Spring Ride

It's the end of March. I have had the most wonderful first year of marrage to Mary Anne. We spent 2 nights in downtown Seattle. Right next to "Pike's Market". I pray for many more. More than I can count.
Now this is a training log. One that has been poorly used for the last few days. Rides have gone by. The rides seem to be normal. Every day rides on the same roads I use all the time. 40, 45, 50, 55, 60 miles. All planned out. I know every corner. Every hill and all the spots to keep an extra close eye on. It's not that the rides are boring, there not. Just I want more to write about these last few weeks. More than I did this good or need to improve here or there. More than I ran down this guy on a hill and passed him by. Or hung out with him or her for awhile. More than, this hill was so hard that people stopped there cars and looked as I went up hill there cars could barly go up. I have not stopped training. Only if Mary Anne and I travel, and then I often take the bike and ride then to. I ride when I'm not feeling good. I ride when I'm feeling great and all feelings in between. I keep to the training. I stay with the program. My program to live a stronger life. A healther life. I ride!
The post today is an epic ride. Epic can be many definitions. Today post is about weather.
I started out by finding all the right gear for the ride. Warm gear! It was 36 degrees and the weather report was saying SNOW. it's the end of March, spring is here. Bad weather comes in spring, but, rarely snow. Once again I was the Stay Puff Marshmallow rider. Heavy long sleave base jersy. Heavy thermal tights. Very heavy wool vest, custom made. Arm warmers, with a long sleave jersy over all that. Then a heavy rain jackey over all that. I had to finish dressing in the garage so I would not break out in a sweat. Regular riding gloves with extra heavy long finger gloves over that. Full baclava over my head ears and neck, with a exrta regular head cover over all that. It was a wonder I could get on the bike. I was ready to go. It was raining and 36 degrees. It felt colder. I started on the ride. I was going to do 40+ miles as this was my second ride in a week. My last ride was good till later that night. A fever of 100. The bathroom was my best friend that night. I guess I could eat again in 10 hours or so. I wanted to just have an easy ride. Roll back into the gears. Not pust to hard. Do the right thing. Have a nice 65% to 70% effort ride. Work the program and get stronger little bits at a time. It was wet and cold. As I moved down the road past the first traffic lights I saw the rabbit. A rabbit is a rider out front. Someone to chase down, to "beat", go faster than. Play the game of king of the mountian. Who's faster, you or me with. The rabbit looked back and it was on. I still was un-willing to use my big gears. I could see I would catch the rabbit, but it was going to take sometime. As the road began it's normal up hill section to Lone Lake I had halfed the distance to the rider in front. He was looking back all the time. He was riding like a good rider. Someone that trained and was fit. I just kept rolling at my pace. Picking up one foot at a time. By the top of the first climb at Lone Lake I could see his face. I knew if I wanted on the decent I would catch him. I stayed in the small gears so it would take a little longer. At the bottom if this hill there was a stop and right hand turn. My brakes were wet and had a little fresh oil on them. I got the bike to stop before going into the cross road. The distance was so close if I stood up and put a little effort in I would be by this guy. On this part of the road you have to take care of you effort as there was a monster hill coming at you. Push to hard early and you die on the steep hill coming up. I was going to catch up at the bottom of this very hard hill and I was fresh to climb hard. I made the gap and we rode the hill together. Nick was his name. He is a nice guy. I was close to 30 years older than Nick. I no longer was running him down and we talked for a bit till I had to go out front becouse of traffic. It was all Nick could do to hold on. He had told me he had seen me alot on the roads from his car. That made me feel good. He asked how many miles I do. I said 3000+- to that time this year. He went silent. Nick just looked at me when we were side by side. The town sign for Langley was coming soon and it would be a down hill run to the town. The only time of the ride I used the big gears. No way Nick was getting the town sign from me, NO WAY. I rolled into Langley doing 30 something MPH. Not even working so hard. Nick got by my side well past the sign at the first stop sign. His eye brows went up. We both smiled and went on. Nick lives in Langley and was following and that was the last I saw of him. It started to snow. It was all wet every where so the snow never had a chance once it hit the ground. As I left Langley, a small town right on the water, I moved past the County Fair Grounds. There small to. Then it was a right turn to up hill to the High School. Every foot up hill the snow got heaver. At the top of this little climb it was really feeling and looking like a snow storm. Roads were still clear. Every mile now was snow. My glasses had to be cleared often to see. Just use my fingers like a wiper. The bigger of the climbs would be coming soon. The ones that go to the highest part of the South Island. I knew the snow would get heavy. The road sides would start building up snow. Left turn to the start of miles of climbing. Maybe in total 5 mile of some easy, some very hard hill climbing. The snow was starting to collect on the road as slush. I just kept it at a little easier pace than normal. I didn't want to sweat to much. There was enough water outside. It was 33 degrees and snowing. I had to watch were the tires went at this point. My front tire was getting bigger as the slush built up on it. I went to change gears at the top of one climb before another climb. My faster gears were frozen solid. All the chain did was skip over the top. So I just shifted till I found a gear that worked and stayed there. There was still climbing to do. All the way up Heggenes Hill. One of my favorites. It's just a senic climb with switch backs. To the top is about a mile+-. It was snowing and sticking everywhere. The horses and pastures were just wonderful to look at. I was really going easy. It was 17 miles to home. My hands were wet. Snow and ice were all over my bike and jacket. My neoprene booties had 1 inch of snow and ice. My feet were warm. My face was warm. I'm sure my helmet had a lot of snow on it. My hands were wet and cold and not working so well. I was on Langley Road my gears were froze. I had 2 gears that worked. I was riding through slush and snow all the time. It was a shallow down hill to Langley and the snow was easing off and the slush was starting to go away. I got to Langley, I still only had 2 gears, but, there was hope for more. I had another steepish climb on the last road to home. By the top all my gears worked and it was 36 degrees again. The steep desent was slow. My hands had lost all feeling miles ago. Home was 2 miles at the bottom. It was much warmer but my hands wanted to be home. Finally one turn and there I was. Still covered with wet snow and some ice. I just parked the hammered bike in the garage to clean later. Took off all the outer layers, everything needed to be washed. Got my hands warm. It stopped raining. It stopped snowing. 43 miles, 3 hours, it was an epic ride. One for the books.