Off season shenanigans

Last year, during our cycling road trip to Colorado, I made a comment about our waitress being a “buxom blonde” and the mocking was commenced immediately.  I was dutifully reminded by my younger cycling friends that no one says buxom anymore except for us old guys.  I can only imagine how they will respond to my using the word shenanigans in the title.  As you read on you will hopefully agree that no other word would do.

A group of us met on Sunday for an easy 50-mile ride that included a stop at the Wild Flour Bread Bakery in Freestone.  Now, we are all in the off season so rides are supposed to be easy.  However, a few of us like to kick up the intensity from time to time.  These are usually short spurts of energy lasting less then 5-minutes. 

As we gathered to get things started there were some immediate clues that this was going to be a fun ride.  To begin, everyone seemed much excited about the bakery stop then the ride itself.  Then we notice David is wearing one black and one brown sock.  This immediately prompted a FB entry to his wife asking her to be more careful when laying his clothes out the night before.

Finally, we are off.  The ride does start easy with everyone riding together and chatting away.  We go over a small climb together as a group.   The final part of the descent is a mild 2% grade and as I descend Pat comes flying around me with Ross in tow.  So I join the train for my first 5-minute burst.  Then I attack and as I pass Pat I give him a big ole smile.  As anticipated, Pat counter attacks and as he comes around me I simply sit up, down shift and watch him hammer himself to the stop sign.  As he looked back and realized what I had done I received my first 1-finger salute of the day.

We regroup and keep rolling along.  I convince some of our group to do at least one city limit sign sprint at the town of Valley Ford.  Sarah doesn’t think there is a city limit sign but I convince everyone there is.  As we approach a small rise about a mile out, I attack again.  I am holding a solid pace with Pat and Ross.  David, Sarah and others are chasing hard from behind.  With the town in view, Pat and Ross attack and once again I sit up.  I see them riding hard and looking for the city limit sign that never appeared.  I’ll let you decide if I knew it was there or not.

After our bakery stop (a requirement for all off season rides through Freestone), it was up a small hill into Occidental.  Once again I attack, once again Pat counter attacks, and once again I sit up after he passes me.  About half way up the climb he sees me falling back because it’s hard to pedal and laugh hysterically at the same time.  He then drops back and shares a few thoughts with me which should probably not be repeated.

With the ride winding down we head out of Monte Rio for home.  David, and his different colored socks, takes the front.  He starts out a little too fast and pulls away.  He sees there is a gap and drops back and settles into the perfect pace.  However, once he quit looking back I motion to everyone behind me to slow down.  A minute later, David looks back and we are gapped again.  He looks at us, looks at his cyclometer and looks back at us slightly confused.  He drops back to pick us up again and the whole process gets repeated.  This time he realizes he is being messed with and rides away leaving all of us to chase him down.

There you have it.  It was a great ride that felt a lot more like playing then exercise.  It reminds of playing games with my 6 year old niece who has a knack for making up the rules as she goes.  The result was a lot of laughter, some great camaraderie, and, in the end, one hell of a work out.

No wonder I like the off season.

Ciao!