NCBC Summer Rally

Hey everybody. This past sunday was a beautiful day on the bikes for 260 cyclists who came out to enjoy the cameraderie and pay tribute to fallen rider Bruce Rosar.
after a moment of silence, the clicking of cleats and the loud squeels of bruce's trademark squeeky toys sent us on our way! we ground our way up to new hill and beyond with a large group of familiar faces: mike d (RUSA VP) al johnson (local RBA) byron, bryan, and bob erwin are hidden in there too:

10 miles after this shot we were good n' warmed up. time to climb the col du lystra!
It's a good climb and I watched mike and byron get away. again.
the next section was really nice as we made our way to frosty's-a familiar stop on the brevets. this day tho we enjoyed the smilin' face face of branson! killa rider and refreshment dispenser. he volunteered as part of his shenandoah 1200 recovery :-)


from here it was familiar roads and riders as bryan and I had rejoined mike and byron.
next up: bynum ridge, the second big climb, after crossing a nice river and picking up my blinky which was knocked off. photo-op!! byron takes a sip and enjoys the view:

from here we cruised a little grinder, then did the real climb which was nice. a little long and steady. in no time we were dumped onto hwy 64 and made our way to the final rest atop jordan lake. strong crosswinds! a quick cookie and off we went. around the choo-choo and back to the start with everybody riding strong! it was great shakedown for mike d who is now in london, ready to tackle LEL. go mikey!!

apart from the somber occasion of losing bruce, this was a nice ride. thanks to david and the NCBC for a beautiful day...

really cool fotos of le tour..

here's a great collection of photography from le tour de france.

enjoy! project le tour

ramblings on riding

so far, summer has been good riding. i chose to ride a single speed to work starting late in may and did so for about four or five weeks. i switched to gears for sundays when the crew would come over for longer training rides. it sure makes the light racing bikes fun after grinding a 40 pounder back and forth all week! i rode my bridgestone XO-1 the week before july 4th so i'd be fresh for the firecracker 100. this annual 100K ride is a tradition around here and my guess is about 650-700 riders showed up this year.

here I am with the stylish bryan hoffman and his colnago:

GO! we launched at eight am, and all was well. the police escort the ride out and close the intersections for about 2 miles. this lets everyone get on the road safely and thru the first big descent and climb. another few miles and we're in holly springs, then out into the country for a SWIFT 12 miles to the first stop at about 19 miles. this only took 45 minutes, we were averaging 23 mph..

1st mistake: not staying on the road. I took a quick break and another fast group went by. now i had to solo a while, about 8 miles worth. after picking up some other guys, i pulled in at half-way to fill the bottles and cop a cookie and banana. 120 seconds later I was on the road again and thought i'd found a train to hook-up with. two guys were up front and pulling good, behind me were 5 or 6 hangin' on..after a road change my pullers got away and now i was the engine. I gave it all i had for a mile or so but couldn't bridge up. i sat up and looked in the mirror and my train just shadowed me. no one else wanted to work, but they sure could suck my wheel! I got some help finally, what a relief as I got to sit in a bit cuz it was windy! oh well, soon enough we were at 40 and filling again. my new friend and I worked together most of the way in and picked up a few others along the way. I finished in just over 3 hrs. at 20.2 mph..
this was a personal best but, would have been hotter if i'd just hung in my original group. I WAS HAPPY with my fuel and fluid management tho..learned a bunch from my rando buddies riding this spring. we'll see how it goes this coming weekend at the summer rally. a tough 100K course. just being out there with friends is always fun.
there's nothing i'd rather be doing this summer! my sundays on the bike are the best!!