The local bike club (Princeton Freewheelers) sponsors and organizes what they call the event every first Saturday in August. It is half a dozen planned riding routes from sixteen to one hundred miles through the New Jersey country side, mainly farming and horse ranch terrritory. It attracts a couple of thousand people from all over the tri-state area with every skill level from sneakers and a cross trainer to amateur racing teams with 5 and ten thousand dollar bikes. I started doing the ride almost twenty years ago and remember signing up for my first metric century and afterwards needing about three days to recover (and I think I wore sneakers too - although I did have a decent road bike).
Yesterday morning did not look good at 6:30 as I was packing up the bike - dark clouds in the west and talk of possible (probable?) showers throughout the day. However, I thought I just sailed through three days of real rain on my end-of-cross country trip so what's a little warm mist when a good ride is planned. So at 7:15 I found myself heading out to the country with a few hundred other cycling nut-cases determined to get in 100 miles before the downpours started. We made it to the first SAG at the thirty mile point with no moisture but after a few minutes for fresh water and a couple peanut butter snacks the drops started coming. And they continued to come on and off for the next 70 miles. I guess the good news was that it was better than the heat waves we had a couple weeks ago and the chance to ride the country roads with a few hundred others was still a great way to spend a Saturday.
So somewhere around the 80 mile point I fell in with a young rider also riding solo (both of my prospective riding partners had other plans and I literally went through the entire day of riding without seeing a single person I knew) and we started into a bit of small talk as we pedalled. Coming out of a long flat stretch we hit a series of rollers. I rose out of the saddle for a few strokes to attack the first hill and then continued through the second and third until the road flattened out again. And meanwhile my young friend fell back maybe a dozen or so bike lengths and I was actually a little surprised to see him only in my mirror. Given another three or four minutes and the now flat road he came up alongside of me again..."Wow", he said, "that was some strong pull" and then he added "especially for someone your age". I looked sideways at him for a minute and then could only laugh to myself...If he only knew. I confess I was tempted at that point to try and kick it up a couple of notches and see what would happen but discretion got the better of me and we sailed in to the lunch that is part of the deal with clearing skies and the same pleasant small talk that started our short relationship...All in all a good day and a fun ride - even the lunch at the end was good. I recorded 101 miles at 16.4 mph, not a bad day's work. And the sun did come out on my way home for dinner on the deck.
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Nah, you should have dropped him like a hot potato. Even better, get behind him and ask him to step it up a notch.
ReplyDeleteOnce in a while, a young buck blows by me while I'm out riding. I will often respond and draft the kid for a while. Then, when he has expended his energy, I'll pass the poor kid with a "Great day to be on the bicycle."
Of course this can backfire. One day on the way to work I pulled in behind a hot shot who just kept going and going and going. It was me who was exhausted by the time we passed the university and I got to say "thanks for the pull."
These youngsters don't know who they're dealing with. You were too kind.
RSRO,
Jim