Its a new year!

At the start of New Year's Eve, I was 47 miles short of tripping the 3600 mile mark for the 07 season. Being so close I decided to take the new Salsa out for a nice ride.

With the rain passing over night, the weather was perfect. Upper 40's and sunny. I decided to take a spin through Powhatan which is something I had not done in quite some time. So I filled a couple of bottles and loaded my leg up with CarbBoom! and then the CarbBoom! unloaded itself on my leg. Maybe it was its way of telling me that my leg was too fat to fit both my leg and the CarbBoom! packets in my post holiday tighter shorts.

The ride couldn't have been better. Everything seemed to take place so effortlessly. Legs felt great on flats even while fighting through the random gusts of strong wind. Surprisingly my climbing legs were still there as well. Alright so they were there considering the limited amount of saddle time the last couple of months.

On the route home, I took a look at the computer and saw that if I turned towards home I would end up about 6 miles short of my goal of 47 miles. So I decided to take the around my ass to get to my elbow route home. Moments later, chain suck and gear skips from hell. Then nothing! A look down to find there wasn't a chain attached to the bike any longer.

Not having any Shimano connector pins in the bag ( not sure where they went ) it came down to, Do I start walking or call someone? Called someone I did! Dad picked me up and gave me a ride back to the house. I took the time to snap a few pics while sitting on the side of the road.

Hard to make the King hub spin with no chain.

Later that night, Jenn and I ate dinner with her family. Always nice to spend time with them. Afterwards I decided to try the Luna recovery smoothie sample that was sent to us at the store. Have to say I was pretty disappointed in it. It didn't mix well and therefore was a bit chunky. The taste was far from pleasant as well. The only good thing I can say about it was that I was able to finish the whole glass without vomiting. Now there's a quote they could use in their next ad. Ha!

After taking a day off from the saddle on Wed, I met up with Nate yesterday for another longer road ride. We left from his house and road over to meet up with some people from the local road club who were leading a ride from the Hanover Courthouse. On the way over, my chain started to skip around again. Not again I said to myself. A quick diagnosis was that the link I used to put the chain back together had frozen up in the cold. Being about a mile from Cobblestone Bikes, Nate and I swung by there to see if they could loosen it up. Less than 5 minutes later we were back on the road and riding fast over to the courthouse. According to the comp we kept about a 20-21 avg from the shop to the courthouse. My legs felt stupid good and were ready to roll!

Two other brave souls showed for the ride. The route was mostly flat with a two good climbs and one teaser. Again the climbing legs felt pretty good. About half way through the 28 mile loop we were doing with them, my hands began to freeze up. The wind was brutal on them. By the time we finished up that loop my hands had me wanting to step off the bike and cry. 16 more miles back to Nate's and I could do just that. Just that is what I did when we got back!

There were points were I had started to worry about frostbite as the pain would come and go but they would never warm up. Hands were whiter than my pale thighs when I got my gloves off. Took about 20 minutes before I was able to use them to load the bike onto the car. Once I got home I ordered a pair of Amfib Infernos. My hands will never get that cold again!

Commutes to and from work for the next couple of days will be the only saddle time I get until my day off on Sunday. Maybe I can get Jenn out for a ride Sunday afternoon. She is usually the one willing to ride these days. I on the other hand, usually find something else to do. This has got to change and thanks to the La Raza, change has begun.