I woke up at 6:30 a.m., rolled over and saw my riding suit that I had hung on the bedroom door the night before. I then remembered the plan for this morning. I rolled out of bed, stiff and shins hurting from the repeated kicks received from my girlfriend during the night. She denies it of course.
The cats hop off the bed and followed me to the kitchen, watching intently and making an occasional half meow, half whine sound. This routine was expected and I know what they are thinking. "Dad, why does making coffee trump feeding us?" They care nothing for the role coffee plays in our society, they care nothing for my morning ride plans, they don't care about my concerns for early morning road conditions but all of sudden their food concerns are waylaid by the fat squirrel they spy in the backyard. Now my actions in the kitchen are old news while the cats take up position at the window to see what the rodent is up to. Cats...
Household concerns taken care of, I put on my one piece race suit and Alpinestars boots. This was my first time riding in this suit. Usually I would feel that a full race suit on the street is unacceptable behavior but the leather needs to break in somehow before I use it on the track. The night before, I had affixed my GoPro camera to the top of my backup helmet and adjusted it to what I thought was the perfect angle. I grabbed my old, worn in shorty Teknic gloves (which I refuse to replace because you can't buy them anymore) and headed out.
As I went down to my bike, I felt good about the fact that I had serviced it the morning before. Chain clean and lubed, slack adjusted, tire pressure checked, brake dust eliminated, lubed levers and made a few APR changes to the power commander (there were a few flat spots in 2nd gear.) A fired her up, probably woke up some irritated neighbors, stiffened the GPR stabilizer 2 clicks and I was off.
I cruised around the neighborhood for awhile and headed toward Skyline Blvd. in an attempt to warm up my Michelin's before getting down to business. My plan was to hit some local twisties to get myself acclimated and then head down the highway to Castro Valley and gas up at the start of Redwood Rd.
Overall, the ride was good, fun as usual. The roads had more gravel than is typical and were still damp in spots due to the early morning hour. My rear tire slipped out more than once. Traffic was minimal but was of the irritating kind. Slow cars that wouldn't pull over, groups of bicyclists that hogged the road and the occasional loitering pedestrian who seem to think that the center of the road is an acceptable place to stroll.
Later at home I reviewed the video, the main purpose for this morning ride. Turns out that the angle it was set at was slightly too low and the the camera itself was far too high on top of my helmet. The result was content that showed the front of my bike from my hands forward and about 20 feet of road in front of the bike... for 53 minutes. At that angle its hard to discern between sweeping turns and straight aways as well as not being able to tell at what lean angle I achieved or if there was any vertical movement.
Since watching this video causes almost instant motion sickness, I wont post it here. I guess I'll have to go on another ride to try and get it right. Geez... what a hard life I have.
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