Tuesday, March 14, 2006

7 is a personal record




Aurora day two was a bit better than the first. In class today we messed with different work station images and configs. The instructor (Don) wanted to hammer the configs, user names and p/w's in our sponge-like brains, his idea of a good time is reimaging the hell out of a pc till you can do it with your eyes closed.
At lunch I drove down to the nearest bike shop for some tubes. You see, because when I woke this morning I noticed that my bike had double flats. I sat drinking coffee and pulling thorns from my tires at 6 am...Nothing like inhaling rubber cement to start the day.

After work I studied an Alamo rent a car map and decided to ride into the city and try to get close to the distant snow covered mountains on the west side of Denver. Packed my bag aticipating an epic ride since I had no idea what could happen in the next few hours. I started rolling south down the east side of Aurora and planned on turning west on one of the many through ways that lead to Denver...With in the first mile of riding I saw a trail-head for the Sandy Creek Greenway. Cool! It led west toward Denver! Jumped on the greenway which is a wide pedestrian gravel sidewalk that parallels sandy creek. Had no idea where it lead but it was much better than rolling on the busy streets of Aurora. Turns out this trail is the bomb! Not at all technical but bypasses most of the busy intersections that slow the continuity of the ride toward Denver. The Sandy Creek Greenway winds along the creek and flows under the highway bridges. I followed the gravel path for eleven miles.
When the path ended I was in an industrial part of Denver. The mountains were still miles away, the sun was high and I continued toward them. Now on Smith street, a rough dirt road that served as a truck route and was not well traveled...Perfect! Then I got my first flat of the ride (I considered it the third of the day after the double flats I fixed over coffee). Had plenty of patches and a couple tubes in the pack, no big deal. Fixed it in no time and rolled on...A mile later I heard the familiar sound of air escaping my rear wheel once again! Pulled to the side of Colorado Ave and yanked a couple more thorns from my tire. Swapped the tube and was under-way...That was the fourth flat. I peddled down 38th Ave into the "hood" of Denver. Sun was dropping on the horizon and did not want a fifth flat. I found my way out of the ghetto and headed north toward the Sandy Creek Greenway. I accepted the fact that I would not get to the foothills but did get close enough for today.
I rolled back up Smith ave where I was paralleling a slow moving freight train so I raced it!

Almost back to the greenway and got my next flat. Yet another thorn in my rear wheel. Ate a power bar and patched the hole..Decided to inspect the front wheel and instantly noticed three thorns plugging small holes in the tire..WTF?? Pulled another tube (my last) out of the back pack and was soon done with that repair (number 5 and 6). Decided to bypass the greenway just Incas there was another thorn with my name on it, stuck to the road and pointed my ass home. Yup, you know it...a couple miles from my home away from home...Number seven strikes...I lost my cool. I was fed up. Tried to fix the fucker but after using my last patch and pumping air heard the evil hissing noise I knew soooo well. How could this be I asked myself...yes, I did check for remaining thorns in the tire...I rode number seven for the final two miles home. Probably ruined my tire but just didn't care....was a great tour around Denver dispite a record number of flats. May buy the stan's tube-less system tomorrow.

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