September riding

[Crankin]

OK, I am seriously exhausted from a hilly ride I did today. Not so much tired exhausted, butI started having mild pain/cramping in my left hamstring, after we ate lunch, and I can't figure out what's up. We road into Harvard, MA, in a circuitous way, to climb Oak Hill. None of today's ride was on unfamiliar roads, just a few we rarely ride on, or, ride in the other direction. So, it's really humid out. Was only about 70 degree when we left, but I wore sleeveless, as it was supposed to go up to 80 or so. I was cool at first, as it was cloudy, but the sun came out when we were climbing Oak Hill. It's shady, so that was not an issue. I had adequate liquid (Skratch, which I reserve for longer, hilly or hot rides). We stopped for lunch at mile 26, where I had half a veggie wrap, ate my Lara Bar, and off we went. We knew we had about a mile climb we always dislike after lunch; so being stiff from sitting, we took it slowly. But, it was after this my hamstring started acting up more. After that, we had a long downhill, so I got to rest it, but I never really felt good for the rest of the ride. The hamstring was hurting, my sit bones were too, and we still had some ups and downs. One thing did make me feel better and laugh was we saw a guy, riding in the opposite direction, with his helmet on backwards. The only other time i have seen this was at the start of a very large ride we were leading, with 3 others, and I was elected to tell the woman. This guy had the back tilted straight up, in the front. It looked ridiculous. If I had felt better, I would have stopped. I did manage to pick up the pace on one of my favorite, semi-flat roads, but as we get near home, there is a small hill, I usually go up at 10-12 mph. DH got so far ahead, I felt like crying... I wasn't bonking, just hurting. He slowed after we turned off this street, and we made it home. My average was similar to rides we do in the Berkshires or Europe, I was so slow! Yes, I rode 44 miles and climbed 2,500 ft., but, it wasn't much different than last weekend. The only difference is that last weekend, I rode on Sunday, and only did a short walk on Saturday, after an intense ride and bootcamp on Friday. Yesterday, I went to bootcamp, it was hard, but I was not sore when I got up.
I have really upped my exercise in the past 10 days, so perhaps I am paying for that. I rolled out my hamstring and will do a short recovery ride tomorrow.