Warm weather ride!

Today Greg and I drove 90 miles to Auburn so we could ride our bikes outside. It's been snowing here all week, only an inch or less per day, but it's cold enough and precipitating enough to be treacherous and nasty for a four hour ride outdoors, and we only have one trainer so indoors was a non-option.

It was 50 degrees in Auburn, I didn't even need a jacket! That was a definite upside. The downside is that Forest Hill Road pretty much sucks for riding. It's slow going on the way to Forest Hill from Auburn, because there's a net uphill of about 2000' over 17 miles, plus it's a fairly wide road so all the cars go fast and it's very wind-prone, and my primary personal problem with this road is the shoulder, which is mostly narrow, strewn with glass and other debris, and there is this ledge created by two different sets of pavement, and I actually wasn't going to reveal this in the blog but today I experienced my first "crash" of 2008 thanks to this stupid ledged shoulder, a car coming next to me, a big stick log, afternoon sun in my eyes, and "Hangin' Tough" or some similar nonsense in my ears. Basically I just did an ungraceful slow somersault and now I have red mud all over my kit and bars.

But the road after Forest Hill Road made it all worth it! Decent pavement, hardly any cars, and so many views! The clouds were incredible.

Also here is Greg at the Vin Diesel Bridge over the American River, so called by me because Vin threw a car over it in XXX because it's the highest bridge in the U.S.

Next time, I will skip the Forest Hill Road portion of this ride.

Sorry for the complaining. I feel stupid bitching about stuff, I mean how lucky am I to have gotten to ride outside on a beautiful day with so many non-snow-covered sights! It should have been a lovely ride. But I couldn't stop thinking about how I used to always share beautiful rides with friends. Now I realize how lucky I was to have started my cycling career in the Bay Area, not only did I have loads of great rides on hand, but I also had loads of great people to ride with. Now it's just me and my ipod, both of which I am bored of (hence today's music selection). In Oakland, even if I did my training alone, I still saw countless cyclists or other friends when I was out riding. Today I saw 3 cyclists, and that's counting the 30 seconds I spent riding with Greg "I Don't Ride Slow" Remaly. Hmf. I feel lonely.

Everything has a tradeoff - apparently the tradeoff for living on a beautiful lake with minimal traffic in a safe and tight-knit community is that I can't ride to the local coffee shop, meet up with a handful of teammates and friends, and spend the day together on bikes. I am still adjusting to this, I guess I just took for granted how important the social aspect of riding was to me. Overall, the tradeoff is worth it. I am happy about our move to Tahoe, even though it doesn't always seem like it on my blog!