Acura L.A. Bike Tour

On Sunday morning, I rode in the L.A. Bike Tour-twice. It started at 5:50 a.m. The night before, I just came back from dinner and bowling so I wasn't able to fall asleep quickly. It usually takes me awhile to fall asleep these days. I don't know. Maybe it's because I have too many things on my mind lately. I finally went to sleep around 1:00 a.m. and then some people woke me up by talking loudly as they walked by my room. Sarah sleeps like a log so she doesn't wake up that easily. I then went back to sleep around 2:00 a.m. I woke up at 4:00 a.m. to eat breakfast and get to the start point early. There are over 16,000 riders, so you have to get there at least an hour early if you want to be closer to the starting point. Otherwise, you'll be behind tens of thousands of other riders and it will take you an hour just to get to the starting line. Fortunately, I got there early and I was off with one of the lead packs. I drafted behind some guys. The course was about 22 miles. At around 6:40 a.m. I already passed my church, so I just decided to go to the end. I was going to stop at church just in case I was running late.

I felt pretty strong when riding behind the lead group. I wanted to attack and drop all of them, but I also wanted to save my strength for the sprint to the finish. The finish line came earlier than I thought. I attacked at the very last stretch where there were tons of photographers. I almost ran some photographers over.

I got a finisher's medal at the end. When I looked at my watch, it was still only 6:50 a.m., so I decided to do the tour again. I was passing thousands of people. Of course, they were mostly just families and their little kids. It was like a sea of cyclists. I loved it especially since all the roads on the course were closed off to cars. This only happens once a year so I wanted to take full advantage of it. I think I might have been the only one to do it twice since I never saw anyone else. I never got passed, but I did pass everyone else. I still made it back to church before the 8:00 service. I got to church around 7:40 a.m. I must have been averaging 24 miles an hour for both rides. I had time to clean up and change and start setting up equipment for the kid's worship. A lot of people seemed to be late for church because of all the road closures. Next year, I'm going to try to complete the tour 3 times. I might just reach the end before the last stragglers make it to the finish line. If I don't then, they'll kick me off to make way for the marathon runners. I biked 13 miles to get to the race. Then biked about 22 miles for the course. Then, I did it again a second time. Then biked back to church. After church, I biked home. I biked about 70 miles on Sunday. You can see my tired eyes after riding 44 miles and getting only 2 hours of sleep. I had some girl on the road take a picture of me, because Sarah still didn't make it to church before I did.

I still haven't been compensated for my bike accident last month. I'm still waiting to hear from the driver's insurance company. Hopefully, they'll give me an offer soon. I bought some new parts for my bike, but I still have more stuff to buy to make it fully functional. My gears and brakes are terrible. I love my new Mavic Kysrium wheels. My original Xero Ultralight XR1 Aero wheels were lighter, but the Kysrium has black spokes that are more aero.