Report on Spin Pizza Monday Ride

I've drawn up a list of 11 weekly rides from the KCMBC weekly ride calendar that I want to try out this summer.  So far, I've absolutely loved the first 2 I've hit -- Saturday's ClockTower with Mitchell and yesterday's Spin Pizza ride from their 119th store in Leawood.  Spin Pizza has 3 locations -- downtown, Olathe, and Leawood -- that offer weekly rides on Wed, Thurs, and Mondays respectively.  They offer short (10 miles) and long (18-20 miles) options at each, and 10% off on pizza and drinks afterwards.  Leawood draws the largest crowd at 60-90 riders weekly.  We were in the middle of that range yesterday.  I dropped in on the long ride, which ended up cruising empty suburban streets and area country roads for a total of 18.5 miles.  Lots of turns, and multiple stops at lights made for an interesting, always changing ride.  The lead group comes in under an hour, I finished in 73 minutes for  an average 15.2 mph with stops.  My moving average was probably closer to 16 mph.  The first 10 minutes we had one big pack before drifting apart, and I always had riders I was riding with the entire ride.  This is true for most people as we all picked our own pace.  This was a definite workout -- but I have much to learn about pacing and when to surge to keep up with a pack and how to use hills and lights more effectively to stay with them.  For example, early in the ride, I surged to stay with the lead pack, but we stopped at a light a bit later, and older (read wiser) riders caught up without the surge.  These riders soon after left me in their dust.  In the end, I definitely felt like I'd done a hard, physical workout.  Lots of fun, and I'd recommend these weekly rides to anyone.  On other fronts, had a good week last week -- got in 4 runs including 8.5 miles Sunday morning and 2 bike rides of 22 miles (to breakfast in Spring Hill on the 4th with Katie) and 29 miles (Saturday with Mitchell).  So far, I'm enjoying riding in group rides on my off running days. -- Bill