Labor Day Rides

[KathiCville]

I did a metric century on Sunday---the annual Tour de Valley starting in Waynesboro, Virginia. Beautiful pastoral landscape with mountains as the backdrop. Inspiring scenery but, whoa, I really had to push to make it to the end. I struggled between 20 and 25 miles, then got a second wind and did OK until about mile 50. At that point, my knees, butt and mid-shoulders began hollerin' at me. But I made it to the finish, 63.8 miles, at 13mph, a better average than I expected!

I came in among the last who were doing the metric circuit, but that's OK! At about mile 40 on my ride, the first of the full century riders passed me, meaning that they had already done 78-80 miles--at twice my pace! The first two guys were so far ahead of the rest of the pack that it was at least another 10 minutes until the third century rider passed me.