Group Ride

This weekend marked my first official group ride, and probably the earliest I've gotten out of bed on a weekend in 6 months. I got a Friday invite from Jack for a Sunday am ride. I'd never met Jack, but we had been trying all summer to get together for a ride, having met on the New England Riders forum and realizing we lived pretty close to each other. The departure time from his house was to be 8am, which is pretty damn early for a Sunday- it meant getting up at 6:15 and leaving the house by 7:30. But we decided to go- myself and Laura, and I invited Kathy along too. It was good practice for the fast approaching Florida trip, which will have us up at that time or earlier for close to 2 weeks straight.

On the way there, we missed the turn for the meeting house, and when we went to turn around, Laura dumped her bike- a result of stopping right on the edge of the pavement, and attempting to put her right foot down and unexpectedly finding the ground 3 inches further away than expected. It gave me quite a scare, but she was unhurt, and the bike only suffered a couple minor scratches. I little while later Laura noticed the handlebars were significantly out of whack which I mistakenly took to mean they were bent, or the risers connecting them to the forks were bent. But when we pointed it out to the other riders they reassured us they were fine- the rubber bushing they fit into was moved around, and by loosening up the bolts and wiggling them around they would re-seat just fine...

When we got to Jack's house, it turned out to be 4 other riders, bringing the tally to 7. I think the biggest group I've ridden in to date was 4. I was expecting all of the riders to have ridden together before, but it turns out Jack had only ridden with one other rider, so this mix of riders was a new one. I was excited to go on a ride for once where I didn't have to lead, and I was also anxious to be lead on some new roads. I was a little bummed to find that we were heading up into the territory that I am most familiar with from my lunch ride excursions- Rochester. Nevertheless, I was still completely psyched to be in a real group ride, and to be meeting some new friends.

It was a pretty short ride, with the total for the day under 100 miles, but it provided plenty of time for us to stop and shoot the shit w/ each other and get to know each other a little better (the allotted time for the ride was 8-1). In addition to Jack, I met JJ (his son Andrew), Mark, and Mike. We eventually split off from JJ, Jack, and Mark, and headed back to Mike's house to meet his wife Nancy. We hung out by his pool for an hour enjoying each other's company.

It was a great day, and I can't wait to do it again. I've been putting off making the leap and attending a group ride for a few years now, and I'm glad I finally got off my ass and attended one. I gotta give credit to Jack for getting me motivated though. Having never met me, he added me to his group email list and gave me a direct invitation, which made it easier to get me in gear.

After getting home, it took less than 10 minutes to fix Laura's bike. It was very easy, and is good as new. I felt like a real bike mechanic! :)