My husband marks all our rides on the calendar. and there it was; P4 on Saturday the 2nd. Some of you know I am doing a P12 this year, that means 12 permanents of 100k or about 63 miles, once a month, for a year. And yesterday I finished my 4th one.

Permanents are pre-planned routes with checkpoints (buying a candy bar at a minimart for example, and getting a receipt) to show where you were and when you were there.
Here in Seattle, we got over an inch of rain on Friday. It rained so intensely that sometimes a cloud just descended on Boeing field while I nervously watched out the window.
Before it was light on Saturday we were up, me with this great foreboding of doom, I knew I would be incredibly miserable if it rained all day on our ride. But as the sky grew light, I noticed the pavement was dry-ish. I donned an array of wool clothing, and covered myself with my Showers Pass Elite jacket, sidi bike shoes and booties.
There were about a dozen riders and most of them are hardened veterans of tough long rides. My husband let me know in no uncertain terms that I would probably only see their backsides and only at the beginning of the ride.
The ride started at 9am and everyone else was still drinking coffee and chit chatting. I was ready to go. My DH was running the ride; he said "Go ahead and leave Mimi, we'll catch up" So I hopped on my trusty Cavalletta and headed north on the Burke Gilman trail. Less than a mile later, my friends started catching up with me, and soon, I was at the tail end of the ride.


(here I am still close to the other riders)

After a bathroom stop, I found myself close to some of the other riders, and with great bursts of energy, I was able to stick to them for a while.
Eventually, totally out of breath and legs burning, I slowed down, the headwind was just killing me. I have a lot of trouble in pacelines, I don't have depth perception and it is really scary to be that close to other bikes.
It's a good way to conserve energy on windy days; but alas, I was on my own.. At every rest stop, I ate, used facilities, filled waterbottles, got receipts and got back on my bike. At the halfway point, people sat down and had lunch. Several riders took off their helmets and relaxed, while I stood and ate my peanutbutter sandwich. No sitting for me, I was doing enough of that on the bike.
For the second quarter of the ride, DH positioned himself in front of me, like a carrot, riding a very steady pace of about 14 or 15 miles an hour. I could never quite keep up with him, but it kept me pushing much harder than I felt like doing, particularly in the wind.
Finally we got to the turn around point, and we had some wind at our backs. I noticed that the ground was wet, that our window of dry weather was coming to an end. I sped down the road at speeds close to 20mph, it was lovely. But my legs were starting to hurt, I knew that when we turned the bend that headwind was going to sock me. the rain started in fits, and sometimes came down hard, or just spit at us. Encased in two layers of wool, I got wet, but as long as I was moving, it was fine.
the last quarter of the ride was just pain to me. My neck hurt, my arms hurt, my lower back complained, my legs and my knees hurt. the tailwind deserted me and I honestly don't know if I had a headwind or not, but 12 mph became my new stick to point. I watched as my DH disappeared around a bend ahead of me and took a moment to stop and move all those body parts for a minute.
Usually the last 5 miles of a ride are an exultation. Joy, relief, satisfaction. This time they seemed to go on forever and ever, I wanted to cry because my legs ached. I was riding the BK trail, so very familiar to me, so I knew right where I was at least. Finally we were done. Oh, i was so ready to get off the bike. I couldn't even walk fast. I trudged through the supermarket and went to their bathroom. I realized that I might be a little low on fuel.
I got back to the coffeeshop, where all the faster riders were, and discovered that they had not all come in yet! SLOW and STEADY got me in before several riders! Although I did not make a public display, I knew my strategies were working. we finished in 5 hours and 29 minutes!

I leave you with these thoughts:
A rider needs to continue to push themself
It is important to know your own limitations. (I would be a fool to think I could ever be the gal who finished first)
Slow and steady might not win the race, but it will leave you with a respectable finish time.