I got what I asked for, that will teach me

The mercury dropped and the snow fell yesterday, something I had hoped for in my last blog posting. I went out for a two hour ride in the afternoon and the wind chill was down to the coldest it's been all winter. Have you ever had a brain freeze after eating ice cream or a Slurpee too quickly? My face and brain felt that way for the first 15-20 minutes. The pain eventually subsided, or maybe my face just went numb and the rest of the ride wasn't too bad if I wasn't riding into the wind.

The rail trail and road were harder than they had been for a while which meant a faster and smoother ride. Still some wet sections but overall a lot better. Anyone notice how much colder you are when you have to go to the bathroom? Fortunately there is a bathroom at the rail trail parking lot that I stopped at on the way back. But on the way to it I kept looking over my shoulder for other users of the trail in case I decided to stop on the side. I had to use my lights on the way home and since I hadn't brought my clear glasses it was a little darker than normal. I didn't want to take off my tinted glasses since they were keeping out the wind.

Robin and Shari have decided to make the trip to Tennessee with me for the Cohutta 100 so we will be travelling two weeks in a row. Robin will race the 100 and Shari will do the 12 hour the following week. I may try to find a team to get on for the 12 hour instead of a solo effort after doing the 100 mile race the week before. That would at least give me a better chance at the Ft. Custer race the next week.

I hope to be able to build up a new Cannondale 29'er prior to the Cohutta, I hear the race has a lot of fire roads where the bigger wheels might be the ticket. I may end up using this bike for the Mohican as well since it has a similar ratio of trails and roads.