Well, our bout with torrential rain and thunderstorms are over, so I decided to head out to do something different. Yesterday I took a "core and more" class, so I am pretty sore from that. I wanted to do hills, but I am sick of doing "my" hill every time I come home from a ride. Not knowing how I would feel today,I decided to start from the Stow Airfield, which is close to some of the hills I was thinking about. We start a lot of our group rides from here; there's a great restaurant that makes all of its food with local produce and they are very cyclist friendly. I used to live 3 miles from this place, so I don't get there as often. On the way there, I passed 3 women riding down South Acton Rd., taking up the whole lane, 3 across . It took the leader quite awhile to sprint back over. This is a 2 lane country road, with traffic going around 45-50. So, I got to the airfield, took my bike off the rack and decided to start out with a good flat warm up. Just as I was turning left out of the airfield, the group of women passed by! I got in behind them, but they didn't seem too friendly and I wanted a fast, flat warm up. So, I turned off and went around in a big circle, tracing part of my former commute to work. My muscles were just aching, but I felt like I was going at a decent speed. Although it was only about 75 out, it was still freaking humid. I was wearing short sleeves, since it was not that warm, but I should have worn sleeveless. So, as I got to the Delany Reservation, I stopped to look at the pond and wild life. My average was 16.2, and I remembered what it was like to be able to have some flat streets around to ride on! On I went, passing into the town of Harvard. I headed up Westcott Rd., which is about a mile climb of 6-8%. I had no expectations of speed, since I felt really over heated and achy. When I got to the top, I stopped, drank a ton of both water and Accelerade and ate my Luna Bar. This was at the spot where my son took my husband to ride up on his first road bike ride. It was early in the morning and when my husband got to the top of the hill, my son was laying passed out on a little triangle of green where the street splits, with some stranger watching over him! He had not eaten breakfast. I always remember this when I ride up this hill, which was really my first big hill I ever climbed. I went on for the nice part of the ride; shady, flat or down hill. This is a beautiful area, with little traffic. Then you cross over Rt. 495, which is a bit freaky and down another hill. With two more small hills to climb, I was running out of energy, but I cut through my old neighborhood to keep my mind occupied and then it was only 2.8 miles back to my car. I was happy to see that my average was 15.2, 23 miles, which for me is good on a ride with 2,000 feet of climbing. I dumped my water bottle over my head, combed my hair, locked my bike to the rack and treated myself to lunch at the cafe, where I ate a delicious Mexican salad with corn bread and iced tea. There were some other casual cyclists in there and I noticed the restaurant now has a large bike rack.
Even though I am not at my best, physically, it was a good ride. Tomorrow we are going to do 50 miles. I leave for the Berkshires Thursday and I do not feel prepared to do the 9,000 feet of climbing we did last year.