I had a challenging 1st day. 57.5 miles is more than I've ever done. I may have come close, but it was when I was in my 20s. Actually, the riding and hills were OK. My physical capacity was fine. I took it slow and rode up every hill. But my butt was so sore, I was thinking about skipping Sunday. (I knew that I'd wake up and decide to ride. But it was comforting to give myself the option of taking the day off.) On the one hand, I was disappointed that the four of us did not stay together. But in the end, I was much happier riding at my own pace without any pressure to keep up. This was a long ride for me. I probably needed more time on the bike for training.
The Saturday ride was also very satisfying. I was right about wanting to ride, once I woke up. I decided to do the shorter 39 mile ride. I felt no need to do more. It felt a bit odd at the 1st turnoff for the 39 because most (~90%) took the 49 mile route. There was no one in front of me and no one followed me either. But a Hilly 100 board member caught up with me and we had a conversation about the ride and biking. The ride itself went well. Again my fitness level pulled me through. Surprisingly, I was not as sore as I thought I'd be. And I only walked one hill, Mt. Tabor. I felt fine walking this one.
I'd consider doing it again, but for the next year or two, I'll stick to closer and smoother rides.
1 comment:
Mitchell,
Your experience is exactly what I thought you would have: (1) you're in great shape and fully capable of biking the 100 miles even if you'd never done it before, (2) you have strong uphill capacity so no problem there, and (3) we can only solve the sore butt issue by riding a lot more, which is hard to fit in our schedules....just have to suck it up like you did. Overall great job on this event! --Bill
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