Galena

Never let it be said that I don’t know how to pick the perfect weekend, oh no! It’s been nice for the last couple of weeks, and it’s the end of APRIL, for chrissake, so one would have a reasonable assumption that the weather would be decent enough to do a training weekend in Galena, right? Umm, no. That would be a big fat no.

Friday the 25th

The fun starts right away, as I leave my place after feeding the turkey vultures that flock to my backyard and meet up with Deanna for the drive out there, talking her into driving so that my mom can use my car. As I’m about to put Sálome carefully on Deanna’s behind-the-car bike rack, she races over to stop me, saying that her bike has to go on the inside, due to some kind of “flux capacitator issues that would destroy the integrity” of her bike because it has 650 wheels. Hmm. As we’re driving, the bikes are swaying every which way because of the crazy winds, so we’re driving slowly and at one point we get a lot of honking, waving, and an enthusiastic thumbs up from a guy who passes us – and as he does we see that he has a USAT sticker on his car. Ah, one of our people. We manage to make it in one piece - just in time for it to start monsooning. Sigh. We all put our bikes on the back porch, and I’m getting very agitated with the clumsy folks stumbling around back there adjusting this or that on their bikes. Finally, words of wisdom from Colleen: “Perhaps you should put Sálome in the house?” There is a reason that woman is a professor. I put Sálome safely away inside the house, and I can rest easy. Or maybe that was due to the margaritas.

Saturday morning

The day dawns sunny....and cold. And even from inside the house, we can tell it’s windy. Nevertheless, most of us set out in various groups. Robyn stays behind due to some odd aversion to being cold-as-shit, and Joe stays behind because we force him to so that he can bake cookins for us. Hey, someone has to make sacrifices, and it’s not going to be us.

I set out with Deanna, Kristin and Susan, and by the time we get down the first big hill, I’m so cold that my feet and hands are numb. Oh, and my ears are frozen, but who needs those? Luckily, when Bridget had asked me if she should bring Precious for me “just in case” (knowing that I’ve only been on one lone outdoor ride with Sálome and Galena isn’t the best place to practice riding on a new bike), I had a moment of temporary lucidity and said “sure, why not!” So at least as I’m almost being blown off the road, it’s not on my Shiny New Bike. Whew!

A few miles later

My feet fall off.

One mile later

At the top of one particularly nasty hill, I tell the girls that I’ve lost my feet, and so I’m not going to do the entire loop as planned, but will do the mini-loop, going along the current road to Stagecoach and so on. Still a decent ride with enough hills – there’s no escaping them out here. Then I’ll take the shortcut road (ha!) back to the house. Off we go on our separate ways.

Stagecoach Road

Okay, so the other road was bad enough because of the crosswinds, which were so strong that I actually had to deliberately lean into the wind so that I wouldn’t get blown over. But now on Stagecoach the problem is that not only are there the same wicked winds, but there are also more cars, so now I have to worry about getting blown in front of one of them, especially since there’s no shoulder, just gravel. I wind up walking up one rather wimpy hill, just because the road is twisty and narrow and has blind curves from both directions. Finally (!) I get to a road leading back into the territories. I think I remember how to get back to the house.......

Some road in the Territories

The woman I’m attempting to flag down as she’s going the other way in her minivan seems oddly reluctant to roll down her window – what, does she think a frozen, footless person with a bike is somehow going to carjack her? I find out that N. Clark, the street our house is on, is waaaaay far away, after I go up this hill, up another one, make a left, keep going forever, and then I’ll eventually get to it. Fantastic. What was it I had told myself about these damn shortcuts? Soon, I see a golfing foursome on the eagle Ridge golf course, and think, what kind of idiot do you have to be to be playing GOLF in this weather? Sheesh.

As I’m riding back, suddenly there’s a car behind me honking its horn repeatedly – I’m about to give them “a salute in the Chicago way,” as we say, when I see that it’s a couple of our cyclists being shuttled back to the house. I finally get to N. Clark, and am so giddy with excitement at almost being back that I cycle on furiously.....until I remember that we’re not actually on N. clark, but on the first small street that turns off of it. Oops. As I pull into the driveway, Robyn has dropped off her wayward cyclist passengers and is on her way to pick up two more, Deanna and Susan. Apparently they can’t deal with the wind anymore and called the house to have someone pick them up. I ask Joe to go look for my feet where I left them, somewhere on Elizabeth Scales Mound Road or thereabouts, and go to take a hot shower to thaw out, where I watch the chunks of ice that are substituting for my feet go from bone white to purple to red to tingly pain. Kind of like the ROYGBIV of foot problems.

Soon, Deanna walks into the house practically in tears.

Deanna: “That wasn’t fun.” (sniffle) “That really wasn’t fun (sniffle).....I almost got blown into a ditch about six times (sniffle)......but I made it up the hill, did you make it up the hill, you know, that hill? Huh huh, did you?”
Me: “No, I didn’t make it up that f&*(ing hill. My feet had fallen off at that point.”
Deanna: “Well, I made it up the hill. It’s too bad you didn’t make it up the hill. Though I did. On my super-light Cervelo P2C, which is so light it helped me just SPIN up all the hills. I love hills! And they love me! I just spun right up all of them! But then I lost speed on the downhills, because I’m so tiny and my bike is so light. Yes, I weigh so little and I’m so tiny that...hey, why are you taking my measurements with that little tape measure? And who are you calling? Are you mfphsfphf.....”
Me, on the phone: “Hello, Acme Blue Barrel Company? I’ve figured out what size barrel I need – in fact, I have the exact dimensions.”

As I was making my call, for some odd reason Deanna suddenly found herself unable to speak. It might have been due to the compression sock stuffed into her mouth, but I’m not sure.

That evening, as we're discussing our rides, I find out that I'm the only one who went riding on Stagecoach, as everyone else decided it was too dangerous. Oh. Need I remind you of my motto here? Funny how it seems more and more apt with every passing day.


Sunday, day of sloth

Since it’s still about 25 degrees outside and I need to pack up to get to my mom’s for Easter lunch, I decide to stay in and try to put the X-lab behind-the-seat bottle holder onto Sálome, though I’m not sure I have either the education level or even just the tools to get the job done. Deanna says she’ll help me, and we manage to get the X-lab on, though it doesn’t look quite right as the water bottle cages are basically parallel to the ground. This seems odd, though Deanna insists that it’s on right even as she’s complaining how heavy it is as we’re screwing it on. “I can’t hold onto it, it’s so heaaaavy!”

As I distract Deanna by throwing a random carbon fiber shiny object into the kitchen, I pick up my bike and then hers to make sure mine is lighter, even though she keeps trying to foil me by buying lighter and lighter CF doodads. Damn, I think she has in fact trumped me, with her CF hydrotail, compared to my “old school” clunky metal x-lab. It’s tough to tell though. This is her plan – if she gets her bike light enough, she doesn’t even have to train. Or maybe even do any races – they can just calculate her time based on bike weight. As I put Salome down and dash to her bike to lift it and thus compare again, I hear Joe-Joe’s shout of horror, the one that speaks to horrible things happening to my beautiful bike, and turn around just in time to see a small teeter from Salome. I decide to stop with this foolishness. Deanna’s just jealous because my bike, the beautiful Felt B12, won in the “Most Pretty” category in Bikesport Michigan’s poll of all triathletes between the ages of 34 and 37 who walked into their store on a random Tuesday in March. If that’s not the final arbiter of all that is holy in triathlon stuff, then you tell me what is.

Besides, my super-secret training plan is to make sure that for all training, my bike is as HEAVY as possible. Lead weights in the bento box, etc. That way when I get rid of that stuff for races, I’ll fly like the wind. Clearly, Deanna is still in the neophyte stage of her triathlon career and doesn’t think to use such sophisticated tactics as myself. Maybe someday.