Sunday, April 18, 2010
Today started out a pretty good day. I slept well last night and we woke up to a delicious egg, toast, and oatmeal breakfast cooked by Team Lemon. The day was rather chilly (started out at 50 degrees according to Megan’s nifty new cycling computer), but the wind had died down and the roads were not nearly as hilly as they had been the past few days. Signs were good.
We started off with a small group of 7 riders. We rode together for about the first 12 miles or so until the rest of the group caught up to us (they started later than we had). After this point, about 18 riders were riding in double pace lines down the side of a gorgeous, not-very-busy, well-paved New Mexican highway.
I will digress a moment from the events of the day to mention a little bit about pace lines. Pace lines can be awesome. When riding in a line, one person (or two people, in the case of double lines) takes the lead and holds the pace for a period of time. When they get tired, they fall to the back of the line and hang out there as another person moves forward to take the lead. And so on. The advantage of a line is that, not only will the person in the front of the line effectively “block” some of the crazy Southwestern winds, but the people in the line behind can draft off of the front people, allowing them to go faster and bike easier with less effort. Sounds like a great thing, right? Well pace lines can also be very bad. They can be very difficult to become accustomed to, especially when many riders have never ridden in a pace line before (as is the case with many people on our team). It is incredibly important to stay a certain distance behind the wheel in front of you – too close and you risk bumping tires and crashing, too far and you lose all benefits of the draft. If someone slows down too quickly in the front of a pace line, it can create a crazy back-reaction and cause riders behind them to risk becoming too close to the wheel in front of them and crashing. One of the rules of pace lines is that you must never cross wheels with the bike in front of you. Crossing wheels means that the front wheel of your bike must never be next to any portion of the back wheel of the bike in front of you. If this happens and the person in front of you has to quickly swerve to the side to avoid something in front of them, their wheel will hit your wheel, causing you to crash. There really is no other alternative. You get too close, you crash. There is an ever-so-slight science to pace lines. It’s not really as simple (or safe) as it may seem.
Today was one of those bad days for pace lines. While it seems fun to have almost the entire team riding together, it can become very dangerous. With larger pace lines, it is more difficult to compensate for small changes in speed or minor swerves of the riders in front. Some of us were a little anxious riding in a group that large, but didn’t do anything about it. Hindsight is always 20/20. About 45 miles in to our day, something happened. No one knows exactly what happened, but something happened. Bicycles slowed, wheels crossed, someone swerved, and riders went down. I don’t really remember everything that happened, but I do remember looking in front of my front wheel, and there was Lauren, underneath her bike, in the fetal position. I had nowhere to go but right over her. My bike literally launched over hers. If you would like a visual, think of me as Rodney Dangerfield and Lauren as the ramp. Needless to say, I crashed on the ground as well. A chain reaction started, with at least 6 riders going down and three bikes in serious need of repair – mine included. I had to rack my bike for the rest of the day while the support team tried to find a bike shop in Hobbs, NM.
Although this was not a good outcome for the day, in the end, we were all very lucky. No one was seriously injured – just bumps, bruises, and some serious cases of road rash.
The support team wasn’t able to find a bike shop in Hobbs. However, through the power of small-town telephone chains, we ended up with an amazing bicycle mechanic name Randolph who fixed all but one of our bikes.
Poor Tim. His back wheel is really bent out of shape. Randolph was able to true my back wheel and bend my back derailleur back in to place. He was my hero for the day. And he probably saved me significant amounts of money.
The amazing people at the high school welcomed us to “Hobbs, America” with a delicious dinner.
It was nice to not have to cook for the evening. We headed out on the town to try to find a location with internet. We ended up at the Hobbs’ Family Inn. 
Interesting place. A few other members of the team went out looking for a drug store and one got shot by a paint ball gun. Hobbs loves us during the day but hates us by night. Interesting place, Hobbs, America.
End of the eighteenth day. And it was crashing.
We started off with a small group of 7 riders. We rode together for about the first 12 miles or so until the rest of the group caught up to us (they started later than we had). After this point, about 18 riders were riding in double pace lines down the side of a gorgeous, not-very-busy, well-paved New Mexican highway.
I will digress a moment from the events of the day to mention a little bit about pace lines. Pace lines can be awesome. When riding in a line, one person (or two people, in the case of double lines) takes the lead and holds the pace for a period of time. When they get tired, they fall to the back of the line and hang out there as another person moves forward to take the lead. And so on. The advantage of a line is that, not only will the person in the front of the line effectively “block” some of the crazy Southwestern winds, but the people in the line behind can draft off of the front people, allowing them to go faster and bike easier with less effort. Sounds like a great thing, right? Well pace lines can also be very bad. They can be very difficult to become accustomed to, especially when many riders have never ridden in a pace line before (as is the case with many people on our team). It is incredibly important to stay a certain distance behind the wheel in front of you – too close and you risk bumping tires and crashing, too far and you lose all benefits of the draft. If someone slows down too quickly in the front of a pace line, it can create a crazy back-reaction and cause riders behind them to risk becoming too close to the wheel in front of them and crashing. One of the rules of pace lines is that you must never cross wheels with the bike in front of you. Crossing wheels means that the front wheel of your bike must never be next to any portion of the back wheel of the bike in front of you. If this happens and the person in front of you has to quickly swerve to the side to avoid something in front of them, their wheel will hit your wheel, causing you to crash. There really is no other alternative. You get too close, you crash. There is an ever-so-slight science to pace lines. It’s not really as simple (or safe) as it may seem.
Today was one of those bad days for pace lines. While it seems fun to have almost the entire team riding together, it can become very dangerous. With larger pace lines, it is more difficult to compensate for small changes in speed or minor swerves of the riders in front. Some of us were a little anxious riding in a group that large, but didn’t do anything about it. Hindsight is always 20/20. About 45 miles in to our day, something happened. No one knows exactly what happened, but something happened. Bicycles slowed, wheels crossed, someone swerved, and riders went down. I don’t really remember everything that happened, but I do remember looking in front of my front wheel, and there was Lauren, underneath her bike, in the fetal position. I had nowhere to go but right over her. My bike literally launched over hers. If you would like a visual, think of me as Rodney Dangerfield and Lauren as the ramp. Needless to say, I crashed on the ground as well. A chain reaction started, with at least 6 riders going down and three bikes in serious need of repair – mine included. I had to rack my bike for the rest of the day while the support team tried to find a bike shop in Hobbs, NM.
Although this was not a good outcome for the day, in the end, we were all very lucky. No one was seriously injured – just bumps, bruises, and some serious cases of road rash.The support team wasn’t able to find a bike shop in Hobbs. However, through the power of small-town telephone chains, we ended up with an amazing bicycle mechanic name Randolph who fixed all but one of our bikes.
Poor Tim. His back wheel is really bent out of shape. Randolph was able to true my back wheel and bend my back derailleur back in to place. He was my hero for the day. And he probably saved me significant amounts of money.The amazing people at the high school welcomed us to “Hobbs, America” with a delicious dinner.
It was nice to not have to cook for the evening. We headed out on the town to try to find a location with internet. We ended up at the Hobbs’ Family Inn. Interesting place. A few other members of the team went out looking for a drug store and one got shot by a paint ball gun. Hobbs loves us during the day but hates us by night. Interesting place, Hobbs, America.End of the eighteenth day. And it was crashing.
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