What a day, First club ride
 

I drove an hour this morning to join a friend on a club ride. The first one for me. After I got there, I realized that I forgot my shoes! Noooo!! My friend, who lives near the start point, said we could go to his house and swap out my pedals for some platforms. I'm thinking, oh no. But off we go. We get to his house and he goes in his garage and wheels out his #2 Lemond and says, "Why don't you just ride this? I have an extra pair of shoes too." His frame is a medium, mine is a large. We swapped out the saddle and hit the road. I quickly got used to the smaller frame. Actually, it was quite nice. It was all I could do to keep up though. By the time we got started, the slower group was gone and I was stuck with the fast guys. We had no maps so they couldn't drop me, haha. It was tough not knowing where we were or how much more we had to go. About halfway through we caught the slower group and I peeled off and stayed with them. That was MUCH better. Since that much went wrong and I still had a good time, I'll have to go back and try it again with my own bike.

My first club ride went like this...

At mile 8, I sustained a flat. One person stayed back with me while I installed my spare.
At mile 12, I sustained another flat, same wheel . This time, 6 members stopped with me, as I borrowed someone else's spare. I carefully checked the tire and rim for thorns.
At mile 13, BANG! a blowout, on the same tire. I said thank you and goodbye to the nice people, walked a short distance to the main road and called my wife to pick me up. One guy joked about placing me on a "black list", but they all graciously invited me to ride with them again.

Since then, I identified the problem (rim tape had moved, uncovering a spoke hole). Its fixed, and with 200 miles with no more problems, I've just about worked up the courage to show up at their ride again :)

A strange side note to my ride on the Lemond. I had been having some trouble with numbness in my left hand on my bike. Riding my friend's bike with no gloves for 30+ miles, I had no numbness. I've had two rides since on my bike and the numbness is back. It hits about 7 miles into the ride. I change hand positions often, but it doesn't help much. Any thoughts???

more stretched out = more pressure on your hands - on your own bike that is

I went from riding an aluminum cannondale to one of Lemond's steel/cf spine series. No more numbness.

Oh, and I never ride with gloves.

Rode the club ride again today on my own bike. I rolled my handlebars slightly forward, and tried to keep my weight off of the middle of the heal of my hand with pretty good results. I still got a little numbness, but not that much. Of course I was trying to keep up with the fast guys since none of the other slower riders showed up today. I told them I could hold that 20mph as long as we are going downhill and I'm drafting. haha I'm hoping that I can keep the numbness to a minimum until I find the answer.