3 weeks ago I got a call from the CIO at work, asking if I could come to his office for a quick meeting,  When I got there and saw him and a Director from HR I knew this wasn’t going to make me happy.  Turns out, I was right.  The company was making some cuts to deal with decreased sales and profits and my position was no longer necessary.  In truth, my position is still in place there, but someone else is doing the work.  The CIO hung on to his core group of people and I was the odd man out.  I can’t say that I would have done something different if I had been in his shoes, but it was still tough to look at the teams I built being handed over to someone else when it was really that guy’s job that wasn’t necessary any longer. Ok, so that’s a few weeks in the past.  Of course, one of my great disappointments is that this didn’t happen in April or May.  If I’m not going to work every day, at least I could be getting in a little extra riding.  But, there is a lot of snow on the ground and the temperature hasn’t been above freezing for some time. I’m working my network of business contacts to find something new, but it’s not the best  time to be out of work in this country.  Meanwhile, I’ll be off to the gym and maybe I’ll tackle a few special projects.

I started this site and then promptly stopped writing and spent the summer riding.  The season is winding down and it seems like I haven’t gotten anything accomplished other than rack up a decent number of miles.  I still have a shot at 30 centuries, but that will be a stretch.  Logging 6,000 miles shouldn’t be too tough at this point, unless the weather does something unexpected. 

 CFC is coming up in a couple of weeks and I have to decide pretty quickly of I’m going to sign up.  It’s been a number of years since I’ve done that 2 day suffer-fest so maybe it’s time I do it again. 

I spent the first part of this week at a conference in Phoenix.  I brought my Ritchey BreakAway with me and added on a few vacation days to the trip.  Yesterday I did a 62 mile ride north of Scottsdale and never really got away from traffic, but I was riding in shorts and a short sleeve jersey, which was a pleasant change from Ohio.

Today I got up early and drove to Tucson to do the ride that was my primary reason for bringing the bike with me.  I rode to the top of Mt. Lemmon.  The ride started at the intersection of Tanque Verde and Catalina and finished 29 miles later in the town of Summerhaven at the top of the mountain.  The first 4-5 miles is relatively flat, but then the road kicks up for the next 2 miles.  It is a beautiful climb on a very smooth road.  There is a wide shoulder on much of the route.  I was expecting a tough climb and a great descent.

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This past Saturday I rode the 200K brevet from Alum Creek Dam to Loudonville and back.  I’ve had a good spring training season so I was looking forward to the ride.  I know that most of it would be flat and on roads I knew well.  We’d have 45 miles of hills between Mt. Vernon and Loudonville, but I didn’t expect any of them to be particularly difficult.

The ride started at 7:00 and, let me tell you, it was cold. I’ve heard various reports, but I know it was in the low twenties according to the thermometer in my car.  I knew the temperature was supposed to go up during the day and I didn’t want to be over dressed in the afternoon, but it was way too cold to take too many chances.  I did leave my heaviest gloves behind and went with 3 lighter layers on my hands.  My fingers were painfully cold for the first hour or so, but eventually it warmed up enough to be comfortable.

I started with Steve Gratz, Joe Giampapa, Dave Levy and Ned Williams and we picked up Kevin Swabb who had started late a ways up the road.  The pace was quick right out of the gate but we quickly got a group together and kept a steady pace into a medium headwind into Mt. Vernon.  After a quick stop to get our cards signed we headed out on the hilly part of the course.

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The routes for the 5 stage Tour of Ohio was announced today. 

The first stage will be a criterium in Mt. Vernon to be held in conjunction with the Great Ohio Bike Adventure.  

The second stage will be a 70 mile road stage in the Hocking Hills, including Jack Run, Cantwell Cliffs, Conkles Hollow, Chapel Ridge and Glick Rd.

Stage three will be a road race from Gambier to Coshocton and back and will include the climb up Hill Street in Coshocton.

Stage 4 will is a criterium in Worthington.  The Tour will finish up with a road stage from Granville to Utica and back, finishing with laps around the Denison University campus.

I’m not worthy.  Yesterday a group of us went out for the first century ride of the year.  We rode the 2 Dog Leg route created years ago by Dave Buzzee.  We started with 10 riders and after a few took one of the cut-offs ended up with 6 people doing the 100 mile route.  The weather wasn’t quite as sunny as I had hoped and it was still in the 30s with some headwind after lunch, so it was a tiring day.  But, I can’t exactly feel great about finishing when Mike Perakis finished with us, but on his fixed gear bike.  At one point he said to me that if he finished the ride he would know that he never, ever has to try that again.  Apparently, once was  enough.