The Couve

I've been unable to join my social bike group's Vancouver contingent on their Wednesday evening rides, until tonight. I got off work early enough, and the traffic was light enough, that I was able to make it through Portland and into Vancouver to ride tonight.

I think there were 14 of us tonight. A surprisingly large group for a mid week after work ride. We started off from about a mile east of I-5 with about 8 of us, then met up with a half dozen other riders at the base of the I-5 bridge.


We rode northward toward Ridgefield along the river. The road was a low traffic dead end road. When we reached the end we regrouped then started on our way back, but not before i took the chance to take a photo.



We took advantage of the low traffic to ride back a bit casually.



The ride had folks with a wide range of biking experience. I rode "sweep" on the return trip. I was riding with a guy who was really struggling to maintain a 13 mph pace. We had a slight tailwind and the route was pretty flat. He was working hard to maintain that pace, breathing hard, sweating, etc. I was truly amazed at how hard he was working to hold a pace that most of us would call a slow social pace. I know I must have been at that point some time in the past, but am glad I'm beyond that now. My congratulations to him for digging deep and finishing the ride.

We gathered on the back patio of Who Song and Larry's for chat and snacks. Summer is coming to an end, kids are back in school and it's too damn cold to sit on the patio after an evening bike ride!

I rode around the neighborhood a little while waiting for the ride to begin. I got enough extra tootling around to bring me up to 32 miles tonight.

..........road bike.......rollers.........mtb.....lifecycle.....total
Today........32..............0.............0..........0..........32
Jan.........474..............0............21..........7.........502
Feb.........530..............0.............0..........0.........530
March.......502..............0.............0..........0.........502
April.......524..............0.............0..........0.........524
May........1003..............0.............0..........0........1003
June.......1016..............0............10..........0........1026
July.......1148..............0.............0..........0........1148
August.....1049..............0.............0..........0........1049
Sept........457..............0............50..........0.........507
YTD........6609..............0............87..........7........6791