It's nice having a mid week gravel ride right down the road from the house, it means I make the rides more often than I miss them and as a bonus it's not an all night ordeal the night before to make sure everything is ready to go for pickup at lunch or quickly after work. I do miss the OMG and Pub Pedaler groups for sure as both are fun rides in their own rights but cutting down the drive miles is really nice. I won't even tell you how many miles I have on my not quite two year old car already but if I had just a 10th of those miles on the bike already this year, I'd beat my total from all of last year.
Pretty good group for the ride last night, probably didn't hurt that Dale was also back in town visiting from Detroit.
Getting to the gravel is a bit more of an adventure at times but once you find it, it's just as sweet. Trying to introduce the ditch beer to the Wednesday gravel crew but they seem a little apprehensive so far but who knows, they might come around.
There be hills though, the usual 20 mile loop will get you about 1,400 ft in elevation. Heck even the pavement to and from the gravel will kick your butt on some nights. Last night was a good one, temps weren't insanely hot and the breeze helped to make it seem even cooler than it was.
The Dutch Hall regroup spot turned into the halfway point as most folks weren't interested in doing the rest of the 4 mile loop. It was also an impromptu valve core removal class when Dale tried to add air to his tires and ended up with core in hand instead.
The road home always seems to be faster than the road out and before too long we were back on pavement and the home stretch. No pictures but hot dogs and beer (if you brought beer) awaited us back at the shop. Good group, good ride and gorgeous night... need to start getting out on these roads a bit more during the week for a quick spin or on Sunday for a longer one. It's a shame to let all this close gravel go to waste.
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