First time to Puerto Morelos on the bike!!. Average speed 23K, distance 70K. Sorry, all stats are delivered to me in Ks not Miles. That is 44 miles, twice what I normally ride in NH. We left about 6am and got back about 8:30? Can’t quite square those two stats. I believe the 23 and 70 as they came from someone’s App but I also know we did not leave before 5:50 and we were certainly back by 8:45. I can check the distance from Plaza de Toros to the start of the Puerto Morelos road where we turned around. Google maps says 34.4K so really 70 is fine. Probably the math error is in the average speed. People said we were up at a speed of 35K for short periods.
Anyway, this was the Sunday ride out of Elite Cyclery. Edgar and Martin both said they would be there and neither showed! Martin did say he had overslept last week so maybe that will be his excuse again! There were 4 of us on the ride. The person who organized it is Monica who wants to go a little slower. And by slower we do not mean Tom speed, just slower than the Hotel Road crew.
Monica pays for the chase car herself. The driver is the same one who drives for Casa Blanca, which is a group that goes out Tuesday/Thursday/Saturdays and I rode with for 5K at the end of the Hotel Road Saturday. They went onto Puerto Morelos but I turned north to Cancun. I was working to keep up with them but I did not feel as stressed out as I normally do with the Hotel Road crew. One of the other men on the ride today normally drives the chase vehicle for Elite Cyclery Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday rides.
Monica has two grown children, 24 and 28, boy and girl. The girl is pregnant so she hopes to be a grand mother for the first time soon. She does interior design, and some architecture, for a man who is building high end Condos with their own Yacht slips, probably north of Cancun. She lives a little south of Cancun and especially enjoys that she is learning a lot on the job from the good team.
I was the first one to arrive and said hello as people arrived but Monica did not understand that I was there to ride with them. She thought I was just waiting for someone else. I think she was a little surprised that Edgar had invited me to go on her ride and not told her and not shown up! I told her that I was slow and knew the roads and would just drop once I ran out of steam. She claimed they road slowly and indeed I was able to keep up all the time. I was suffering at the end but she had done so much to be sure I was comfortable earlier that I felt guilty and my mantra was “you have to finish with her”.
We just went straight from Elite Cyclery to the Tullum/307 road and all the way down to Puerto Morelos access road. We did stay to the right when there was a service road and to avoid the tunnel. There was a lot of ride over road furniture. Rumble bars and dimples, but the other riders signed them carefully. One would come to the lead to call extra attention to the rumble setups. For the last 5K one of the men went to the front and pulled 35. I was just hanging on, breathing as heavily as I can. But luckily the turn around point came and we stopped, had water and Monica asked about my story. When we started up after 10? minutes, I rode next to her and got her story until we sped up again. Her boyfriend is a behavior neurologist working in Mexico City where she was until coming here in October. She was doing free lance interior design. He trained in Atlanta and Florida. I assume the father of her children is not in the picture as she refers to this doctor as her boy friend. She said she was in Boston a couple years ago in the winter and saw how bad the weather could be. She and boy friend are both Mexican, probably Mexico city. She encouraged me to no believe all the bad publicity and visit the city.
From left to right, the big gringo, Jesus, Carlos who is the normal Elite chase driver, Monica and our chase driver. We took pictures at the turn around and again just before reaching Plaza de Toros and lastly, where this is from, at Elite. One of the men manning the garage at Elite took the picture. Monica tried to blue-tooth this and all the pictures to me and then tried whats app but in the end I just texted her and she replied with the pictures. She was always watching the traffic and encouraged us to stretch and even handed out goo bars at the end.
Today is also Patriots football at 1pm! Last year I was able to get hooters at mile 12.5 to not only put on the game but the sound! There were a number of fans in the restaurant. My plan is to get there about 12:30 and see if the manager is willing to put the sound on again. If not, maybe I will have time to try a few other sports bars on the Road. I’ll plan to eat lunch where ever I watch.