Day 3 TdF - 2009

Day 3 is another transfer day. We rode only 50 km, from the hotel to the start of today's stage. At the stage starting town, we lingered around the carnival like atmosphere waiting for the individual rider call ups and sign in. Saw many of the tour favorites and rider favorites. I like Lance a ton and am a big fan. The rider I most like to emulate while riding is Jens Voight. He can hammer on the front, works for his mates and can hang with the best on any stage with the strength to pressure the field or break to take the win or make it really hard for the guy who does win. I took many pictures, some are ok, most are too far away for anything worth keeping.

After the ride and watching the stage start, we boarded the bus for a six hour ride to the Alsace region, getting into the hills. We'll be here for the next two days. A six hour bus ride is not a lot fun, but gives me time to blog, sleep a bit, and yes, do some work.

The bike ride was easy, but a bit adventurous. Before the ride, Doug and I, well let's face it, it was really me as the instigator, tried to find some fellas who wanted to go longer and faster than the planned ride and route. The organizers know me a bit from last year and I did a bit of this last year as well. So, they were pretty OK about me going off on my own with a group and getting to the end point on time. The organizers were pretty helpful with mapping a route and giving direction. In the end, Doug and the others seemed a little concerned about vectoring away from the group. So, I backed off a bit to give them some comfort. We'll vector off the plan on some other day.

On the ride, Doug took position on front for about 10k and kept a pretty good pace. I then took a turn for about 10k and pressed the pace as well. While shifting from small ring to the big ring following a decent little climb, I snapped my shifter cable from its coupling on Ms BA. As a result, I only had my small ring for the remainder of the ride. Several folks noticed it and wanted to stop due to my mechanical incident. I said, "We're good;" and while rolling, took up the slack in the cable, wrapped it around the frame and tucked it in. Several folks were still a bit concerned. I pulled over, showed the ride leader all is good, and we rolled on. Having the small ring only slowed the pace a bit, but thanks to my man Jamie (Capt Insaneo) and his coaching, I can spin a good cadence at 120 rpm or so for a good long time. So hovering in the 34-11, terribly cross chained, we kept pressed the pace reasonably hard.

When we got to the bus, I clipped the frayed piece of cable and pieced it all back together. I only show less than .5 cm of cable on the front derailleur. Not great, but functional. The support crew for the group indicated they have shifter and break cables. I'm planning to acquire two of each as an insurance policy. Since I'll not be breaking down the bike for the next 13 days, I may just cable up the entire bike tonight and eliminate all concerns about cable snafus for the remainder of the trip. [Amazing, Microsoft spell check recognized the word 'snafu'. No spell check error.] Not much more for today, take care.