Hi Jenn -
I ride with my DP a lot, too, and it's taken me a long time to come to terms with his fastness in comparison to me. After a good many rides feeling frustrated and down on myself, I figured out that my training rides - even with him - need to be focused on my training. Likewise for his rides. And mostly I had to / have to figure out that as a 3rd year rider who didn't start from a very athletic background, I'm just not going to keep up with someone who has been riding and racing for 15 years.

Here are a couple of things we do to help both of us get a good workout on the same ride:
1. He leads at a "tempo" or "cruise" pace. I have all I can do to hang on his wheel - when I do, I get the benefit of the draft; if I don't, I can hang back at my own pace until he finishes his interval.

2. I take off on an interval of some sort, and he gives me a head start. Then he chases me down and passes me.

3. We do hill intervals on the same hill, but he starts working hard before I do - so our intervals are the same length of time, but he covers more ground.

Basically, I'd rather have him leave me for periods of time and ensure that he's getting a good workout, too, than hold back for me and not build his own fitness.

That said, he also doesn't tease me about my training "not paying off." Because it IS paying off; I'm just less experienced at this. And if he did say something like that, I'd probably feed him his handlebar tape.

Best of luck-
Solveig