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"It's really raining out there..."
From today's almost-daily diary entry (www.ChainReaction.com/diary.htm)
02/15/05 7:18am- "MIKE, KEVIN HERE, IT'S REALLY RAINING OUT THERE" said the voice mail that came in while I was getting my bike ready. "Give me a call if you're still planning to ride." So I call him back, and he tells me that it's really dumping, as if I can't look through the window and see all the water that's pouring over the gutters that I haven't cleaned. I tell him of course I'm still going to ride. That's what I do. I ride, on Tuesdays and Thursday mornings, no matter what. But Kevin decides to stay indoors, saying that he needs to get some decent rain gear. As if. As if it really makes a huge difference; when you've got a ride with lots of climbing, you've got the choice of either getting soaked from the inside (sauna effect) or the outside (rain). Still, you at least have the choice. Just saw a couple other cyclists out there, both on Canada on my way to the start. Brave souls, they, as it was seriously dumping at the time. In fact, it kept on dumping all the way to the top of King's, where the heavy rain was replaced by heavy fog. Too bad, as it takes some of the "epic" nature away when a ride starts gnarly but ends on a softer note. One benefit to nasty weather though- the car traffic always seems substantially lighter. The biggest effect rain has on my ride is to lengthen it by maybe 15 minutes or so. Some of the extra time comes from the fact that the Iron Pig (my rain bike) weighs a whole lot more and just isn't all that fun to ride. No STI shifting, cranks a bit on the short side (170s while I'm used to riding 175s these days), and gears that aren't quite as low as they ought to be (42 front/23 rear vs 34 front/27 rear on the 5900). But, it works, and when it gets all messed up you don't have to worry about having destroyed expensive equipment. I thought about shortening the ride a bit by lopping off the Old LaHonda west-side loop, but according to my bathroom scale, that wouldn't have been a good idea. (Why do we keep scales in the bathroom anyway? Wouldn't they have more effect if we kept them near the dining room table?). Overall, it was a good ride. Certainly not fast, but sometimes you need to ride just because you can, and if the weather is foul enough that people would think you crazy for wanting to, well, that's all the better. The only thing that could have made it even better would have been if the rain had kept up through the day, since bragging rights are greatly diminished when the day becomes not-so-bad, even though it was insane when you were out there. "You rode today?" If it's a Tuesday or Thursday, the question is entirely rhetorical. It's what I do. --Mike Jacoubowsky Chain Reaction Bicycles www.ChainReaction.com IMBA, BikesBelong, NBDA member |
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