daylight savings time couldn’t have come any sooner. it felt odd sleeping for an hour longer, and initially, I woke at 6am thinking it was 7am. I forgot to set the clock by my bed an hour earlier, but luckily, my phone updated itself, so my alarms were all on cue. finally, I would be able to ride with a bit of sun. though I guess I wasn’t expecting it to be all that warm out anyway, since the weather has just been cooling off. I dropped down into the embarcadero, but started seeing road closures and detours. another half marathon. it went up towards fort mason, marina greens, and crissy (like every single running race I’ve ever seen), but looped on the bike side of the golden gate bridge. a cop told me and two other cyclists that the bike side would be closed. we would have to take a shuttle…cue the shuttle:
we must’ve been one of the first guys to take it, the bridge guy that was doing the shuttling seemed somewhat frustrated at the whole scenario. the wait wasn’t too long, and before I knew it, we were already on our way across the bridge. him and I chatted a bit about the half marathon, and how they’d be running on the bike side, since the pedestrian side was closed. the bike walkway would open up once the runners were finished with their race – he didn’t know a definite time, but mentioned that there would be shuttles running cyclists across, both ways, until the race was over. ‘that’s not going to be ideal for big group rides,’ I kept thinking…
as we all exited the van to get the bikes off the rack, the driver guy said (not verbatim), “yea sometimes you got runners in the back that aren’t even running. they’re just walking side-by-side, coffee in hand. why are you in a half marathon if you’re just going to walk? you can walk anytime you want.” we all laughed a bit, and I just naturally assumed that by time I made it back towards the bridge, I’d have to wait for another shuttle. with that in mind, I was eager to get my legs going again – I also didn’t want to just loop paradise once, so the plan was to do it twice. the most mileage I’ve put in the saddle since 2 months ago. so off I went.
I’m not sure if the bridge closure and bike shuttle situation turned people away from riding across the bridge all together or what, but I didn’t see one cyclist out for a pretty long time. eventually, I spotted some leisurely riders on paradise drive, but they looked to be marin residents. and then I caught up to the try-hard of the day (the same one as on october 15th). he was on the same blue look, but it no longer had the subway sandwich sized saddle bag. he must’ve exchanged his black mountain biking cargo shorts for black bibs, too. full leg warmers and a wind-puffed black jacket, the same attire. he also had a slew of cables running along his top tube, I’m assuming they were for lights. I called out to him as I came up on his left side to pass, and that was his cue. the water fountain prime prize was in his sights as he ramped up the pace while keeping his cadence near 40rpm. the legs swimmingly fought each pedal stroke. his white helmet flicking around every so often to see if I was still ‘there’. which I was, but a safe distance away going my own pace. he grew tired near the end of the road, and I started catching back up to him. he heard my derailleur shift and the fire reignited his legs. you could see it in the way he rode. he never wanted to be passed by anyone. kudos to you, mr. blue look guy who swapped cargo shorts for bibs, and a sandwich saddle bag for a compact one. you now have 2 water fountain primes to your name. oddly enough, after filling up my bottle, I went along the side road, and there he was again. waiting (menacingly) on the opposite side of the road. I gave him the nod of approval. well played, sir.
the second time around paradise wasn’t as eventful. there were a pair of guys that were riding, and they recognized me from the first time I was going around. one of them shouted out, “hey, you did it twice!”. you just have to do some things twice, sometimes. I headed back towards the bridge and caught up to a guy riding an all black parlee. with black lightweight wheels. and black everything else, too. he passed me on the bike path, and made the next few lights. I had assumed that he would be gone. but, as sunday’s luck would have it, I caught up to him through sausalito. now he was going a bit slower, so I passed him. uh oh, cue the kom sausalito prime. he passed me right as the climbing started, and was unrelenting in his slow cadence, seated climbing. he got away, taking all the points with him. the bike side of the bridge was open, and as I rode across, I saw him stopped on the first pier, talking to another cyclist he knew. the tables have turned – now I’m ahead and will take the points for crossing the bridge first. of course, when I stopped to take a photo of the bridge, he dropped down into crissy way ahead of me. le sigh.
I made it into the marina, and the fun just really didn’t stop. people running and walking 3-5 abreast, headphones in both ears, completely in their own ‘zone’. once that was over, it was maneuvering through people walking all over the path up to fort mason. I still don’t understand why, since there are freshly painted bike and pedestrian symbols on the ground. I passed one guy who was running in the bike lane area and he told me to “slow down!”. my apologies, next time, let me ride in the pedestrian path so that you have more room in the bike path to run. take those headphones out of your ears next time so you can hear me laugh.
oh, sunday’s.
