110th ride

I rode to work this morning just fine, and after a good full day's work I rode to church to do my weekly work of creating the projections for Sunday's worship. When I left there, I decided to do a considerably longer ride home—one of 15 miles, which took me a little under 2 hours. This was quite slow, but there was a good reason for it.

When I got to about my furthest point from home (some 7 miles away), I could begin to sense that Michigan's blessedly lovely roads managed to suck a considerable amount of air out of my tires. Although neither was flat, pedaling was difficult—increasingly so the further I went. And you might know that this would happen on a day when the two people I would contact for assistance (Michelle, and Doug Tidd) were both out of town! So I knew I was on my own, and just kept pedaling away, slow as it was. It made climbing the significant grade southward on Wagner to Scio Church Rd. (about miles 10 to 12 of the ride) a huge challenge. And needless to say, I had no thought whatsoever of speed. I was just hoping to be able to keep going so that I could make it home.

I almost did make it, although for the last several miles I could both hear a feel a ka-CHUNK with each revolution of the wheel (both front and rear). Then within the last mile, I began to hear a flapping sound also, and about a quarter mile before reaching home, the rear tire gave a limp "pop" like the mild explosion of a balloon, which was precisely what it was. At that point, I was happy to be close enough that it was feasible to walk it the rest of the way home.

Tomorrow, therefore, I won't be able to do my traditional long Saturday morning ride—or, perhaps, any ride at all tomorrow, since we are attending a big family reunion in the afternoon. But I'll at least get it over to the shop in the morning to get it repaired.

Meanwhile, with my rides of both morning and afternoon, I did 17.2 miles today, in a ghastly time of 2 hours 8 minutes.