Sun, Sep 20 2009 - Rye Ridge (View Original Event Details)
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Usually you thank the attendees for the great ride, and I will, kinda, eventually, but for now, the first thanks goes to the Mother Nature, without whose warm and sunny appearance, albeit an appearance so late as to be really pushing the wire, I would be strung up and naked in a little 8x10 cabin with the female contingent of the trip having stripped me and split my clothes between them so they could stay warm and alive.
Second of all, I'd like to thank my hot water tank for being there when I really needed him (he's in the garage utility room, the man-cave, thus he's a he), after the ride.
Third I'm not sure whether to thank the female contingent for not killing me or for bearing with me after some of them considered turning around at the 20% mark.
Finally the other (2) guys who led the way, but usually while leaving me behind them to single handedly pled for mercy from the female riders.
I also learned a few other things today. From now on when theweathernetword (r) says 1-2mm of rain, I will understand it to be a typo and they mean 1-2 METERS. And when they say the rain will be stopping around noon, I will tag on an unwritten "AND THEN IT WILL START TO SNOW".
The ride was interesting. The weather wasn't great to start but the "forecast" suggested it should be better by the time we got there. When we got there, it had been a 150km drive so we said, "screw it, let's go, it can't get much worse". But it did. It was drizzly (fo' shizzley), rainy, foggy, then snowy. I was concerned about hypothermia and the like. Finally we got to a little cabin in the woods where we huddled around for a communal lunch and wringing out of the socks. It brightened up a bit and we continued (a loop and we were past the 1/2 way mark).
And finally, with a heraldic trumpet from the angels, the clouds broke just as we were pedalling (pushing, swearing) up to the top of the ridge and the views. Wow, it almost made it worth it all. Some say it did, me... meh. Actually it was pretty spectacular. And it stayed mostly sunny and much warmer feeling all the way down for the 6ish km of mostly coasting downhill. And warmish feeling so the 1/2 dozen or so creek crossings didn't cause quite so much shrinkage. Special commendation to Michelle for riding through a creek for possibly the first time ever.
In spite of the rain, the dryness of K-country sucked it all up and it was surprisingly NOT muddy.
Today's Dead Cat Bounce Award goes to .... Erica who bounced about 3cm vertically and about 10cm horizontally after a spectacular crash caused by riding over a small, tippy rock. Rocks are evil. By the way, I was right behind her at the same speed and my GPS says I was doing 26km/h. OUCH !! Runner up goes to Phyliss who didn't bounce at all, but that was because the depth of water in the creek she was riding through was deep enough to slow down her descent before she hit rock bottom.
In all seriousness, THANK YOU to all you who completed a very mentally and physically demanding ride. You can congratulate yourselves on doing a tough 32km with about 800m of cumulative climbing!!