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| Time to ride |
Snow and wind last night, 50 mph gusts shaking the early flowering magnolia bushes. Snow in the pre-dawn. Waken to melted roads & coated trees, shrubbery, lawns. Intermittent snow showers. And, increasingly, a lot of blue sky and April morning sun. Dripping eaves.
I raced to gear-up. Though the sun was out, the temperature hovered around the freezing mark. I dressed exactly, the chosen layers perfect. I encountered winds, a driving snow squall, and wet pavement throughout but I was perfectly comfortable the entire hour's ride.
Only an hour, true. But an hour of Rasputitsa simulation. I deliberately sought out the weird unpaved roads in Woo proper. A deliberate neighborhood meander. Coes Reservoir. Canada geese beak to the rage. Gates Lane a muddy ruin.
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| Coes Reservoir |
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| Gates Lane, April 3, 2016 |
The whole point was to steal a few miles on the Crux Elite, to get out there in cold weather, fully geared up, and pedal into the maw of whatever. Whatever turned out to be a snow squall on the long climb from Cherry Valley up Goddard Memorial Drive toward the airport. Blowing winds and snow. I loved it. It was unexpected.
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| Goddard Memorial Drive |
I ended the ride with a climb to Bancroft Tower .
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| Bancroft Tower, April 3, 2016 |
You Shadman! Out in the hovering-near-freezing, actively choosing the dirt and dreck to test the superiority of your scales, your silvery shining Shadman armor, testing, trying, taunting, triumphing. Patton would embrace you and kiss your sweat-streaked cheeks and pin a medal on your paperbagged breast. Capt. Dubstoyevsky, to the fore! (Trumpets blare, the sargaent barks: "Ready - Aim - Fire!" The muskets explode, the air grows pungent with spent saltpeter.) And this is not even the test! It's only the prep! You are the deci-essential demi-sel Dubstrosity himself, Oh Monsieur Lescaret, voloiste des Artes et Kilometers, many of them in awful conditions. I wish you guys a productive and useful final week of preparation - a week from tomorrow right? To the Northern Kingdom! (But not if it's fricking snowing and or raining, please.) SCROID
ReplyDeleteHail Scrodicus! Your enthusiastic yawping imbues the Shad train with determination. Yes yes, a week to go. Rasputitsa Style!
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