Tax Day

So the post is about yesterday. April 14th. A day that took me back. Winter came home again and it's here to stay for a bit. The glories of Saturday just a crack in the door of what's to come later. Winter is now back and in control. 39 degrees, wet, a bit of wind to chill it down and make the ride a little tougher. I so wanted to ride in light gear. Just a jersey, bib tights, arm and leg warmers, regular gloves. That was not for yesterday, no not at all. It was winter gear and the winter bike again all over. Neoprene was a welcome sight. So once again I was ready to battle the weather. To make the miles and do the circuit. Keep the training going no matter what. On the road again in the winter of this little Island.
As I went down the first mile of wet road I knew I had picked the wrong gloves. Still hoping they would do over heavy winter gloves. Bad choice. So I stopped into Half Link the local bike shop to find a pair of new winter gloves. No turning back for me at this point. David and his wife were busy working on bikes brought in on Saturdays glory. Bikes that thought it was summer. Bikes that thought it was time to be dusted off again. Take there owners for the adventures of the road and trail. So both David and his partner looked up and smiled with a slight glance outside at the rain and cold. "Where did it go" David asked. "Not here" was my reply. I was looking for a good pair of warm water proof gloves. David had a pair of thin neoprene gloves in my size. I put them on, on the spot. As I stepped out the door. I looked back to the 2 and said, "you know I'm tough, but I sure would like to see my naked finger again, have some warmer weather". This cold riding is getting hard. Testing my steel and my truth. Truth to the road. Out I went to do the mile, new gloves and all. Down the roads I know so well. Rain, hard cold spring rain. It had hailed a few mins ago. I was facing a white ride. Hard rain is tough to deal with. So up the first of the climbs. Just getting warmed up. Starting to know I would get this ride done. As I have done so many times before in winter weather. Even my face shows the signs of all the weather this winter season. The cutting cold of thousands of miles on the un-covered bare skin exposed to all this weather. Well here some more. Down the first climb at 25 to 30 MPH. Hard rain pounding on everything. It might even snow on Friday. That's the forecast. Friday is a ride day. First I finish this ride. One ride at a time. Down to Saratoga Road, right turn to Langley. Keeping the gears soft. Not putting to much pressure on as today was a recovery ride. I'm still doing some re-build from my over training of the recent past. Letting the muscles repair and build up. It's hard to force these low efforts. I always like to push harder. On easy efforts I'm looking behind me a lot. Looking for the rider coming up on me. The one that wants to pass me. Make me feel slow. It's hard to talk myself down from the push. I have started to use big gears on the flatter areas. Just roll the big gears over and not push them to hard. That way I get the speed up with out to much effort. Staying in the recovery zone but feeling fast. All this thinking and I was through Langley and up Maxwellton and cross SR-525 getting near the fun climbs of Jewett Road, Glendale Road, Holst Road, Deer Lake Road and Heggenes Road. All the best hill climbs in my circuit. The pace kind of climbs. Just ease up and stay out of the "Red Zone". It's good work. The best part of the ride. As I went up all this the tell tale signs of winter showed with white on the side of the road. White of winter. A fair amount of hail had collected at the tops of each climb. The sides of the roads were filled. It was real cold to. Winter at the top again. After all this, it was the turn for home. 15 miles to go on this 41 mile ride. Back to Langley. Up Bayview Hill. Then the FAST decent to Bayview Corners where "Half Link" is and on home 1 1/2 miles away. Just riding easy as I did the whole ride. Feeling good about the ride and the effort. Looking forward to a hot bath. A shower to. I was dirt up to the knees again. That's winter riding on April 14th.