What bike would you recommend for a century?

[Starfish]

Starfish, I'm like you--I would use it on a long stretch of road. I don't cycle around the homes without being on alert status and hands on the hoods. I'm a solo cyclist and would probably enjoy riding more aerodynamically. Right now I keep tucking in the elbows and knees a little.

Why kind of aerobars do you use? Are you happy with what you have?

How long did it take you to build up to 80 mile ride?

As for going uphill, that's pretty impressive. If I attempted that I would look like this--

I'm being a little conservative with my mileage at first because I don't want to overtrain--and I'm bad about overdoing it initially. I try to take days off in between the 15-20 miles I ride. I would like to do 30 tomorrow, weather permitting.

I've got a pair of Syntace bars, but honestly I can't remember right now what model. The elbow pads are adjustable for width, but they don't flip up out of the way. But, I have tiny hands, and I can actually grab the regular bars right under the elbow pads, so I don't feel like the aerobars are ever in the way. I do like the ones I have, but I am not experienced with any others.

As for your training schedule and building up, it is really hard to know what to tell you since we don't know how long you've been riding, what your fitness was before you started, and all those kinds of things.

You will find that you can glean a whole lot of info by using the search function here on TE to check out a lot of older threads. And, of course, by all means post your own questions!

What I would say is that in general, you are wise to start conservatively and learn how your body responds to the training. You get stronger and faster during recovery times, when your body mends itself and makes the adaptations to the stresses you put on it through training.

As for me, I spent a year or two on a paved trail riding an old steel mountain bike, and doing up to about 50 miles. After that came the Sequoia and into 60-70 mile rides. First flat century was, I think, 2005. Yesterday's ride was 80 miles and 7300' climbing, and my goal event this year is the Shasta Summit Century with 100 miles and 10,000' climbing. It is a hard, worthy goal for me for this year, which has been very personally stressful. Just getting to the ride is my victory, really. It is all so individual, and so dependent on personal details of fitness, training, other stresses in life, joint health, SO many things. I know a friend who started biking one April, and by that July she rode 130 miles in one day. She joined a racing team in September (5 months after starting to ride), and hasn't looked back. She just took to it! Everyone's different.

It sounds like you're doing great!

[sundial]

Starfish, I can empathize with your health issues. Part of the reason I haven't been riding as much as I used to is because I have a really bad knee. I've visited 2 orthos this last year to get an opinion and they both said I'm really limited with options other than a total knee replacement in the near future. But being the stubborn gal that I am, I'm determined to keep my original equipment, even if the warranty has expired.

So far I haven't had knee problems. I am actually more concerned with my good knee because of over-compensation. I'm fortunate that the LBS has access to a young prominent orthopedist that is a pro cyclist and I can meet with him to see if I need to shim one of my shoes as well as fine tune my fit.

Prior to cycling (just within the past 3 weeks) I walked the dogs 45 minutes most evenings. That was about all other than riding my bike on the trainer occasionally. My dogs take me for a brisk walk so I'm getting a good cardio workout. Now if I can get them to pull me on the recumbent, lol.

[Starfish]

Starfish, I can empathize with your health issues.

Thankfully, no health issues here. More the mental game with some stressful circumstances a couple years in a row...but, I really have learned there is a physical toll on recovery times, etc, during times of high stress.