Distance: 34.15 miles
Time: 2:09:39
Average Speed: 15.8 mph
Max Speed: 43.4 mph

Time to get back in the swing of things. I’ve been off the bike long enough. My leg still hurts from last week’s crash, but I think it’s fine to start pedaling again.

Humberto gives me a call saying that he was itching to ride and I told him I was gonna go on a little road ride up Lytle Creek. He said he would meet me at the Starbuck’s off the 15 fwy, but he had to fix a flat first. I told him to give me a call before he left because my house was 7 miles away and it would take me a half an hour to ride there. I questioned his sanity because he was riding a mountain bike with some gnarly tires. Great for dirt, but a pain on the road. Hell…his Trek Fuel weighs twice as much as my Trek Madone.

45 minutes pass and I get no phone call, so I phoned him. Humberto says, “I’m already here.” Well crap…I told him that I would now and catch up to him, but told him to wait about 15 minutes before starting up the hill. He says that he’ll just leave right then and I’d catch up to him with no problems. Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I’d have to bust some ass to make up 30 minutes and 7 miles. This wasn’t the way I wanted to restart my training, but oh well…

Well I pedal off like a madman and guess what makes my ride more enjoyable? Yeah…wind. I’m riding into a headwind while going uphill. Great…

To fast forward a bit, I catch up to Humberto at mile 16. He was on his way back down the hill. He said he didn’t go all the way to the end and from what he described, I’d say he only had about a mile to go before the end of the climb. I probably would have caught him before the end.

Anyway, the beauty of climbing is that you earn your downhill run. Humberto kept claiming that he can get up to 40 mph going downhill. While I didn’t think it was impossible, I did think it was quite a chore on a mtn bike and his speedometer was probably not properly calibrated. Well, along one section he was going pretty fast. He may have hit the 40 mph mark, but he was pedaling like a madman.

I felt it was my place to remind Humberto the superiority of a road bike over a mtn bike on the asphalt. I’ll go faster with less effort. I demonstrated this by passing him like he was standing still when we were flying downhill at speeds over 35 mph. I would coast and allow him to catch up then I would drop the hammer and sprint away from him while he could do nothing but watch.

I showed some kindness by allowing him to draft behind me, but on the final straight stretch to Starbuck’s I kicked it into Time Trial mode and maintained a pace of 30 mph for about 1000 meters.

It was a good run, but it was getting dark. Humberto loaded his bike on the back of his Excursion and I set off to beat the darkness because I still had a 7 mile trip back to my house. My hats off to him for doing so well. Especially, since he was a big boy. He weighs a bit on the north side of 200 lbs.

I ended up extending my trip home another 2 miles. I pull into my driveway with a sense of relief along with a bit of disappointment. It’s great to be done with the physical exertion, but there’s such enjoyment to be pedaling the miles away that only another cyclist can appreciate. That’s the reason while we saddle up on our two-wheeled steeds to experience that feeling day after day.

I don’t need drugs…just give me my bikes.

///// Blogged from my iPhone /////