Ride # 51: In Between Showers

Thursday afternoon around 4:30
May 22
Damp and overcast

Another day when I almost didn't ride. It rained earlier, a heavy downpour around noon and then sporadically through early afternoon. Then it stopped and the streets began drying out. It was cool and overcast and I wore tights, a long sleeve and a short sleeve bike jersey, a windbreaker. Rain threatened, a thick gray sky heavy with moisture.

Forest Gnome

But it did not rain. The entire ride was dry. Even better, the thick moisture-heavy day pulsed with emerging greenery, whole roadways lined with fecund green, glorious to ride through.

Upper North Row Road

Approaching Sholan Farm
County Cork

Question I pondered at one point:

If you were having the time of your life and you knew you were having the time of your life, really KNEW it, and knew too that it would never again be as good as the time of your life you were having, would you approach things differently?

Ride Summary: 17.89 miles (28 K), 14.4 mph. No road kill. A few big crows. A few places that felt like Ireland.

Note that the Strava stats differ from those above because I got about 3 miles into the ride and realized I'd left my phone at home on the deck, exposed to potential rain. So I went back for it and only then was I able to start tracking the ride.

Ride # 50: To the Summit

I Shad and The General
Tuesday afternoon
May 20

Ride # 50 on the year! A milestone. Certainly the earliest in a "season" that I've notched this many rides before. With Jah's blessing and the grace of supernatural trolls, karma, Dharma, and dumb luck I'll manage to keep riding at this pace until the end of the year.

But best not think beyond the next ride. Or, in this case, Tuesday's ride which turned out to be a focused dash for the summit of Wachusett.

At first, leaving as late in the day as I did (5:15), I didn't think I had the time or energy to actually make a cheeky assault on the mountain but as I got a few miles into the ride and felt pretty strong I thought, why not go for it? So I did and felt better and better, stronger and stronger as I went. In fact, for perhaps the first time I actually powered hard up the last third of the mountain, standing up and hammering relentlessly right to the summit. My legs didn't feel heavy or thick or uncooperative. They churned with a strength that usually isn't there on those final 100 yards up to the rocky crest. Allez!

Wachusett Summit looking south toward Worcester

Ride Summary: 27.5 miles (44 K), 14.4 mph, almost two hours total (much of it climbing). 3,050 feet elevation gain. Strava details. Felt thoroughly pumped and strong the whole way.

Road Kill: One garter snake I didn't stop to photograph.

NOTE: Apologies for the rides posted out of sequence (#49 posted before #48), oh well.

Rides # 48: It Was Supposed to Rain and Didn't

Saturday afternoon, May 17th, 4:00
70 degrees

The forecast had been for rain all weekend. Instead, we enjoyed the finest weather we've seen yet this spring. Low humidity, deep blue sky, bright sun, occasional puffy clouds, temperatures in the low to mid 70s, perfect cycling weather.

These are the days of Blooming and the twin cherry trees dazzle in front of Chez Shad as I hoof it past them.

Chez Shad and The Cherry Tree Blooming

I'd intended that ride #48 be a longer affair but the day got away from me and, as I was committed to traveling to Sunderland in the evening to take part in the annual Asparagus Party that a close friend holds each year, I necessarily had to do a shorter ride than hoped for. Nevertheless, I made the most of the 90 some minutes I had by foraying west into the Princeton Hills.

Knowing the ride would be limited in scope, I hammered from the get-go. In the first few miles, my knees felt weird, uncomfortable, like there were little puffy sacs of pain and fluid just below each knee cap. I tried to focus my thoughts and sensation elsewhere. On the long neighborhood hill climb in the first mile of setting out, I tried pay attention to my pedal stroke, to summoning equal effort on all 360 degree positions of each rotation. I also paid attention to my breath.

And then I was through the neighborhood, past the senior citizen center, past Rockwell Pond, and starting into the hills.

In the lemony circle of the Most High

Well-rested, unencumbered by gear or clothing layers, feeling positively alive and tireless, I easily could have headed to the mountain, or extended the ride to 30 or 40 miles but I didn't have the luxury of time. Instead, I powered hard in the time I had. My knees felt fine after a few miles. I practiced deep breathing and imagined the oxygen flowing down my spine, through my glutes, across my archipelagic thighs and infusing the Plain of Hamstring with airy energy.

Ride Summary: 20 miles (32K), 14.1 mph, about 85 minutes or so. I saw an eastern towhee, a striking bird of black, white, and russet. Towhees tend to scratch around in the bracken and the one I saw was doing just that close to the road's edge. Strava ride details.

Road Kill: One dumb dead opossum.

Ride # 49: Riding to Overcome the Asparagus Party Debauchery

Sunday Afternoon, 1:00
Fine Tuning before the Launch

Another awesome weather day. No humidity, bright sun tempered by huge puffy clouds on a deep blue background. Low wind. With the Niceness!

I've been tracking my food intake religiously for over a year (via www.livestrong.com/myplate) and have lost about 22 lbs in 14 months. I've actually reached a certain point of stasis whereby I fluctuate by a few lbs depending on the recent few days of eating/drinking and riding or not riding. Last night at the asparagus party I ate and drank with abandon. Instead of (gulp!) trying to itemize my vast consumption, I just recorded a ballpark number of calories consumed (I went with 2200 given the beer, lamb, jerk chicken, rice & vegetables, corn bread, challah bread pudding, cupcakes, and chocolate peanut butter balls I consumed). This morning I note that I gained two lbs from yesterday, logging in at 148.2 lbs (67 KG).

All the more reason to go BIG.

Today, I manage to leave early enough to have time for a reasonably long ride (though not early enough to do the proverbial 60+ miles ride that every weekend I imagine myself doing). But feeling slightly taxed from last night's indulgences, I am not up for a lot of climbing so eschew the western route and the Princeton Hills and instead head northeast into the semi-rural commuter towns of Lunenburg, Shirley, Groton, Pepperell, Devens. I conceive of the course as I pedal. Part of it, I decide, should take in the Nashua River Rail Trail. I generally avoid community rail trails on nice weekend afternoons because they are busy with weekend bikers, inline skaters, dog walkers, etc., but today it makes sense to incorporate about seven miles of this trail to provide a car-free passage between Pepperell and Ayer and the last leg of the ramble.

Rail Trail Style

Bubble It Dub
In the scruffy town of Ayer

Ride Summary: 40 miles (64 K), 16 mph, 3,062 feet of elevation according to strava (and I thought I was avoiding climbing), two and a half hours a-spin. Lemonstar - Lunenburg - Groton - Shirley - Pepperell - Groton - Devens - Shirley - Lemonstar.

Road Kill: A bad day road kill. I arrived too late to save the big water snake I came upon dead on its back near a culvert.

Water Snake, West Groton

A large fisher buzzed with flies and the stench of decay (it had been dead more than a day for sure).

Fisher, all dignity gone

Finally, I happened upon what I thought was a dead monarch butterfly. However, it turned out to be alive but on its back upside down and struggling mightily. I gave it my finger, it grabbed on and righted itself but when I let it go, it fluttered but couldn't stay aloft. I left it on the road side, off the tarmac at least. But I doubt it lived.

Butterfly that probably didn't live

Ride # 47: Temperature Drop

Tuesday, May 13
4:00 in the afternoon
cold 50s

Yesterday in Cambridge where I went to hear Michael Pollan speak about the importance of cooking food (real food), the temperature in Harvard Sq. was 89 degrees (31 C). Today, setting out on a raw, overcast day in a rancid mist, the temperature was a wretched 52 F. That's a 37 degree drop. I was back in tights and  a fleece top. I tucked a paper bag against my chest. I wore full finger gloves. It was like March all over again.

But ride I did anyway. More hills, more sweet climbing. But there was an air of sullenness about the hills today as if they were happy to wreck the cadence of a cycling enthusiast, as if a momentary lack of focus would result in catastrophe. I paid very close attention and pedaled with force and conviction.

In the end, it was a workman-like foray into the hilly wilds. Felt great. The back and hip have both gotten better. Am still stretching before and after riding, and that continues to help. Allez!

Ride Summary: 23 miles, 14.2 mph, 98 minutos. No fresh road kill. Strava stats.

Parting Shot

Orange Clad Shad

Ride #'s 45 & 46: The Wild Blue Yonder and the Blooming of Spring

The Beginning of Real Spring
Saturday Afternoon 4:30
75 degrees and humid

Ride #45 on Saturday afternoon was, by necessity, a wink and breath, nothing more. 9.8 miles, a quick ride to keep the metabolism firing at a high cadence. There was no time for a real ride. I always held 10 miles as the minimum requirement to qualify as a numbered ride so I lump Saturday's by-necessity quick 9.8 time trial up to Sholan Farms and back into the two overall weekend rides. One was brief, the other massive.

Late Saturday before the imminent arrival of dinner guests, I undertook the Brief Sprint for Metabolism Enervation, an insistent dash to Sholan Farm when prudence suggested that I should not. I flew in the shadow of thunder gods, clouds of plentiful ire. It was fantastic.

In the Ire of Thor Hushovd, the God of Thunder

Sunday was something else entirely. Ride #46, early afternoon, the day an absolute gem of a Sunday in May. The quintessential Mother's Day. Total blue sky. A deep, rich blue. NO clouds. Consequently, completely sunny. The Unadulterated Sun of Plenty. And warm! 80 degrees. Vast.

Vast

I wanted to go BIG today, do either a lot of miles or a lot of climbing. It turned out to be climbing, 3100 feet (according to my strava reading), a three hour ramble that took in the Drumlin in Lancaster, a hefty stretch of rt 62 in Princeton, a determined grind on Mountain Rd, the Summit Rd climb, and Upper Justice Hill Rd on the way back to Chez Shad.

Ended up with a fantastic day in the saddle on the best weather day of the year. A Vitamin D debauch. I yearned to absorb the light and the air as I zipped through it at 20 mph. I was a blur, a hurtling succulent sluicing in every sunbeam and every wind gust that exploded around the mountain and crashed into me. Wind! Light! Air! The planet!

And birds. A raven, a robin, a red-winged black bird. A red tail hawk. Innumerable small sparrows a-flutter from road side to shrub.

The sun boomed. The wind gusted.

Today's meandering path to the mountain top took me past Sholan Farms and then south to Lancaster for a Drumlin drive-by, then across the wide Davis Farm Stand flats to the center of Sterling. Out the other side quickly and a meditative if arduous march upwards in the general direction of The Mountain (the quarry) on roads relatively new to me. At one point I rode a ways on the narrow and cracked tarmac of Redemption Rock Trail and then logged several miles on equally narrow and dicey rt. 62. Those are the sinewy & dangerous tendons that stitch together fantastic meanders like today's. You undertake them with an equanimity of spirit and pedal with tenacity and a concern for the Most High.

Then it was The Mountain. Mont Vontusett. The Wachusett. The coup de climb. The gates still closed so no motor vehicles. Pavement smooth and clean. A joy of an ascent.

Summit

I achieved the hat trick. Thrice in a week I spun my wheels on Wachusett's rocky dome. Which is telling. Making a direct foray to the top of Wachusett, a 27 mile round trip ride, used to be a killer. Now? Today I finished with 42 miles and though I definitely felt like I did a huge ride, I didn't feel sapped of energy or bodily beaten down; I felt tired in a good way. I was hungry. And very much alive.

In the Great Blue Yonder

Ride Summary: 42.44 miles (67 K), 14.3 mph, a whisper shy of three hours astraddle. Windy! Plenty of head winds made several stretches additionally challenging. Great views from Wachusett. Clear air, not too humid. Mt. Monadnock clear and looming to the north.

Road Kill: Snakepocalypse. Three snakes today. The first one I came upon must have been killed within the hour; I was that close to saving it. The second and third were slain just a few feet apart at Bartlett Pond Brook on Hobbs Rd. Ugly business.

Snake # 1, a garter snake

Snake # 2, a water snake

Snake # 3, another garter snake

Parting Shot

Shad rides but Nature calls

Ride # 44: Lemonstar Wachusett Loop Style

Backyard 
Thursday 4:00 PM
75 degrees

I Shad and the honey cherry tree halo

The Goal
Mt Wachusett on the horizon

On the way to the top

Summit Style

Ride Summary: 31.3 miles (49 K), 13.4 mph, two hours and change of hard climbing. 3,285 feet.

Finally, a warm day! 75 degrees (23 C) at departure. Shorts and short sleeves and it felt great. I felt great. Strong, loose, energized, light on the bike. InI offer thanks and praises to the Most High! Climbing was a joy. Ride to Climb as the imaginary bumper sticker in my mind reads. My cycling mantra.

I didn't see any road kill today. But I did see (or hear) cardinals, crows, a red tail hawk, some Canada geese, a mockingbird, some red-winged black birds.

My Strava data for today's ride.