning intermediate cyclist), without as much potential for disaster as with a third chain ring.
After a brief pit stop at mile 6 for some stretching and a visit to the “necessary room” (mk2, portable, unisex variety), I headed for the open road. I really liked the new cranks and the feel of the cleaned up drive train. It was good to really turn over the pedals. Cranking them, even. And you thought the title was about Bill not getting coffee… I got my coffee. Oh, yes, I had my coffee.
Good deed for the day #1 happened at rest stop #2, about 17 miles into the ride. The people had to set-up the rest stop in a rush and had not realized that the sanitation company had stuffed the cardboard “waste barrels” into one of the “necessary rooms”. A woman was walking around collecting trash, and when I told her where the cardboard trash cans were, she was thrilled. Because I’m just that kind of guy.
Good deed #2 came about 60 miles into the route. Somewhere between Cat Spring and Bellville, I passed a woman who was riding at a pretty good clip (slower than I do, but not that much slower). I told her, as I am wont to do, “grab a wheel if you’d like.” She thanked me, but was clearly not okay about being 18″ behind my smelly rear-end, so I thought nothing of it. A bit further down the road, I stopped because one of my sensor magnets was contacting my wheel/cadence sensor, and the woman passed me and stopped. She said that she had lost her map and asked whether we were on the right course. I told her that we were and gave her an estimate of how far it was to the next turn. I offered that we could ride together if she wanted, but she was self-conscious about speed differentials.
I got ahead of her again once we pulled back onto the course, and pedaled along until the next rest stop. It was 11:30am, and I was famished. I ate half of a banana at the three prior rest stops, but it was getting on towards official lunch time, so a PB&J sandwich was in the works. This, of course, necessitated more fluid so I was set for a more extended rest break. Meanwhile, this woman comes in and crosses over the railroad tracks that the rest stop is next to, and then she stops, looking confused. Then a train comes and she’s stuck on the other side. She then makes it back to the rest stop and offers up that she’d like to ride with me if that’s okay so that she doesn’t get lost. Fine by me. Cyclists are both safer and faster in a group. I tried to get a couple of other people at the rest stop to join in, but they weren’t having any of it. Too bad.
After “lunch”, we set off, and I tried to explain to Liz (that’s what we’ll call her, since apparently that’s what other people call her) the finer points of drafting. And by finer points, I mean the basics. She had apparently taken up distance cycling specifically for this ride, with her longest being an 80 mile ride about 10 days prior. I, being the grizzled veteran that I am from countless hours reading internet blogs and chat rooms, offered up to Liz the idea that miles 60 – 80 of a century are the “valley”: the part where you’ve gone a long way but still have a long way to go. My experience with my stitch and other issues from the prior week only confirmed this gem from the online community. I felt that she would do better if we rode together, but she was adamant that she not slow me down. And by adamant, I mean self-conscious.
Well, we can play it her way. I pegged my pace at about 15.5 – 16 mph, and hoped she’d hang on to my wheel, but a couple of small hills later, and she was more than a quarter mile back. I pulled over to the side, stretched a bit, drank a bit of water and waited. She finally came along and the enormity of her struggle was playing out clearly on her face. Time to talk her through the ride. So we rode. I’d call out when to expect hills, how big they were, where she should be in the prevailing wind, how long until the next turn and other miscellaneous things. Basically turning the unknown and demoralizing into known and manageable obstacles. Besides, normal people don’t think of talking to cows as “normal”. It seemed to work, since we made it through from mile 61 to mile 78 at a comfortable, but not blistering, pace. She introduced me to a few of her coworkers who were working the rest stop (the same rest stop as rest stop #2 since we were circling back on our route), and they insisted on taking my picture.
After that, it was easy. It turned out the ride was only 95 miles long, when the map online claimed 98 (last minute route change?). We were among the last of the finishers, though after mile 78, we did pass people doing some of the shorter routes. We also picked up another guy who was on the century ride who had declined my offer of riding together at mile 61, but we stopped enough times to check maps (distinct lack of route markings — yuck!) that he mostly stayed within eyesight of us. One of the times we stopped, a guy asked us whether we had seen “XXX” (it was windy, I was tired, it sounded like a person’s name). Sorry, mister, but I can barely understand you, and I haven’t seen anything that looked lost that didn’t have a rider number on it!
At the finish line, Liz’s husband and son were there taking her picture. She cried. I congratulated her and them, and then headed off to try to get my full century by doing laps around Katy Mills Mall (a lap is approximately 3 miles in case you were curious, using the car dealership as start and stop). I did one lap around KMM, and got honked at enough times and got pounded by the wind enough that I decided to call off lap #2. Yet again, just short of truly ticking over triple digits. However, as Amy implied in my last attempt at a century, rounding is fine if your conscience lets you, so since I finished every mile of a ride billed as a century, and then added three of my own, I called it a day. I earned some chocolate milk!
Back in March, I wrote that Chuck was 
