After a night of not much sleep (got up before 3am when it was clear that I was just getting more and more irritated about not being able to sleep), I went out today with eight others on Cheryl M's Star-Spangled Sourlands Ride. We were a group of varying abilities (and attitudes), and Cheryl threatened 50 miles with about 3000 feet of climb, but said that we'd have an opportunity to cut it to about 40 miles if we chose. There was a debate about whether we woudl go with the majority choice, or whether a minority with a pressing inability to complete the full ride might carry the day...
... so off we went. We went up Poor Farm ( a hill of some reputation) and turned onto Harbouton-Woodsville Road, with a terrible road surface; the places where the new surface had not stuck at all were actually a relief, and I, for one, rode the brakes on all the downhills on that road. I was glad to get off it when we turned*. Most of the roads after that had better surfaces (including Pennington-Rocky Hill, at the end, which I remember as up until a few weeks ago having a two-foot-wide rough spot for miles; it's newly-done now, though). Harbourton-Woodsville was also closed on the other side of 579, but the 20-feet-or-so of missing pavement, and the not-quite-waist-high barrier fence didn't keep us from getting through.
Humid day, and got hot later (although it was a visually beautiful ride). Some were saying the humidity was lower later in the day, but it didn't feel that way to me, perhaps because I was tired. Along the way, another rider appeared to have gotten something into his eye, which he couldn't get out. I stopped with him for a while, and when he was ready to go, the rest of our number were not to be found; we didn't catch them until the rest stop at Sergeantsville.
Also at Sergeantsville were perhaps a dozen-or-so riders training for the Anchor House ride, including Glen, who's come out with the Hill Slugs. I got the impression it was to be his first Anchor House ride, and I suggested he meet people and connect, which I did not do on my first one last summer. That lack, I think, made the experience less fun than it might have been.
Shortly after mile 30, Cheryl called for the delegation to consider the case of the shorter or longer ride, and we opted for the longer. It turned out we were mostly in better shape for the long ride than we had feared (although that one rider did have another eye problem later), and it turned out that the route was more like 45 miles than 50 -- but I didn't hear any complaints; I think we were ready to see the starting point when we got there. When we did, Cheryl brought out water which she'd left on ice in her care... and watermelon pieces! What a treat! I ate more watermelon than I have eaten any kind of fruit in years; Cheryl, my hat is off to you - watermelon was just the thing today!
Here's hoping for a better sleep tonight than I had. I'm hoping ot go on a ride tomorrow where I can push the pace a bit and show off what I can do. That way, I'll be in the mood to sweep at the All-Paces ride on Monday, if I'm called to do that.
*I seem to remember being told that the poor condition of Harbouton-Woodsville Road was due to the newly-placed surface being washed away during Hurricane Irene last summer, but some in the group thought the problem was newer than that.
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