Spring break, fail.

Last Friday I woke up sick. Raced on Saturday at the UO collegiate road race anyways, because the weather was wonderful and I held off the worst of it for a little while, and I pulled off 3rd in the 65 miles of rolling course around Elmira - Warthen, Sheffler, etc. The men's A race had maybe 30 guys and 9 of them were from UW - so it was a bit craptastic trying to get a result but so it goes.

Sunday I spent on the couch. The whole day. Bam. Hello virus, let's spend some cozy time together. You bring the ugly, I bring the blankets.

I slowly rode the fixed gears across town a couple of times, with near disastrous results, early in the week. But when it's spring break and sunny and all thoughts of actual vacation related activities (really long rides, daytrips to the coast, random Portland activities, riding in Bend) have all evaporated, then you gotta try something.

Of course, the first day I felt remotely like riding, yesterday, saw the wonderful sunshine turn to lousy rain and wind. A couple of the UO "A" riders and I did some team time trial practice and while it was productive, TTT riding in wind and rain kind of sucks.

Today was finally almost normal. Wake up, drink tea, clear out the nose and throat, drink more tea, watch the rain, drink coffee, google stuff, drink more tea. Find the DeFeet wool kit and the Showers Pass Protec jacket. Make sure the Flaming Lips and Fleetwood Mac are on the iPod. Roll out.

When it's crappy out and I need to fall into a rhythm and tap out a few hours, the best thing to do is to just go and start climbing the various southern hills. Up and down, click into whatever gear matches the required effort and start turning. Click, click, stand on the pedals, sit down, click, click, click. Over the top, spin out down and find another one. Click, click, click. At some point, time stops mattering, and I just ride. Up into the cookie-cutter developments and all the little crests and points and peaks into the clouds and then after a couple of hours, I stop right below the cloud level, look down and feel alright.