Back on the blue bike

In August, Jenn and I borrowed a tandem, in preparation for riding it on the Old Kentucky Home Tour. She and I have put a few hundred miles on that bike, including two century rides, as the one or two of you who pay attention to my ramblings here will remember.

Since that bike had been in the garage (it's still there, BTW--Bill and Kate haven't asked for it back yet, although I'm sure they will eventually), I had not been on my Strada. At all. Any club rides I did wound up being joint efforts with Jenn.

Until today.

I mentioned to her last night that there was a century ride today out of Finley Firehouse, next to Melissa Hall's house. Melissa puts on some lovely century rides, and while this was a new route, it sounded like a fun one. Jenn, having worked a lot of long hours of late, begged off, so I got the blue bike out for the first time in months.

Last night, I looked it over, but didn't clean anything. I inflated the tires, checked the brakes, made sure the shifting was working, got my drink mix and other items ready to go, then went to bed.

About sixty, maybe sixty five miles into the ride, I realized the rear shifting wasn't working right. I'd upshift, then have to yank on the cable to get it to go into the intended gear. At first, it seemed the cable was sticking inside the casing at the rear of the bike. On inspection at the lunch stop, this was found to not be the case, so I rode on. A bit later, I discovered the real problem--the cable was fraying apart near the head in the shifter. This is a rarity for me--I've not had one of my cables do that in many years. Of course, I've seen it happen to others, and I knew what could happen soon if I continued to shift with that cable--it would break, in the shifter, and cause me to do roadside repairs involving not being able to shift for a while.

Rather than have to make roadside repairs, I opted to quit using the shifter. I have a triple chainring on this bike, after all. I left the chain on the innermost cog (the easiest to pedal, in case I encountered more hills on the way back to the car), and used the three chainrings to gain some cadence control.

Of course, the rest of the course was pretty flat. Not knowing how flat, I was still reluctant to let the rear derailleur move the chain to, say, the seventeen-tooth cog (it was on the twenty-three-tooth cog). I wound up pedaling at 135 RPM a good part of the way home, just to keep up with the rest of the folks on the ride.

I'll tell you this: my heavy legs don't like spinning that fast for long. I can get peak RPM readings of 175-180 on this bike, but have no real power above 130 or so.

Otherwise, it felt good to get on that bike again. I miss how fast that bike is at times.

One unpleasant event during the ride: I had to teach a dog a painful lesson about chasing bikes. He (I presume it was a he) had chased the other riders some distance from his driveway, and was coming home when he saw me (I was catching up to the rest, having missed a turn a quarter-mile or so back). He started heading right for me--why, I have no idea. I headed for him for a bit, then changed direction late, hoping he'd continue on his path so I could go around him. No such luck--he zigged as I zagged, and I rolled right over top of him. I made an abrupt stop, but was unhurt--didn't even fall. He had fallen under my front wheel, and my back wheel went over him as well. He got up, limped to the shoulder of the road, and looked at me as if to say, "Why did you do THAT?" There was a kid in the driveway, who asked if I was okay. I suggested that he have his folks take the dog to the vet to check for injuries, but the kid said the dog was fine.

I like dogs, in general. I certainly don't wish them ill. However, when one is allowed to roam free so that it can chase traffic, I a) blame the owner for being so blase about the dog's health and safety, and b) have a hard time feeling sorry for a dog that chases bikes, cars, and anything else that moves along the roadway.

I'll fix the cable tomorrow. I'm too tired to mess with it tonight.