It seems like every Sheboygan WORS race I've ever done it's been a great sunny fall day. It was a little cool but that's what fall in Wisconsin is all about. Speaking of fall, I took too many of them in this race. I was battling for second in age group when a bad line put me on the "Sheboygan slickrock".
Then on the last lap a phantom root grabbed my wheel and cost me 3rd place, but 4th in age 23rd overall in Sport is a good way to end the MTB season. Johnny G. decided to test the waters in Comp. Sport distance is still good for me for now. I'm actually looking forward to the shorter race distance of the cross season.
It's cyclcross season again, and that means suffering. I think it's the hardest thirty or forty minutes (depending on category and race organizer) in cycling. It is fun though when you get a good course set up. Lapham isn't my favorite course, but it's good practice for the rest of the season.
I say bike lanes. What? Fall is a great time to ride not just to see leaves change color but for the fall colors in the foods you find and the different places you find to ride. Cyclocross brought us to the Madison area.
Produce brought us to the Captiol square. Mrs. Bikesafer and I rode around Madison after a stop at their farmers market for some heirloom tomatoes to go with our fresh basil from the garden, 18 year old balsamic, olive oil and fresh mozzerella.
What an interesting place to ride. Bike paths all over the place, and bike lanes on almost every busy street. Not just bike lanes, we have those in Milwaukee too, but in Madison most of them are clear of debris and potholes, and more importantly DOORS. Almost every bike lane in MKE is unrideable because of the proximity to the door zone. We also rode in our first ever protected and contra-flow bike lane on University ave. It was a good ride.
But with fall not only the leaves seem to change. The drivers are starting to get cranky. I got an earful yesterday from Mr. SUV, who passed into oncoming traffic to get to the stop sign a few seconds ahead of me only to wait there to bitch at me about "us guys", (cyclists) getting out of control. I also learned that in SUV land, cyclists aren't allowed to use the roads. As he drove off, the wife or mistress or whatever yelled "you gotta be safe". Yes I agree, and how safe is it to pass (anyone) if you have to go into oncoming traffic?
Really it was more like clang, clang, snap. That was the sound of my second Fat Tire 40 disappearing in an explosion of suspension parts. Mikes tandem has taken a beating lately.
After we destroyed his cassette with some bad shifting at Ore to Shore, we thought we got our share of mechanicals out of the way for a while.
It was still a great weekend, because one of the reasons I mountain bike is to hang out with my MTB friends. So we had a great weekend in a beautiful log house full of friends. There's always next year for the race result I was hoping for.
On the way home I got a warning for not having my registration sticker properly displayed. I have no problem being pulled over for it, but it seemed ridiculous to me to give me a written warning since I had the registration AND the sticker with me in the car and planned on sticking it on the plate at the next stop. I started to think as I wasted 20 minutes waiting for the warning, about how many times I've had evidence of drivers clearly running stop signs or running me off the road when law enforcement wouldn't even contact the offending driver. I understand this was a different agency, but I get a written warning for not having my sticker properly displayed while many reckless drivers drive away with impunity. It seems like those priorities are a little screwed up.
It's been a bad stretch of rides lately. 3 flats on the last 4 road rides. 2 flats in the Ore to Shore and one on the ride back to the hotel from the race, then last night on the tandem with Mike, that squishy feeling came twice and we didn't have another tube. Well we did but it was a road tube. So we limped home on a squishy road tube in a mtb tire after one patch job. Change tubes again and back out for a nice night ride by the lake. On the way back some lady in a van came about 3 inches from giving us a serious dooring. Let's hope that covers the flats and the near doorings for a while.
Johnny G. wanted to test out his lights and his mad night riding skills before the WEMS night race so we took advantage of the near full moon and headed to the kettles. It took me half the lap to get into a flow but it was a great night to ride.
I followed Russell's advice and went to Kenosha to see the races. I'm almost thinking I might like to try the whole track thing after watching it. Looks like a blast. I was going to bring out the good cameras and shoot some artsy stuff, but I didn't feel like workin that hard so this is all you get. I can't make any guarantees about the quality of these photos. They were toned and sized on a new computer I'm not used to yet.
