Sparkle and Boom

A quick morning ride before breakfast, a little jaunt before the sun came out to brand us all as its own, that was the general idea. Meet at the Blairstone overpass at 10:00 A:M when the temperature is a brisk 92(I wore my arm warmers!)
Take a quick spin up the Fern to the Cadillac trail and back, that was my intention.

"Hey, what do you think about finding Dogboy's Falls Chase loop and doing that instead?" said Cupcake, who hates me and wishes me harm. "Sure" said I, who hate myself and wish myself harm. "Let's do that. Let's ride off into the barren and exposed plains with no clear plan or knowledge of the trail."

So that is what we did, and it was all gooey gravy for a while. Pounding up random sand roads, enjoying the longest unknown climb in Tallahassee, pushing the pace, and drinking all of my water in the first 20 minutes.

Somewhere on the Cadillac trail headed back to homebase my hammer came down on an empty chamber *click*. Confused, I came up out of the saddle and tried to fire another round into my legs. *Click*. Then panic- click,click,click,clickclick!

Nothing. I was spent. Four tablespoons of hummus the night before chased down with three Diet Ginger Ales (with Sucralose!) and a strawberry smoothie for breakfast and every single bit of it used up, reconstituted, and used up again. I watched CC grind away out of sight ahead of me.

I caught up at the top of the hill and he wordlessly passed me 3 Shot Blocks. For all I know he recited the Gettysburg address when he did it. I was delirious. I crawled down into the pain cave and waited for that little trickle charge of sugar to kick in, which it barely did.

Temperature under the Blairstone overpass when we finished the ride two hours later?

98 in the shade.

Juancho