I got started today at 5:00am and on the road by 6:15am from the bike trail off College. I was going to go to the coast and take Cannon Road to head inland from there to train a bit on some rolling hills to prepare for the MS ride, but decided to go down to the Del Mar train station and back. While heading back north, I caught up to a large peloton(50-60 riders) and have to tell you it was so much fun knowing I can keep up with the club riders and maintain in a large group of cyclist with the same interest in bikes that I have, until I got the flat. It did turn out to be a slow leak which was nice, so it gave me plenty of warning and another cyclist noticed it too so I pulled off out of the peloton to fix the flat. I carry plenty of equiptment to change a tire, but did almost find myself in a pickle because the first tube actually had a pinch in a location other than where the nail was sticking out my tire, so I had to replace the flat with a new tube, which wasn't a problem but I only had enough air to refill that tube with about 40 lbs of pressure instead of the 140 I usually ride with. This happened because I use a CO2 cartridge to fill my tubes back up and not a traditional bike pump, which will get me in to trouble one of these days. Hmmm maybe I should look into getting a pump... They say flats like these come in streaks...
I decided to make a "B-line" home, which still ended up being right around 53 miles round trip, but would have been nice to take the inland route home to test my training development. Despite the flat and slow pace home, I was still making good time and the ride was extremely rewarding once again.
