What a day, what a day, what a day.
Earlier this week Caleb spilled the beans that Robert would be out of town and was going to ask me to host the weekend ride. Of course I don’t mind, but I always have difficulty picking a route. It’s one thing to have a favorite route, but quite another to ride it over and over and over again. Thankfully with Caleb’s help we decided on Sunrise as the route and I mixed it up a bit by starting from the PT’s on the corner of Green Valley Pkwy and Horizon Ridge. I also bypassed Wetlands Park because at the time I was planning the route their website indicated that several trails were closed due to flood damage. I figured it would be safer to avoid the park all together in an attempt to keep this an all road ride. Unfortunately, despite my best efforts we still had a few sections that were nearly gravel.
I had a great breakfast before rolling out of the house. I didn’t make plans to meet anyone beforehand which allowed me to take my time getting to the start. Despite that I still ended up at PT’s nearly a half an hour before anyone else showed up. Better to be early, especially if you’re leading, than late. I did get to have a nice conversation with a gentleman hanging out in the parking lot. I learned that him and a few others like to walk the area and they meet at PT’s on Saturday mornings. It’s something the group started doing during COVID. Was a pleasant conversation and a great way to burn some time while waiting for everyone to show up.
It didn’t take long for everyone to start rolling in. I was surprised that we had as good of a turn out as we did. We even had a few west siders turn up. I felt kinda bad for Josh who drove all the way to the start to only be forced to drive home because he forgot his helmet and shoes among other things. Most shared our sympathies with him that he’d be missing out. With our group ready to roll out we took a nice group pic with PT’s in the background and set off down Horizon Ridge for Gibson.
I knew from the start that I wouldn’t be up front with the hammers today. I was still carrying around some fatigue from the two centuries the weekend before, and I wanted to sweep to make sure no one ran into trouble. Riding a much more relaxed pace made for a more enjoyable time. I got to chit chat and visit with a few people as we rolled around. At one point as Caleb and I were riding along Horizon Ridge, I told him, “Hey man I hate to interrupt, but just take a minute and check out this sunrise unfolding in front of us.”
He stopped, took a second, and replied, “Yeah man cotton candy clouds up there. I rarely take the time to look. I’m so used to looking down at my computer.” It really was an awesome sunrise.
The entire group made good time across Broadbent and onto Jimmy Durante, but dang there was a lot of crap still in the road. I was surprised considering that the big rains had been the week before. I had expected to have more of it cleaned up by now. It got even worse once we were onto Cabana Drive. There were still mounds of mud and dirt piled against both the inner and outer curbs. Thankfully we still had a nice clear track for us to ride along without being forced into traffic.
As we came up on construction at Desert Inn, the lead group got mixed up and went straight when the route wanted a right. This left pretty much Caleb and I alone along the stretch until Hollywood. Talking to John later he admitted it’s his habit to continue straight to Vegas Valley before making the turn. It didn’t really matter and we all met up again and continued on. I did share with John that Desert Inn is all nice new pavement to the east of Cabana and he really needs to come back and check it out.
We made our way over to the Green Valley Grocery at the corner of Los Feliz and Lake Mead without any incident. Of course we all stopped for a restroom and snack break. Everyone topped up their water bottles knowing there was no stopping until the Terrible’s on Lake Mead in Henderson. As we set out I reminded everyone that we’d regroup near the guard shack to make sure to get everyone into the park before continuing on.
The ascent and descent of Sunrise was great. There wasn’t too much crap in the road, but wow was the right side of the road washed out. A few spots had obviously had a ton of water running alongside the road and had the potential to undermine the road surface. As I was checking it out I realized the white line was right along the edge of the asphalt. It reminded me of several sections of CA-1 except CA-1 was even narrower for both lanes of travel traffic.
I was bringing up the rear through the guard shack, and everyone made it in without issue. Shortly after, I noticed Adrian stopped and when I asked if he was ok he was just making a quick phone call before moving on. I slowly rolled while waiting for him to finish and catch up. When he did, he and I started chatting. While this conversation was going on I looked down at his rear tire and hollered to him that it looked like it was going soft. We stopped to take a look at it and that is when the nightmare began.
It is somewhat a blur now, but this flat was a nightmare. Once we stopped Adrian said he was running tubeless. We decided that we’d hit it with his pump thinking maybe a small leak was the culprit. Once it was aired back up I could hear a hissing sound. After waiting for a few cards to pass us by we spun the wheel and be damned we found where the air was leaking from, but more importantly there was no sealant coming out to plug the hole. We decided in order to get Adrian rolling we needed to get a tube in. Thankfully Adrian has one on hand and we set about getting it installed. We have nothing but a hard time getting the tubeless stem removed and getting the tire to a point where we can squeeze the tube in. Then the process of getting the tire reinstalled was awful. The tire was so dang tight, I feared we wouldn’t get it reinstalled at all. After what felt like forever it finally was back on, and we set about airing it up with the pump again. Once we thought it had high enough pressure we went to remove the pump and the valve core came out! We reinstalled the core, aired it back up, and damn it again the core came out when removing the pump. We decided to hit it with a CO2 and that went without issue, but once he started rolling I could see the tire wasn’t seated properly. So now we’re tearing everything back apart to get this tire to seat right, and I don’t want to burn another CO2 in fear of it still not seating right. So we hit it with the pump two more times and be damned the same thing with the valve core coming out. We bite the bullet and try another CO2 to only have it get burned because I’d failed to set the inflator’s valve to the ‘closed’ position after using it previously. It was at this point that I was half tempted to throw Adrian’s bike off into the bushes. I was so frustrated. I snagged my CO2 and inflator out of my repair kit and set about reinflating the tire. Thank the lord this was the last time. It took the entire CO2 and the tire was seated perfectly. Adrian rolled it around a little and felt like it was good to go. All in all this flat took us AN HOUR to fix. During this time Frank had rolled up because the couple of Adrian and Frank had originally planned on riding out to the dam as a part of a century ride for the day. Well that was kiboshed.
The three of us did roll together until the intersection of Northshore and Lakeshore. It was at this point that Frank chose to continue east along Lakeshore to make for either the dam, Boulder City, or both. Meanwhile, Adrian and I continued west back towards Henderson. We made one stop at the Terrible’s at Athens and Lake Mead along the way.
As we made the climb up Gibson, Adrian was outlining how he had planned on riding home. Realizing he wanted to cross the 215 before continuing west I convinced him to stick with me until Wigwam and Arroyo Grande. Once we got to that corner, Adrian took the right onto Wigwam to make his way over to Pebble and eventually home. This left me solo to continue up Arroyo Grande and Horizon Ridge to PT’s.
Before heading in to PT’s to see if anyone was still hanging around, I made a quick stop at Giant to grab a couple replacement CO2s. I usually only carry one with me, and the last thing I wanted was to get a flat myself and not have a way to inflate my spare tube.
Rolling into the PT’s parking lot I recognized several vehicles belonging to a few of the riders that were a part of the group. I went around to the west side of the building and saw several bikes parked on the patio. I opened the patio doors, parked Shadow with everyone else, and proceeded inside.
I was greeted with hollers of, “Where in the hell have you been?” I couldn’t help but smile, pull up a chair, and share the disaster of the flat repair. We all moaned and groaned together while they also started throwing food together onto a plate for me to tackle. Ended up with 1.5 pancakes, 2 slices of toast, and a sausage patty for my troubles!
I had a great visit with everyone who had hung around after the ride. In typical fashion though it was soon time to head out and for home. Thankfully, Joy was one of those who hung around and we rode out together. She ended up joining me all the way around Anthem, up Democracy, and even rode right by the house. I escorted her out of my little neighborhood, putting her on a main drag she was familiar with, before saying our goodbyes.
Once again a great ride with great people despite the flat nightmare. Sometimes crap just happens and you gotta do the best you can with what you’ve got. Ultimately, we were still out riding bikes and enjoying nature.
New bike fund: $27.09 (+$0.02)
2.44 new miles — From Wandrer.earth
359 vehicles @ 5.2 per mile, 1.4 per minute, Speeds: 35.4 mph (avg), 63.9 mph (max) — by MyBikeTraffic.com
Give your activities the names they deserve. — by Bandok.com
Mostly clear-Sunny, 80°F-97°F, Feels like 79°F-105°F, Humidity 30%-18%, Wind SW 2mph-NNE 3mph — by Klimat.app
— myWindsock Report —
Weather Impact: -4%
Headwind: 38% @ 3.1-12.8mph
Longest Headwind: 41m 26s
Air Speed: 16.2mph
Temp: 78.8-98.7°F
Precip: 0% @ 0 Inch/hr
— END —
Max elevation: 3065 ft
Min elevation: 1406 ft
Total climbing: 3713 ft
Total descent: -3702 ft
Total time: 07:01:42
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