A long weekend....

Among the ten thousand other things that happened over the weekend, there was a criterium here in Traverse City on Saturday - the 1st downtown race in many many years. http://www.cherry-roubaix.com/

Always wanting to support local events, I figgered I'd better pony up an entry for myself. No crit specialist I, and without a current USCF license (I was a Cat 4 in '01, tho I raced only in Masters 55+ events) , I check off the box for the dreaded Cat 5/Citizen's Class - a field that could be fun and could be a train wreck. Hey folks, I'm not likely to be even remotely competitive since half of the field is nearly 1/3 my age!

The course included a few blocks of brick streets, six turns, and a pretty fast short course. No, they wouldn't let me ride a fixed gear - This was the 1st year for this event and if the city had allowed the street closures to be a bit earlier, the organizers would have included a fixed gear class !!!!! There's always next year.

My only goal was to put in a few laps, heep the rubber down, and be alive for Sunday's hilly fixed century with Lost Gears at the Leelanua Harvest Tour in Leelanau County. (more about that later)

So, for the Criterium - Goals accomplished, crashes avoided, dead last finish.

Sunday sees LostGears and I headed 25 miles out to Glen Lake School for the Leelanau Harvest Tour. In 1991 I rode my first full century at the LHT, and in 2001 I rode my first fixed gear century at this event.

So, as usual LostGears honks his way up every hill and stretches my tongue to the max in the early miles. Somehow we'd missed hooking up with my geared friends...did they ride the Metric? At the first food stop at 22miles My rear tire blows, and we screw with that for way way too long and finally see a sidewall tear in the Continental 2000. Yikes - some pretty fast spun-out descents we'd already ridden today. Better to have a blowout at a food stop we all said.

Maybe we missed my friends along in here somewhere, nevertheless, a gorgeous day. Lost Gears riding his Coppi with a 42x15 and me on the Milwaukee with a 49x16. We were suitably wasted at the finish - maybe I'll scrounge up some photos, neither of us packed a camera for either event.

Off to Las Vegas on Tuesday morning for Interbike, and Lost Gears is off Monday morning for Virginia. Here in Michigan it's about to turn colder. We'll be riding in the woods before long.