Saturday's Ride 6/29: Herding Cats!

The first ride of the 2013 training season!  An amazing 21 riders showed up in the predawn darkness to get ready for the ride - a Penultimate record.  A few old faces and lots of new ones.  I was worried about the size of the ride and keeping everyone together and we did not disappoint.  A special thanks to veterans Jeff, John, and Calvin who did extra duty ferrying and herding everyone in the right direction.

Too many riders to picture!

We embarked on the CW inner city loop (route here).  Today was not a good day for tires.  We had one blow before the bike was even taken off the car, and the resulting explosion of Stan's will probably leave an indelible mark on Silver for the rest of our training season.  (However, Laura redeemed herself later when she passed us running south on the Bosque trail chanting "Domo, Domo").

Less than 3 miles into the ride we had another tire explode.  We were all pretty close so everyone heard it at the same time.  After hanging out for 20 minutes as the intrepid rider (heckled assisted by several veteran riders) got the bike ready to go again.  And we were off, a quick jog through the neighborhoods and down toward Isotopes Park, before heading south by the airport, then east where we picked up the very southern end of the Bosque trail at Rio Bravo.

At this point, since there was less chance of getting lost, the pack seperated out with speed demons heading out ahead and some trailing behind.  The main group kept a 14-16 mph pace for most of the way to Tingley Beach.  The Bosque trail was very crowded today (with all the forced closures of most of New Mexico due to fire danger) and we wound our way past walkers, runners, roller bladers, and other cyclists.

Waiting for tire number 2 to be fixed

Our last rally was at the top of the Bosque trail where the main group headed headed back toward the diversion channel and south to the University.  We really spread out here, with the first riders making it to Serafin's (our wonderful jersey sponsors) about an hour before the last riders made it there at 9:45.  All told a good ride, everyone made it home and healthy (I think).  Those last few riders got to finish breakfast as the Albuquerque Pride parade rolled past.