Super Soaker Saturday

Although I was not thrilled in the least to wake up to the above radar images, I couldn't help but say "rain/shmain, it's Saturday- Time to ride!" Really, the temps were not bad, in the 50s, and yes it was raining and would rain for 99.5% of my ride today, but it wasn't a storm or a downpour, just a steady drizzle.

After Wifey got back from her a.m. run, I donned a fresh chamois (direct from Hammer and ripe for soilage), found my rain jacket and boogied out the door. I hadn't done my local road loop in months! I can get pretty burned out on it, no matter how many ways I mix it up, but today it felt nice and fresh. It's not a long loop, only about 30 miles, but the cool drizzle would make the ride feel much harder and me like a cold wet dog.

I guess it was sorta like a loop in (cold wet) dog years. Maybe instead of saying I did a 31 mile loop, I'll say I did a 50K loop? Kilometers are sorta like the "dog years" of measurement. They make it SOUND longer, PLUS I can sound uber pretentious by throwing around metric lingo even though I live in the U.S.. OK, Metric System- ON!

I started off with the Craft rain jacket on, but that would only last a few K before my core temp was up and I was baking me inside the thing. Even though the drizzle was pretty cold, it wasn't killer, and a base layer, arm warmers and jersey would be enough.... for a while at least.

The constant drizzle pretty much soaked me and at about the 24K mark I was cold. So I pulled over and got the rain jacket back on and threw a wiz. Ahhh, much better. Nothing like riding in a cool rain to A. make you wet, and B. make you have to wiz like freaking steer about every 10K.

My legs felt nice and spanky and it felt good to be on the Campeon. There wasn't much traffic out there today and often I found myself in a complete Zen state. It was so peaceful to roll through the rain with nothing but the sounds of tires on wet pavement and drizzle hitting my helmet and jacket. Those sweet sounds reminded me to throw a big thank you to the Big Guy upstairs for any assistance he may have had in getting my hearing back to near 100%.

I knew I wouldn't be out too long today, only about two hours, so I didn't want to take in too many calories during the ride. I I rolled with only a two bottles of Ghettoade®. I took a gel and two "fun sized" Milky Way bars just in case I got out longer or had a major bonk. In the end I think I only drank about a half a bottle of G-Ade and ate nothing. Nothing like riding 50K on about 60 calories and a half a bottle!!

My crank was soaked, my nether regions shriveled up Sunmaid style, and my hands flirted with rot. Just from 50k!! Eeesh, if I had gone longer shit would have just started falling off of ME and my bike. Tonight is going to lube-tastic. You know, for my bike. Of course if I GET to bust out any lube the day just got a bit better!! ;) Sorry.

Of course I would have loved to have got a longer ride in. BUT I am pretty happy to be getting a 50K loop in in the middle of November. Tomorrow will be a bigger challenge since temps are supposed to drop tonight and the "S" word has been mentioned a few times.

One of the final cool parts of my day was saying enough is enough of the Light beers shit and treating myself to a few fresh bought Sierra Nevada Celebration Ales. One of about 2 or 3 good things about this time of year. I of course will have to limit myself to 2 or 3 so as to avoid monkeying with my bloods PT levels, But I figured since I'm only letting myself have beer on Saturday night (for medical AND weight loss reasons) I'm going to enjoy a REAL beer!! And I gotta tell you it is tasting pretty damn good. BTW the '08 Celeberation Ale is HOP-FRIGGIN'-TASTiC! Mmmmmm.

Lastly- Some Salsa tid bits. I got a few product updates via my old team Bikeman.com yesterday. It seems that Salsa dealers should have at least a few Big Mama's in stock as well as some of the Salsa 2009 Team gear. The 2009 Kit is friggin's sweet and I gotz me some crossed fingers that an item or two makes it from Salsa HQ to my ass in 2009.

Time to get in the White Trash Mexican cooking Zzzzzone and bean it up!!

Later.