I had my first night ride on the road of my life tonight. Yeah, I've ridden around town at night, hell Diane and I would ride home from Deer Park after nights of drinking, but never have I done an organized road ride at night. It was a great ride. It was freaky, terrifying, fast and well fun as hell.
Mark, the super tri guy hero, lead with me riding closely second wheel, Amy rode on my wheel. We were all lit up like some kind of circus train with blinky lights and reflective clothing, it truly was something to be seen. We left from Peoples Plaza and headed out around locust point, and Chesapeake City. In all we did a little over 30 miles. Despite the fact that I have probably ridden hundreds, maybe thousands of miles on these roads the entire time I felt like we were foraging into the black abyss, and I was almost completely lost. Here's a People World Championship tip, Mark is a great wheel to sit behind. I sucked his wheel like it was the last wheel on earth. As ride leader he did a great job keeping Amy and I abreast of any potential hazards. Traffic was light. It was good.
As we cut through the night I wondered if folks knew what we were, or if they would report us to the UFO police as UFO's. Heading out to Locust point, Mark warned the bridge will be rough. I was a little worried as 2 weeks earlier on a similar loop the bridge was out. We hit the bridge at I guess 20 mph or so only to find that it wasn't paved at all, but gravel. Luckily I had switched my hand to the tops, and got my weight back. I drifted probably 2 feet to the right, almost took out Amy, but we all rolled out cleanly. Great mountain biker huh ? Nothing like riding through gravel in the dark, at 20 mph on a 25 mm tire. Rock and roll.
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