Naked Lady Ride

Wednesday brought another long ride out of Peachtree City with the two fellow Ironman Florida 2013 entrants I rode with last week, Chad and Jared, and two new guys, John and Tommy.  Chad, John, and Tommy were wearing their Beck Janitorial team kit.  Jared had a kit that matched his bike colors.  I wore my Charlie Bates Solar Astronomy Project team kit.  Chad and I wore our CBSAP kit during Ironman Florida 2011.

Before the ride I applied some Chamois Butt'r.  More butt'r than I'd ever used before.  I was glad I did. Later, for a short run, I put some butt'r where my Garmin heart-rate monitor strap rubs on my "massive" chest.  I was glad I did that too.  The run was shorter for me than for Chad and Jared.  I was out of gas after the first mile and rode the golf cart with the women and children for about two miles before recovering enough for the final half mile sprint to the finish.

Back to the bike.  This would be a good time to include a disclaimer.  Here it goes.  At no time did I take the lead or pull during the seventy-six mile ride.  I was probably in the front a total of two miles and while there I was being pushed by the four beasts behind me.  I'm glad I got that out of the way.

Chad, Jared, John and I took off and headed north out of Peachtree City to meet up with Tommy.  With Tommy on board and John, for the most part, in the lead we crisscrossed through Fayette, S. Fulton, and Coweta counties.   The cities of Tyrone, Fairburn, and Chattahoochee Hills all came and went.  We stopped for a minute at Le Jardin, an abandoned high-end subdivision obviously started before the real estate bubble burst.  I took take a few pictures of the "Naked Lady" statute located behind the swanky iron gates and stone walls of the entrance.

(l-r) John, Jared, Tommy and Chad like the Naked Lady

I like her too

I came prepared for the ride with three water bottles, a Clif bar, GU Shot Bloks, and a banana.  After our stop at the statue I ran into an orange barrel barrier bending my rear derailleur hanger, lost my Camelbac water bottle on a gravel road, and lost my backup bottle of water.  Fortunately, we stopped to refuel at a gas station twenty or so miles before the end of the ride.  And fortunately for me, I didn't go down on the asphalt when I hit the barrel.  I recovered from the impact but had to stop briefly to clean my drawers (if you know what I mean).  My bike was rideable albeit noisy as the rear derailleur chattered as I pedaled.  One might ask how does one ride into a four foot tall, two foot wide orange and black barrel.  However, the more appropriate question would be how does one avoid one when it's obviously bent of destruction.  The answer to that my friends I don't know.

My rear derailleur

Chad's wife and kids followed us on the run and gave me a ride when I needed it which was soon after we started.

(l-r) Audra, Tamara, and Carter

Thanks for reading.

Atlanta Center Tri Team Kit

My new custom Atlanta Center Triathlon Team kit arrived last week.  Creating the kit was a six month long ordeal.  The team ultimately settled on images provided by Steve Ramsden of the Charlie Bates Solar Astronomy Project (CBSAP).  Comprised of Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) employees we wanted our kit to reflect this affiliation in some way.  We toyed around with pictures of aircraft and air traffic control towers but none of them seemed to work out.

Then Steve stepped into the picture.  He had a large assortment of images, many of which were in the correct file format.  That's important.  Eventually Steve reluctantly provided us with doctored up images of the sun and moon.  I say "reluctantly" because apparently doctoring images is frounded upon in astronomical circles.  But they were "doctored up" using portions of other real images.  What harm could that be?  In our case the image of the sun includes a number of solar flares.  All the flares are real and were photographed.  They just weren't all photographed at the same time.  In the case of the image of the moon.  During a normal solar eclipse the moon is a blacked out circle.  It looks like a hole in the sky with the sun's corona all around.  In our case, in place of the hole, Steve placed a real image of the moon with all its crates.  Below the sun on the front and the moon on the back is a silhouette of the Atlanta skyline.  The sleeves of the jersey have the NOAA logo on the left and the FAA logo on the right.

I setup an account with Champion System and submitted the images and my ideas.  After many variations we finally ending up with what you see below. 

Cycling shorts and jersey

Cycling shorts and jersey

NOAA logo on the sleeve

FAA logo on the sleeve

Tri shorts and tri top

Tri shorts and tri top

The distance tri shorts have a small pocket on each leg

The tri top also has a pocket on each side

Well, that's about it.  I can't wait to wear my new kit in a race.  IMFL will probably be my first opportunity although I will wear it a few times when I train to break it in.

Pictures of the whole team are forthcoming.

Thanks for reading.