C Series: Ride Report

Here's a ride report reposted from No Drive's first C Series ride site:

This past Saturday we had the first C ride out to Grand Haven in back. Unfortunately, the battery in digital camera was dead on Saturday so I had to resort to using my phone for pictures. Needless to say, I'm not as willing to pull it out when riding so only two pictures from the ride [pictured on the right is from outside of Founders waiting for riders]

On the suggestion of Nicola, the route was changed because of traffic on Lake Michigan Drive for the Labor Day weekend travelers [for those not in the know Michiganders, for the most part, LOVE their cottages, boats and the lake shore] to taking essentially taking Leonard St all the way out.

We had a few people who RSVP'd to show up via Facebook, but do to alarm clock issues and other things, the ride ended up just being myself and Nicola Fester [who has some art in the latest/next Bicycle Times magazine!]. Nicola showed up as she always does, on a single speed and needless to say she rocked it. It was a humbling day, especially on the return.

We left at 9:10am just to see if anyone else would be joining in on the fun and made our way to Leonard via Monroe. Neither of us had a computer on our bike to know what we averaged for speeds but we kept a steady pace out to Grand Haven [State Park/Beach/Lake Michigan pictured to the left], getting there in around 2 hours. No real story to tell on the way there outside of my poor attempt at a bunny hop over a crack that then ejected my spare tube.

After briefly hanging out at the beach to refill water and snack a little, we were back on the bikes. Once getting back on the bike, the legs were a little sluggish but quickly bounced back and we made our way back. One the way out, the wind was minimal, if anything a slight headwind but nothing to go home about. We were happy to know we'd have a little tailwind. Mother Nature had the final laugh as the wind changed up enough to be a head wind.

Around mile 50ish, just outside of Eastmanville, I got out of the saddle to climb a hill and well, Nicola passed me just as I had an outburst of sorts, as my body let me know that I would be allowed to spin but not to put down any power for the remaining part of the ride. I'll be the first to admit that this was from the lack of any real base miles/training outside of my daily commute and cruising. I was concerned before the ride because any of my long rides this year, my legs have decided to cramp and I thought this might have been a precursor to what was to come. My body decided to remind me of this a number of different times after this especially on climbs. Fortunately once we hit Walker, I could see the light at the end of the tunnel and pushed through.

Throughout all of that, Nicola was a champ and although she said she was being worked pretty good. She threw down and was a champ, humbling me for sure. We ended the ride at Founders and of course, stopped in and enjoyed some stellar food and drink. All in all, I was extremely happy about this ride I hope to see more people come out for future rides. I'm thinking the October 4th ride will be a Grand Rapids to Bell's Brewery in K'zoo.

Here's the ride: