April 15th rides SUNDAY

[run it, ride it]

Hmm, I guess this counts:

1am ride about 5km from my friend's house to the bar we were meeting up at. I told everyone driving there that I would beat them on my super-speedy 80s roadie. No one believed me.

So there I am furiously pedaling, the bar just metres away--when a car CUTS ME OFF! I swerved to avoid it, crashed, sprawled out on the pavement. My left brake hood was bent in, my front gears bit into my calf pretty hard, and a mighty black bruise showed up on my thigh today.

So there I am lying in the middle of the street, the offending car of course long-gone. Pulled my bike out of the traffic, bent back my brake hood, locked it up outside the bar--and everyone who took the car appeared just then! I DID beat them, crash and all!

[pooks]

Wow -- you rock! Way to show 'em.

I hope your leg and bike are okay, though.

[weathergal]

Did my first 40 mile ride of the year. My average was slow, as usual, but I'll put part of the blame on the 18-20 gusting to 25 mph winds I had to fight against. At least the temperature was nice, getting up into the 60s. Not too bad considering we had 10 inches of snow fall on Friday.

[lesliejo]

I am trying to get ready for a local ride happening next weekend, so I took off for a three hour spin. I wanted to get some hills in just to test the thighs. Rode up a four mile grade that did the trick. Sure was fun coming back down. It was a beautiful day, started out at 44 degrees, but when I got back it was in the upper 50's. Saw lots of wildife, between the birds and coyotes. The wildflowers are in bloom along with the fruit trees. Rode through some beautiful orchards. Such a nice time of year.
I think I am ready for the ride! Ended up clocking 48 for today.

[lauraelmore1033]

Myself, I consider a 9-13mph pace a "stop and smell the roses" speed. In fact that's my usual average range with hills, ...and I don't even stop to smell anything!
You should decide what is right for YOU and then go with it, whether that means giving it your best shot and working towrards it, or cancelling it.

That is the pace I would consider "stop and smell the roses" too. Actually, now that I've had a chance to reread the leader's response and look over other material about the tour, I think I misunderstood what she wrote. I had written to ask if she would advise against my husband riding his hybrid since we would be going at a "leisurely" pace (which I imagined to be 10-13 mph). She replied that "leisurely" meant something different--depending on your skill and fitness level. She then described these people on the tour who COULD ride a hilly course with an average speed of 14-15 mph. I think I put those two sentences together and skipped the middle bit. I now realize she wasn't saying that these amazing people thought this pace was leisurely, just that they could do it, and that leisurely does indeed mean different things to different people. She did advise against bringing a hybrid, which is probably a good idea.

I think the challenge to be overcome, for me, is a mental one. Low self-esteem has been a stumbling block for most of my life. When I lose my confidence about something....well, the effects are quite dramatic. I have noticed that my ability to climb hills, for instance, has a great deal to do with what's going in inside my head. If I'm relaxed and believe I can do it--by golly I can do it. If I'm feeling anxious about my ability to climb the hill--by golly, I can't do it. At least not without stopping.

With that in mind, I'm going to try the same course again this week and see how it goes before I decide what I want to do. I'm sure my husband would not like to go through a 9 day repeat of today's performance. I imagine he would support (with grumbles) any decision I would make about it. Especially, since I was the one who wanted to come on the tour in the first place.

[lauraelmore1033]

I'm very excited so I'm posting here even though I already have a thread going elsewhere...I went clipless today for the very first time and it was AWESOME! No problems! Yahoo! Rode about 30 miles in the worst wind...Nat'l Weather Service says gusts up to 35 mph. There were little tree branches all over the bike trail and some really BIG oak tree branches were falling as well. I wouldn't want to get hit by one of those! I could've done without the wind, but other than that, a great ride. On the plus side, a nice steady 20 mph headwind does give you a better workout.

Good job on going clipless and surviving the wind. When the winds die down you might even find you've picked up a little speed from going clipless. I noticed a nice burst of speed when I did, since I went straight from flat pedals to clipless

[mimitabby]

LaurelMoore,
May I ask what tour you are talking about? Perhaps one of us has already done it and can calm your fears?


a lot of people had exciting and important rides today! I'm really impressed! I'm going to go read about the 400k next. My DH did a 300k yesterday and it went well too. Today he only rode 12 miles I rode more than twice that many myself today; so I'm ahead of him, right?