locked and loaded

It has been a whirl wind week. The full summer force of bike shop life is well under way. Long days, long rides, lots of lots of stuff. Sometimes I realize just how much therapy bike riding is for me. The last few weeks I have been making it out to Blue River a ton, a number of times I have been out till 1:00 AM pedaling the singlespeed, breaking down the spiders work.

Bike Source is fielding a team for 24 hours of Landahl. I am not gonna beat around the bush, we want to win the overall on fixed gears. Scott Capstack, Craig Stoeltzing, Travis Stephens, and myself. Scott and Craig are golden, I have fitness, Travis can ride a fixed gear like nobodies business. I have fixed gear ride number 2 under me. My 1st ride was a 4 hour effort that left me so sore I could hardly walk for two days. Today was ride 2. Blue River again, two solid hours of riding. I now have a total of six trips across High Line in me, each one I am a little faster, little smoother, learning the tricks. It is fun to be learning something new.

Saturday was my first ever Lenexa Midnight Ride. I had heard the stories and was totally pumped all week. I was having trouble imagining 1000 bike riders taking to the streets, but there they were. We warmed up at Blake's house making sure everyone had the essentials. It was about 4 miles over to the start and I could tell the Electra Townie was a prime choice for the evening. After registration we rendezvoused at Jerry's Bait Shop and jammed to some band called Soul Bandit. They were throwing down pretty hard on the saxophone. Ben Fishman and I made up Team Townie (he had purchased the matching red three speed to mine earlier in the day) We made like Soul Bandits and skipped ahead of some 600 people to get up to the end of the first wave of riders to be released. It reminded me of being the noisy kid at the back of class as we kept the riders entertained waiting for midnight. Fishman and I took off right from the start. It took us about 5 miles but at the turnaround we had passed the 200 riders in front of us and were sitting 3rd and 4th. I was talking so much crap to all the guys on road bikes, it was hilarious. We hauled down into the tunnels and caught the next 2 people. As well Bob Gregor came from behind and was rallying with us. It was a tough dig up the hill out of the tunnels. The foot forward technology of the townie does not lend itself well to climbing out of the saddle. I was now drilling it across the flats on Bob's wheel. I was drafting going 24 MPH. I had to be careful with the raked out front end to keep my distance back. We were insight on the finish line when disaster struck. The engineers at Electra had not tested for high speed sprint launches to the finish line. I dropped my chain, feet went sprawling off the pedals, I was bouncing along, feet trying to run, trying to keep my private part damage to a minimum. I was braced to hit the ground but it never came, I rode it out on my top tube. I put my chain back on and rode gingerly across the finish line with everyone who had witnessed it ecstatic about the whole incident. Ben and I rejoined Soul Bandit for the final few songs and headed out into the night. All in all the Lenexa Midnight Ride is pretty much the greatest thing ever.