riding

Firstly, big thanks to Travis for truing my wheels yesterday night.  I left work a bit earlier to take the wheels to the shop so Dustin could work on them first thing today, but Travis was nice enough to just give them a glance while I waited.  With both wheels perfectly true, I rolled out this morning and noticed the difference immediately, mostly on the rear wheel.  It could’ve been the combination of shoddy front tire pressure yesterday, but whatever it was, the bike rolled smooth.  And then I saw the same skunk in the same spot this morning while cutting through Fort Mason.  If the guy (or girl) is going to keep running across the path to collect stuff for its nest, I’m going to have to find a different route to get to the Marina.  It’s sketchy…and I don’t want to smell for days and days.

I guess it was a bit more quiet than usual, and though I found myself ahead of the school buses, one caught up to me from behind, which was a first.  One thing about school bus drivers in Marin though, they wait until the path is clear before attempting to pass, and they always leave at least 4ft+ when doing it.  After all, safety first.  The legs felt more or less like jello the entire ride, mostly because I ran some stairs with my co-worker yesterday.  Good way to opening up the lungs, that’s for sure.  And it breaks the seemingly endless cycle of work, so thus far, it seems to be a great routine.  Oh, and shout out to Percy, who was at the edge of the bridge as I was coming back in.  Hope you had a good ride!

Good stuff, Wednesday.

Nothing beats the smell of sunscreen in the morning.  And though I always dread the sensation of having something on my face, it all seems to fade away as the sun is coming up over the bridge (slowly singeing off your skin).  Today was also one of those days were I saw a handful of people out that I knew, namely Joe (BRITEsport) who was coming back from his ride as I was heading out towards Mill Valley, and then Travis, Connor and Gabe, who headed out a bit later.  I saw them as I was heading back into the city.

I think there was some other stuff I was going to mention, but they’ve all faded away from memory.  The same exact school bus passes me in the morning at almost the exact same spot on Camino Alto almost every day.  I know it’s the same one because there’s only a few buses with rear escape hatches that have windows on them.  At that point, they’re usually empty, though.  Heading down into Mill Valley and Tiburon to pick up the kids.  And somewhere in between, I catch up to them, like I did today.  The same bus that passed me was now packed with kids, and driving down the road, ahead of me.  No riot police on the bridge – I think it’s going to be a good day.

First of the month!  And the first ride of the month.  I have no idea what was going on at the Golden Gate bridge this morning, but as I headed out, there were at least 50+ Marin police officers at the newly built tourist center.  There were handfuls more spread across the length of the bridge, and the parking lot on the other side was closed off to the public.  Pedestrians and cyclists were allowed through, but not cars.  I was thinking that there was a big running event initially, but cops with riot helmets seemed a bit excessive.  Maybe a big group photo?  Who knows.

Funny thing was, my other heart rate strap was acting finicky – it would read for a couple seconds, then stay at that reading.  Or it wouldn’t register at all, and just drop.  After a couple minutes, I figured out that the strap wasn’t tight enough.  A couple minutes after that, I figured out that if I puffed up my chest a bit more, it would read consistently.  So there I was, riding in Marin, with my chest puffed up like a douche, just so that I could see my heart rate reading.  Pulling over and fixing it wasn’t an option, clearly.  I lucked out and was able to pass some school buses before they threw out their flashing reds, caught a stellar descent on the turn off at half Paradise, and had basically no wind the entire ride through.

On my way back, traffic was all jammed up on the bridge.  A big tour bus was stopped in one of the lanes, dropping off police officers onto the pedestrian walkway, east side of the bridge.  Needless to say, everyone driving, running, and cycling across the bridge was still confused on what the hell was going on, but I guess that’s Tuesday’s for you.