Mike's Bike Blog

I made my first group ride with the Southwest Cycle Sport group from their Bee Cave location. I didn't know what to expect, from their website it just said there would be a Memorial Day ride with an 8am roll out. There were about 10 guys in the group as we rolled out they mentioned 50 miles was on tap. We rolled out at a social pace on Bee Cave Road down to 360. As we approached Loop 1 a spirited sprint started and I geared up and met the acceleration at 30+ mph. The group got split and I managed to stay with the lead group as we turned onto Southwest Parkway. A light split the group again with me and 2 others. We continued on till around William Cannon and stopped to regroup.

On Hwy 45 we got the fastest paceline going that I've ever been in, we motored along going 35-40 mph. Jeremy one of the Southwest Cycle Sport riders, pulled us along. Somewhere around here we stopped for a water break. After our refueling and we got back on the road on a hill leading up to Southwest Parkway Jeremy attacked again. This time there was no answer as he got a sizable gap on everyone. There was some discussion in the group about who would give chase, I thought there would be a spirited chase so I went. I bridged up to Jeremy and we continued on to the light.

Shortly after getting onto Barton Springs Road another attack materialized. I was in mid pack and saw the attack coming so I got ready and made my jump as the group answered. Again we were attacking at nearly 40 mph, I would sneak quick peaks down at my Garmin 705 to see the speed. I made my move as I approached the front of the group. I pulled around to the left and found myself in the front. I pulled up as we hit the rollers and the group came around. I got onto the back but was completely spent and found myself starting to lose contact with the wheel in front of me. I hunkered down on the hill before the turn onto Lost Creek to catch back on with the guys.

I love Lost Creek Road, it was one of my favorite routes I'd take when I worked at Keller Williams for my lunch time rides. Normally I'm not much of a decenter, I seem to get passed, but the technical and winding hills on Lost Creek were to my advantage. I was able to get ahead on the docents that would then allow me to climb up the hills at my own pace and not lose too much ground. That is until 1/2 way up the final climb up Lost Creek. I wasn't able to stay in contact with Jeremy and one other rider. I knew there were still plenty of hills on Bee Cave that still lay ahead so I was content to ride with the second group and let the other 2 go. We got caught at the 360 light so Jeremy and the other were gone and we didn't catch up to them till the Southwest Cycle Sport parking lot. When we got onto Bee Cave we got a paceline going all the way back to the store.

I had a great time with the group and they invited me back. My legs held up faboulously, I was a little worried as I was coming off a heavy week. Last week I put in 297 miles so I wasn't sure what to expect from my legs. I was really excited to get home and see what kind of numbers my Garmin 705 would have there for the route and for my power. The route was of interest to me as it covered a lot of new places I'd never been to. The power always interests me but this one I really wanted to see what my numbers were for the sprints and what my overall power would be as I put in some race efforts. Imagine my pissed offness when I plug in the 705 and there is no history file. I've been bitten by the file corruption bug that I'd heard about on the wattage group. It appears there is a bug in the Garmin 2.70 version of the software where a lap gets corrupted. The lap file was there but I couldn't get it off the device. After plugging and unplugging it a few times a blank history file showed up, but my lap data was gone!  Stupid Garmin! I should have known better when others have had problems. I guess if I'm going to go out for a ride and I absolutely want the power data then I'll have to bring along the PowerTap head unit as a backup. I'm not sure if the corruption happens only when the device is recording power or if it happens when not paired to a power device as well.  Sorry I can't post the route, once we got off of 360 I was on all new territory and I have no clue how we got to Hwy 45 or how we got back to Southwest Parkway.