What a beautiful ride today at the Tour de Vineyard in Florence Texas!
This ride had the best ratio of recumbents per 100 cyclists of any ride I’ve been to in central Texas. Of course, the majority of the bents were from my house.
Robyn on the green Catrike Expedition, Liz on the red Catrike Expedition and myself on the Bacchetta TiAero where three of the five bents there. Brian Buckmaster on his ICE Vortex trike and the same guy from last year on his Velokraft VK2 from New Mexico rounded out the five bents at the ride.
The turnout was a lot less than last year with maybe 100 riders total.
The day was gorgeous! Started out in the mid-60s and gradually rose to the mid-70s during the ride. Very few clouds to begin with and then slightly cloudy at the end to take the edge off the direct sun.
Here are Robyn, Liz and Brian at the beginning of the ride. For some reason they put the starting mileage signs up backwards. Robyn and Liz doing the 15 mile route very quickly moved to the back of the line before the ride started. Nothing like getting run over at the start of the race by the super fast high mileage riders.
Here is a picture of the start. Several of the people remember me from the prior years - evidently all recumbents look alike and even though my bike was different this year they ‘remembered’ me from last year and the year before.
A lot of questions about recumbents. People are really interested in the comfort aspect.
The wild flowers were out in force. This particular field stood out due to the vast size and amount of bluebonnets!
Robyn and I wore our Team Vite jerseys we picked up in Florida earlier this year.
The first part of the ride was fast, fast, fast. The first 6 miles I was directly behind the pace police car with my TiAero, the Velokraft VK2 and two other upright bikes. We pretty much left everyone in our dust.
About the 6 mile mark not only was I getting a little winded I was also worried about how I was blowing my pre-ride strategy of taking it easy on my bum right leg - which is still healing from the ride two weeks ago.
Well the leg felt great! But I still backed off the pace some and then stuck to the pre-ride plan of doing the easy 30 mile route.
I ended up with 30.6 miles at 15.9 mph. That TiAero is a really smooth, comfortable ride. A lot of people talking big expectations at the beginning of the ride (me included) - but I finished first on the 30 mile route - mainly because all the really fast riders did the 55 mile route.
After the ride we sat out on the veranda sipping wine, having a light lunch, and just enjoying the day! This is why I really like this ride! After Brian finished the 55 mile route he joined us gabbing for a little while.