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Nothing like last year

newyearsdayI was a little hesitant to go for a bike this morning, because of the heavy fog and damp streets, but today's ride is the annual New Years day ride, and that only comes once a year.

So I dawned my tights, long sleeve jersey, gloves and attached my trusty blinking red light to my seat post, and headed down to the Long Beach marina for the start of the ride.

Upon arriving at the marina, I discovered I wasn't the only one. There were quite a few riders already there, and a continuous stream of riders still arriving. Plus as we headed down PCH, we continued to pick up new riders as the pack swelled to somewhere easily approaching 300 riders, if not a lot more. [I'm not good at estimating the size of crowds.]

It was a little frightening at first, as everyone attempted to reach their comfort zone in the pack, but there didn't seem to be too many squirrelly riders today (they probably all decided to stay in bed on this foggy morning), and the pack managed to avoid any major incidents, as it shedded many of the weaker riders, attempting to achieve a good rhythm.

It takes strong legs, a good set of lungs, stamina (this is a 100+ mile ride) and a hemoglobin in the normal range to complete the entire ride, and at best, since I only possess maybe two of those four attributes, I cut the ride short, stopping in Corona del Mar, along with several other riders, and then headed back to Long Beach at a leisurely pace.

As I look back, today's ride was a good one, and I'm glad I went. I'm now ready to face the world after completing my other two New Year's day traditions, hot dogs and sauerkraut for lunch, and watching the Rose Bowl on TV.

And if the weather is any indication of the year to come, we should be in for a spectacularly good year, when you consider how poorly 2008 turned out after starting with fantastic weather for last year's New Year's day ride.

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