June 27th ride report

I spent the morning riding my new Bacchetta Giro. I got in 22 miles and had a great time. I played around with hand placement today to see if that would reduce my "swaying" factor and it seemed to help some. I sure can feel a difference in my legs when I ride my new bike. It seems I'm using muscles that have been asleep for quite some time but they do seem to be responding just talking to me a little bit more than I'm accustom to. I passed a pasture in which there was a herd of buffalo today, lots of little calves running about, very cute. Time to clean the house:mad:

Since it was warm enough in the AM to ride without tights, I did a little bit longer / different route.

Today I rode with my former exchange student from Germany, who is now a pro! Delta Airlines "lost" his bike, being transferred from JFK to Logan on Sunday. Let's just say it was a tense 36 hours until it was delivered this morning. We did a nice 24 mile ride, which was a recovery ride for him, but hey, at least i can say i rode with a pro. Tomorrow he is doing a local time trial and then Thursday heads off to do the Fitchburg Stage race. It was sunny and humid, but some clouds came over at the end of the ride, so that made it OK.

17 miles to go to make my goal of 1,000 by July 1st.

Today's ride was another chilly early morning ride:
30 miles, the first 8 miles with a stiff headwind. I was worn out before the hill climb even started! Then 5 miles of suffering climbing...up past Robert Redford's Sundance Ski Resort.
Descent was scary: holding on to the brakes for dear life just to hold the speed near 40 mph! (Yes, I know riding the brakes in a no-no). Shivered the whole way down (the sun was still hiding behind the mountain).
It was beautiful! But I really need to get over my fear of coming back down after a long, steep hill climb.

We just got back from a nice evening 12 mile ride along the Reservoir. There were a couple of hills -- I know that more experienced riders wouldn't think much of them....but, for us, it was good practice.
Ben made it farther than me, but....I kept trying to tackle this particular hill, and each time I'd say, "Okay, make it to that next postbox....or, make it to that next tree.."
I didn't want to ride back to the car, so instead I worked on hills.... Gotta love 'em, right???? ;)

It was such a beautiful day compared to all the rain we've been having. The days are still long, so it's nice to be able to get out after work.

Have a peaceful evening all!

Denise

I had a nice, though short ride this afternoon. Nothing hard, just a pleasant ride around town.

One funny though, I was about 1/2 mile from home and thought how it wasn't as hot as I thought. Then I realized it was because I didn't have on my helmet. So I had to turn around and run home to get it!

After being whipped by the heat the last couple of days, todays 89 felt great. Went out for a 48 mile flat ride, and the first 25 were at a 19 mph average. Wow. Where did that power come from? Then of course, reality struck, and the total ride averaged just over 15 mph. Oh well... It was a beautiful day to be on a bike, and not at work!

My ride today was slightly over one mile. :cool: To the LBS. I thought I'd be "checking out" the new WSD tri saddles they got in, then heading out for a nice ride. In fact, I left the bike there so they could install a Serfas tri saddle and aero bars with adjustable arm rests. I walked home. I'll pick her up on Thursday. I'm working a 24 hr shift Thurs-Fri night, then Sun-Mon morning, so I don't see a long ride this weekend. But unless I get absolutely slammed on the Thurs-Fri, I'll take her out on Sat and play with the aero bars. It is really exciting to take this next step. It's a mark of my committment to myself as an athlete. :D

My husband and I ride together most of the time -- we did a lovely 21 miles this evening, in the 95-ish heat. Our ride was a sort of "can we do it" experiment -- we've been thinking about a 26 mile ride on Saturday with a group that Earl found out about yesterday.

It was a great ride -- he's generally faster than me, but I was spinning along pretty comfortably at around 15mph a lot of the time. We ended up averaging about 11.5 mph by the end of the ride, but cruising through subdivisions, there were plenty of intersections to slow us down.

The last couple of rides we went on were kind of slow, relaxed, and short -- this was fun tonight, and I'm looking forward to Saturday's long straight stretches! (gosh, my first quarter century this year, a month into my new "obsession!")

Karen in Boise