Doesn't matter what the calendar says, the legs and lungs insist it's late April, maybe early May. This is a climby route, with lots of little ones interspersed with some bigger, longer efforts, the kind that always give me trouble. And sure enough, there was trouble in several spots. Trouble that in a normal year would have been much less so. Still got quite a ways to go to get the legs and lungs up to speed. Was definitely feeling the 24 miles from Sunday. However, such a nice fall day. Blue skies, leaves starting to turn, lots of leaves on the ground, especially between 10.4 and 10.8 ... or were those leaf-colored rocks? Who can tell? Average speed was pretty ridiculous, but I was chasing a speedy quick OG on a hard tail (a bit lighter than a full squish ride)...