Thanks Sarah. I'm completely new to outdoor cycling, but I'd like to think that I'm in decent shape from indoor cycling, weight lifting and the other cardio that I do.

I only have two rides under my belt on my new bike. Last Thursday I did 21.6 miles and then I did 24.5 miles on Sunday. Both times I felt like I could have easily kept going if I didn't have to get home to do the kid trade-off and then my little technical difficulty with my flat tire on Sunday. I'm planning to ride 30 miles on Friday morning in honor of my 30th birthday and then I have a ride planned with bcipam and tprevost on the 29th that will be either 38 or 48 miles. We have some trips in the coming weeks that will limit my riding through mid-June, but after that I will be able to get more riding in because the kids will be out of school and I can leave for rides earlier before dh has to go to work.

The metric has 1400 feet of climbing and the century has 3500 feet.




If I stick with the river trail around here for my regular rides, I'm only riding flats, so I'm going to seek out some more hilly routes that bcipam recommended. I'm also hoping to start doing some rides with one of the local clubs in mid-June so I can get accustomed to riding with other people.