Saturday July 14 The Circuitous Route

Well, Saturday was a chaotic ride.  We met at 7 at the usual Panera with 9 riders, Cons being noticeably absent.  George brought along another friend and new rider for us named Mike (last name unknown to me) -- and Ian joined us as well.

Our goal was to practice pace lines and avoid the rain by going up and down Green Bay a few times until we saw what was going to happen with the weather - after one (or two?) loops Dave suggested we ride down McCormick instead.  All agreed and off we go, after which Cons called and said he arrived by mistake at 8 and was riding up to St Mary's on our usual route to find us.  Hahaha the one day we do something different...(trying to avoid Emerson's  "foolish consistency.. the hobgoblin of little minds...").
In a few words, we rode around in circles looking for Cons and Cons rode around in circles looking for us.  Finally reunited at the top of Walker Hill, successfully climbed by Felix, Mike, Cons and overachieving Ian (who rode up twice or maybe 3x).

Our training program got put aside for the day - we didn't really bother keeping to any kind of discipline and just rode as fast as anyone felt like, including a sprint up University.  .  Oh, and also George had flat tire issues on his tubular which resulted in a loaner wheel from Green Bay Cycles sometime during the ride.  We stopped as much as rode and ended up with 50 miles in about 4+ hours....

Footnote, when we left Walker for home I felt sluggish as if my tire was going flat, but just assumed that I was imagining excuses as usual.  Got on my bike to leave Panera and my rear tire was completely flat.  I  took off my bike shoes and socks and walked home.

Participants:
Felix
George
John
Rich
Dave
Bob
Mike (new rider, not Big Mike)
Ian
Heidi
Cons