Saturday, November 11, 2006

Saturday morning ride

The underside of an abandoned train bridge.




I had just finished my 32 mile ride and it was a beautiful crisp fall morning


Shot of Riverfront Park from across the river



Just nice shot of the Little Rock skyline with fall colors.
Got up this morning and enjoyed a leisure breakfast of pancakes and a juice glass of chocolate milk and played with Sadie for a bit. About 8 I was geared up and ready for my morning ride. I flipped on the tube to check the weather. I knew it was chilly since I had let Sadie out earlier. Brrr, it's 44 outside with the wind blowing down from the north. I drove down to the river instead of riding the bike down there (I know, I'm whimmy). It seems when the cold weather hits it takes 30 minutes to suit up and make sure you have everything. The little things like Chapstick can make or break a ride some days. The group from J&P Bike Shop are rolling in as they are finishing up. They are wrapped up tight. Looks like a blizzard about to hit. I pretty much layer almost as much. Base layer, jersey, wind jacket, shorts, tights, 2 pairs of socks, cap, helmet, full fingered gloves. See what I mean?! HA!
I push off from the riverboat parking lot and the wind comes in bursts. I'd be riding along doing fine then swoosh and the bike shakes. The wind was coming straight down the river and at times there was no shelter from it. You had to just put your head down and plow through. It wasn't real hard but I'll say this much, there were small white caps on the river.
As I went over the long wooden bridge into Burn's Park the Cannondale demo truck was unloading. Lots of mountain bikes which you could take out and ride. It was still about 30 minutes before the scheduled time for them to be there but it appeared they were ready to go. On my way back later they had a nice crowd. Sorry, no photo's since I forgot to take my camera on the ride.
As I got over the Big Bridge, which was cross wind madness, I looped under and headed out to I-430. Once I got there I was feeling good so I climber River Mtn. Even though it was windy I felt I had a good climb and turned around at the top and zipped down. Back during the summer I was having some weird sort of wobble when I would go down hills once I hit about 25 mph the bike just didn't feel solid. I had that happen going down so I slowed down. The strange thing was that I had no problem coming down Ft Roots a bit later. I let it go wide open until just before the first switchback.
After I came down off of River Mtn Road I had wonderful tail wind pushing me and riding 25, 26 mph was so easy. I sort of felt for the folks that were riding into the wind then. I had be there and done that.
There was a photographer out there and a few minutes later another rider and I were cruising along and he said that it was the Rails to Trails folks! Wow! Maybe the bike path will be in their publication and website. After a few minutes of riding together I turned and headed to do a couple loops of Burns Park. It was strange not seeing soccer going on.
All in all it was a great morning to be out riding!





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