Ole Noah built himself an ark.....

North Hackett.... flooded.....
This is normally a horse pasture..

It was cool....

There are usually 10-12 feet of clearance below the trestle....

The east side trail at Big Woods Lake....

The west side....

Heading toward New Hartford....

Dressed "just right" for today's weather....

Butler Road. Closed due to high water....

The Queen of Cross after lunch....

I assumed that since the Cedar had crested early this morning I would be able to hit the bike trail on Hackett and head to Cedar Falls. Wrong. Hackett is still under water. I Climbed Grand Boulevard heading west and rolled by the Utilites and then got stopped on the south side of the golf course. Under water. Rolled into CF on State and headed out to Big Woods Lake on North Main to find that you couldn't get around the lake due to water over the trails. I headed back into town on Main then out 2nd to Division, then out 4th to Union. I headed north to the gravel just before the railroad viaduct and then west toward New Hartford. The gravel was in pretty good shape, allowing for the frost boils and pot holes, which are pretty normal this time of year. Butler Road is under water on the north side of the tracks, so that was a "no-go".... I headed south on loose gravel until I crossed the highway, where it was then pretty much packed as hard as asphalt all the way to 27th Street. The wind was pretty much out of the west when I got to 27th Street so I headed east toward the UNI Dome. The tail wind made it pretty easy to roll at about 23 mph without TOO MUCH effort. About mile into it Clint Stainbrook rolled up behind me, said "hey, how's it going?" and then took off again. He's a machine. Must've been rolling in the high 20's. He can do that all day long.

I got back into town at the University then headed north on Hudson Road to 12th then took Division back to 2nd and then back home. It was a good ride on the CX bike. I'd pumped the tires up to 80 psi before I left home, planning to ride on hard surfaces. I could have let some air out on the gravel, but it all worked out in the end. I love that bike!

G-Ted is back home, TI v.4 is in the books. Sounds like they ran into some truly shitty roads and wind and weather, so it was shortened to 250 miles. Yes, they had finishers! Go read about it on Ted's blog. Follow the link to the Trans Iowa site and listen to the podcasts. Brootal.

Redemske finished 5th in th Cat 4 roadrace in Iowa City yesterday. I haven't heard yet how everyone else did. I know that the women's races should have been hotly contested with Syd Brown taking on the Punk Rock girls. Our own Kat Porter was planning to be in the mix as well! It was a windy bear yesterday. The Old Cap Crit was today and I'm pretty sure they had a lot of starters.

That's it for now.

Ride safe.

Peace out, yo!