RIDE REPORT
Wednesday, 29 May 2024, Late Spring Ride from Concord
Ride Leader: Gene Ho, assisted by Frank Scibilia
28.4 miles, 11:00 am start from Concord, MA
Riders (28): Gene, Frank Scibilia, Aliza Edwards, Barry Nelson, Curt Dudley-Marling, Dale Ferguson, Dave Balaban, David Goldberg, Don Mannes, Emily McPhillips, Frank Aronson, Frank Calabrese, Gerry Sheetoo, Herb Kavet, Joanne Samuels, John Kitchen, Linda Nelson, Marie Keutmann, Mike Hanauer, Renee Rees, Richard French, Sanford Gotlib, Susan Amsel, Susan Linz, Susan Sabin, and first-timers Alex Nelson, Charles Barry, and Dan McNamara.
A tonna folks showed up. The headcount list showed 28 registrants and 26 that I spoke to in person. But that's not to say they weren't all there. I probably spoke to some twice and others not at all. But, that's not the only thing that didn't go according to plan. Luckily, it was an error in the right direction. With the pent-up demand for summer weather, nature finally delivered and we all turned out to get our share.
Frank Aronson and I conspired to get more than our share. Despite our living on opposite sides of a large town, we thought it'd be a great idea to bike from our homes, meet in Weston, and get in a few more hours of great weather by commuting to the start. But, good weather for biking is also good weather for construction. That obstructed my normal route to Weston. What should have been a leisurely commute turned into a frenzied rush, against the traffic on a busy road, to make up the extra distance caused by the detour. That was just an inconvenience. Frank was even less lucky. Patiently waiting for me, his phone rings. With the bright sunlight, his phone's screen is hard to see. Parking his bike against a signpost, he seeks the shade of a nearby building to take his call. Crunch! A passing garbage truck whacks the front wheel of Frank's bike, cracking the carbon rim. So, he and his bike are out for the day - and a few bucks. The joint commute did seem like a good idea at the time though.
At the starting point in Concord, we were clogging up the Monument Street parking lot, so we had to get our show on the road fast. We split the attendees into fast and slow groups. Frank Scibilia, a ride leader in training, got volunteered to take the fast group out while I would ride with the party-pacers. Frank got his folks out expeditiously and we followed shortly thereafter. Running a tight ship with the party-pacers, we dutifully posted our human arrows and Dale, our sweep, swept our residue from the route. Neither arrows nor the sweep had much to do though. It really was a tight group with everyone moving at a surprisingly crisp pace. Oddly our group had more women than guys and some of the women were new to each other. At one turn, two riders, both women, ignored the arrow and continued straight along the road. The sweep, thinking they had missed their turn, chased after them. Riding a regular bike instead of his normal e-bike, he exhausted himself chasing these women fruitlessly. When he finally returned to the group, we speculated on who the missing women were. But all the names we considered were women who were already there. We then realized that the women the sweep had been chasing were on their own ride and never part of the WW ride. But, at least we now knew who the members of our own group were. The sweep had probably heard it before but he was admonished to stop chasing strange women lest he get himself in trouble.
While that incident sucked up a fair amount of time, some of us decided to make up for it by taking advantage of the warm temps and going for a swim in Heart Pond. They stayed in a good while so the water musta been pretty comfy.
The faster group kept tight enough not to require arrows nor a sweep, prompting at least one complaint: without arrowing, there was no opportunity to sprint from the back to the front, depriving some of needed exercise. Let's all rub onions in our eyes and "cry these guys a river."
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