Words

My mind plays a sound track while I ride. I'm not sure if everybody does this or if it's just me. I used to sing to the inside of my helmet during moto rides, even when I was racing. On cycling rides I'll ask the crew if they've heard of this song or that song and I usually get a "no, not really" and I figure it's just because they're younger and don't know the huge sound track that I do. But maybe they just don't have one playing all the time. It can get irritating to have a song stuck on an endless loop in my head. Sometimes it's not a song I really like. On a recent ride I mentioned that the tune King Tut was stuck in there then Mingo piped up and said that Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer was currently running on his play list. So you can guess what replaced King Tut. In fact even now that song is starting to play. No! Stop it! There, that's better.

On one of our night rides Steve A. kept reaching down to adjust his shock. So the Van Halen song Panama started playing. You know "reached down between my legs, eased the seat back". Now that should be playing in your head right now. If it's not then you don't have this problem. On a Forest Meadows night ride I had a tune that I don't even know the name of but it has a chorus that goes "and all the girls say he's pretty fly for a white guy" I mean, where does that even come from?

I took my MP3 player to Munson one summer afternoon with some old Who songs I'd just downloaded and even though I'd heard these songs thousands of times when I combined them with the ride on this perfect afternoon they had a new sound to them. Now when I hear "Rain on Me" I picture that afternoon automatically, kinda like a music video.

I know the words to hundreds of songs. I can't remember your name but I can remember all the words to "Closer to Home" or "Tangled Up In Blue". This makes the mental sound track thing a little easier to explain. It also drives Rupe crazy. When I'm listening to the classic rock station on XM I can (and do) sing along to all the songs. Not only is my voice irritating but he can't believe I know all the words.

So, can you or do you play the mental song game? I bet W.B. does. I've done it for so long I just assumed everyone else did it. Maybe that's not right. Oh well "King Tut" is starting to loop back around again, I've got to go.

Long Ride

When it's 104 outside you can't imagine what it would feel like to be cold. But cold it is. Our night rides started out in the 50's, then the 40's, and on the most recent ride crept into the upper 30's not long after we started. Every time I leave the house I think "this is as cold as I'm going to ride in". Yet I show up the next ride thinking "it doesn't feel too bad". By the time we are 30 minutes in I'm warm and even sweating a little bit. The more of these rides I do the better understanding I have of what I need to wear and not wear.



The up grade on Stumpy is going well. My new Mavic wheel set made a huge difference in how the bike rides. The Crank Brother's carbon bars didn't make as much of a difference but then again I really didn't think they would. I went with a flatter bar with less sweep than I had in the stock bars and along with the Ergon grips the numbness I was getting after 30 minutes of riding hasn't come back. Now I'm shopping for a new drive train (do cyclists call them that?), cranks, chain, and rear cassette. I'm sure before I make every purchase that this is the part that will make me faster and give me the confidence to tackle some of those obstacles that the rest of this crew just floats over. But alas, there has been some progress, just not as much as I was hoping for. The biggest progress is in the money leaving my bank account.



The long paved/graded road ride called the Dirty Ron was last weekend. We finished with a little over 60 miles in 4 plus hours of pedaling. The weather couldn't have been any better and the views of the south Georgia farm land never got old. You see so much more from the bike than you do out of the window of a vehicle. The after ride party at the goat farm was amazing. Even though I was too chicken to try the sheep/goat chili the hospitality of our hosts went above and beyond. I do wonder how I was the one who got stuck with starting the hamburger cooking fire and got out of the truck to open most of the gates on the tour. At my advanced age you'd think some of these young whippersnappers would have given me a little slack. Not this group. They did let me tag a yellow sign though.



While we were sitting by the fire enjoying some brews after the ride it reminded me of all the times my old moto crew sat around smokey camp fires while on our many adventures from Colorado to Kerr City. I am very fortunate to be able to have done the things I've done and even more fortunate to still be able to do them.



I'm sorry I don't have any pictures to post with this little blog. The only camera I have that works is too big to carry on the bicycle. I have asked Santa to bring me one for Christmas so we'll see how good of a boy I've been.



Speaking of Christmas now that Rupe is 14 I can't just go to the store and pick out gifts for him like I used to. Everything he wants just about has to come from Best Buy or Higher Ground and nothing in either of those places is cheap. I guess I have only myself to blame. He didn't get to ride with us this past weekend but he went both days the weekend before. The night rides are difficult for him because of basketball practice plus he doesn't have as much cold weather gear as I do (and I refuse to share). On our last ride I was huffing pretty hard to stay in front of him in the trees and only able to gap him when we got on more open stuff. The day is coming.



Not much cycling wise on the calendar until San Felasco on January 8th. We've got a lot of time off around the holidays so I hope to get some bike time in during the daylight. Maybe even a couple of rounds of golf to break things up. Life is good!