Monster Cookie Metric Century April 29

[DarcyInOregon]

Hi Susan,

Suzie and I rode together and we had a fabulous time. We didn't know anyone because we don't belong to any clubs. However it was fun meeting and chatting with other cyclists at the rest stops and at lunch.

I was on the descent on Champoeg Road when a pack of male riders went by, probably going around 40 mph. Their bikes hit the ridge, that big bump where the asphalt of the road is lower than the bridge, and their bikes went up into the air. That is where other cyclists have blown out their front tires and crashed in the past if they were going too fast. Right in front of me, there was a serious accident in the pack. Hitting the big bump caused the airpump of one cyclist to fall off his bike, and the pump hit another cyclist in the pack, which caused that cyclist to crash into the first cyclist. Both cyclists crashed into each other at the end of the bridge at a high speed, and as I came to a stop I heard over and over again, "Do you need an ambulance?" The pack had come to a screeching halt and were gathered around the downed cyclists. They were in shock, but seemed to think they were ok. Their bicycles appeared to be totaled, which is a shame, given how expensive they probably were; the bikes looked like expensive racing bikes to me. The airpump was sitting there in the road in the middle of the bridge and I picked it up and handed it to a member of the pack.

Suzie and I are happy with our ride with respect to our statistics. However, it was disconcerting to see how fast many of the cyclists can pedal, especially as we thought we were doing well, but zip zip zoom, there would be another pack of Category A riders flying by us, and many of those really fast riders had totally gray heads, meaning they were older than us.

We get confused about our average speed. I've stopped paying any attention to it as being significant for myself, but it was especially confusing on this ride. For the majority of the miles, we were holding a speed that varied between 15.5 and 18.0 on the first half, and 14.0 to 17.5 on the return. Yet when we reached the mid-way destination, our average speed was only 12.6. When we checked it again upon our return, even though we had ridden slower on the return half of the ride, our final average speed had increased to 13.

The day after the ride we are both doing well. I have just a bit of soreness in my thighs, and a little rubbing soreness in my crotch. Suzie says she has the same thing. I think it means we both trained well for the ride with our own respective schedules. I hope to finish a few centuries by the end of the summer, rides that are similar to this metric century and don't have endless miles of steep climbs.

Here is our photo. I am the sturdy beauty on the left and Suzie is the gazelle beauty on the right.