Oy Vey! I thought going away was supposed to be restful. 4 days in Litchfield gave me angina. Between the H.O., the management trainees and the BlueHairs, I've had my fill of family for a while.
Thankfully, I did a couple of good rides while I was down there. The was some drama on Friday night though. I locked my bike on the roof of the truckster and left my keys in Columbia!!! A frantic call to Grand Stand Bicycles and I was on my way. I borrowed a pair of ChannelLock pliers and coaxed the nut off the locking skewer.
The group meets @ 7:20 on Saturday in front of Grand Strand Bicycles (owned by Hawley's alum and former Columbia rider, Tim Woolford) and sets off promptly at 7:30. No waiting around for stragglers down there...
It was a meandering and convoluted way to get 60km, but it was a damn good ride. No fiddling around either...it was 35kmh out of the parking lot. Between the early start time (I was up @ 5:45...on vacation) and the lack of warmup, I struggled for the first 10 minutes or so. Once the diesel was warm, it was go time. The "A" group started with about 20.
The ride winds the Murrell's Inlet and into several big neighborhoods and ended up taking on a bit of a figure eight loop. I had no idea where I was or where we were going so I kept my mouth shut, took my pulls and didn't get invovled in the dynamic...until the end. Those guys just don't know how to ride in a paceline. Guys would hit the front and wind it as tight as they could for 60 seconds and pull left. The problem was the fact that rest of the group went left with the guy in front! No one was pulling through in the right line, so I started to...! I think they finally figured it out(kinda). Tim says he's tried to explain it, but he's not making much headway.
The ride was 60km and we were back in the parking lot with an average speed of 34kmh! Overall, a really good, steady, tempo ride with a bunch of really nice guys.
Sunday morning, we met @ 7:30 again, for a ride out of the middle of Myrtle Beach, down through Socastee and back. This ride was about the same speed, but had some stretches of open road, rather than diving into gated communties every 2 miles. There were 15 guys on it and we did another 60km in under two hours. Another good ride with nice dudes!
After both days, I went back to the condo and lounged on the beach, threw the kids around and lazed by the pool. The condo complex had a 'river' style pool that had a current in it. You sat in a floating donut and the current just carried you around the perimeter. Freakin' sweet!!!!!!!!!!! I kind of fell asleep and was jostled awake when I skipped of the side with my elbow. Yeeouch!
I tired and am going to bed. I'll be out tomorrow night, if no rain. I'll ride either way, but the rain will bring out the cross bike.
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