Best laid plans !
Just as I was looking forward to my Thanksgiving Day ride to Salem Lake, I received an invitation to join some new friends in their celebration. That killed my aspirations for Thursday and yesterday went much the same. Today’s ride was a delight!

It must have reached 60 F and was very sunny. I had planned today’s ride to occur during prime TV football time. But I had forgotten that Wake Forest University was playing at home and was pleasantly surprised that there had been no sign of any game traffic until I stopped at the last major intersection before the home leg of my ride. A gentleman in a neighboring lane asked about my ride, mentioned the game and said “we won”. As the light changed in my favor, he bid me a safe ride, I responded in kind.

Then for the rest of my ride I pondered the extended team concept. Something like concentric circles in a pond disturbed by a stone. At the center is the actual team, the first circle is the alumni attending the game, the next circle is alumni watching on TV, the next ring are other supporters attending the game and so on until circle, by circle all supporters are represented in what is surely a global we.

We who ride the roads by ourselves are an independent lot. Our “team” is much more ephemeral than most. We share a distant drummer who sets a cadence each of us interprets individually. Yet they ask why we do this.

The ride today was 14.15 miles in 1 hr 4 minutes. No load today, except for the rack trunk. A respectable distance at a decent pace reflects the benefits of two days of rest. Tomorrow, it is Salem Lake. Temps are expected to be in the mid 60s.

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Stats
Weeks miles: 26.82
Months miles: 180.85
Year Since June: 990.19
Bike: Trek 620 w/commuting and trail gearing and tires.