LRRH News Feed

[bikerHen]

Wow! What a weekend! From dinner Friday night to Sunday breakfast with Trekhawk and family, it was a weekend I'll never forget. It was great to meet everyone, and put a real person with your name. I thought the ride was perfect, with the exception of the aforementioned headwinds during the last 20, not flat, miles. Marty and I just kept plugging along and along until we finished!

CyclaSutra, you're great! From trying to teach me to draft to mooning me to show off your great tattoo. Sorry your hunt for the perfect gravy train got you off track. Maybe next year I'll be fast enough to keep up and help you stay on course. Marty, again thanks for being the perfect riding partner. Too bad we live so far apart, we could be training for our next century together. And Trekhawk, it was great meeting and riding with you for a few miles anyway. Your family is great, and you are an awesome rider.

My ride moments? Meeting everyone, riding under the irrigation sprinkler for a quick refreshing shower, having a 14.5 MPH average for the first 70 miles, and finishing my first century.

My oh my gosh moment for the weekend? As I was driving into Logan, Friday afternoon I passed a guy jogging with another guy riding a bike fully loaded with touring packs. They were just coming to the top of a steep climb and I thought, they sure are fit. Well, fast foward to Sunday morning, I'm a little over a 100 miles into the drive home, truly in the middle of nowhere, when I see this guy riding his bike along the interstate. I think wow, good for him. Then about 100 yards ahead I see a guy jogging! It's the same pair I saw in Logan! All I could think was, My gosh I just drove over a 5000+ foot pass! Talk about being fit!!!

[caligurl]

great ride reports and awesome pics! thanx for sharing!!!!!!

[AuntieK]

I had a lot of fun at LRRH, ladies!
The weather, the ride, the company, and the route were all beautiful.
I enjoyed meeting many of you at the Friday night dinner. Here's a picture of us after our meal (sorry it's so dark):



I believe (I apologize if I've got some of you mixed up) this is
Yau Ming, Cyndi, JoBob, me, ljkl, Marty, Lifesgreat, CyclaSutra, BikerHen, TrekHawk, aka_kim, and one of the friends I brought along.

I wish I could have met more of you. I did pass some of the Amici Veloci jerseys at the beginning of the ride. I was the one who said, "Hello TE girls" as I passed. I would have hung out and rode with you if I wasn't in such a hurry to keep up the the group I was with. They were in a hurry to get finished because they had to be home by 5.

I managed to finish the 69.67 mile ride in 3 hours 54 min, with an average speed of 17.5 mph. I did manage to give myself a good case of road rash when I missed a turn, turned around and found myself in the gravel. Still mending that wound. But still I had a great time and am looking forward to next year.

Yellow, I will manage to meet up with you on one of these rides someday!
BikerHen, thank you for the very cool patch you made for me!
CyclaSutra, I love the sticker...still trying to find just the right place for it.

[yellow]

Great picture, AK. How can it be that we missed each other????? You kicked some serious butt. That racing training is paying off! Just think of the road rash as crit training!

Ladies, I want to thank those of you that traveled far and wide for coming to the ride and contributing to its grand-ness. I had such a great time meeting new friends, seeing old friends, and feeling like I belonged with a group of people again (live and in the flesh...not just online). I got a little melancholy last night after I said goodbye to the last of you. You are all my very fast friends!

(Blurry picture of me attempting to take pictures of people behind me. Learning curve is pretty steep on this activity. )

[jobob]

Yep AuntieK, I remember you whizzing by me early on in the ride ! Nice riding with ya.

Thanks for the dinner group shot. I think you have all the names correct, good job. I haven't gotten around to downloading my compactflash cards and wading through all the photos I took from the dinner. I'll get to it eventually !

[jobob]

Learning curve is pretty steep on this activity.

Tell me about it.

A wee hint: Glance ahead first and make sure you're not about to ride into a crater in the road. Been there, done that, still don't know how I managed to stay upright and not drop the camera.

[Trekhawk]

Way to go Leslie! Remember how nervous you were about the 30 mile Lodi ride - and look at you now!!!!

Thanks bikerz and all you great girls - I have been thinking back over the last year and I really feel like I have learnt so much and Im pleased to say 99 percent of it is from you great ladies here at TE. I would never even be out at organized rides if you girls had not encouraged me all the way. See Bikerz look what you started with encouraging me to do the Lodi ride last November. My husband says that you have all created a cycling monster.

[Lifesgreat]

Yep AuntieK, I remember you whizzing by me early on in the ride ! Nice riding with ya.

Well, it was nice for you TEs to keep flatting so I could catch up to you.

[maillotpois]

Wow - great photos and report you guys!! I almost feel as if I'd been there!

[Trekhawk]

Here is one of Bikerhen and Cuppas (thats SadieKates name for me) looking a tad nervous before the start.

I think I could have done with a good cuppa that morning but I left all my tea at home.

[SadieKate]

Now that I'm more recovered from our drive home, I'm going back to read more carefully.

Eh, I prefer to think of it as keeping expectations low, so that when you do succeed, everyone is pleasantly surprised.
Including yourself.

We're going to need to work on a team jersey for jobob, TrekHawk and BikerHen - TEAM SANDBAGGER. Just can't guite think of the right graphic . . .

[cindysue]

This was a really enjoyable ride - for the scenery certainly - but the best part for me was riding with so many friends - some I had just met for the first time.

Everyone was so encouraging. I was having a rough time of it - lots of leg cramps through most of the last 1/2 of the ride. Sarah had warned me about drinking water at that altitude and I really tried but I just couldn't get hydrated - a lesson learned that I need electrolytes in addition to water. I had my new bike but no bottle cages, so I just had water in my camelbak. I suppose drinking 1/2 a bottle of wine the night before and only getting 3-1/2 hours of sleep didn't help....... Well I spent the next two days drinking lots of water and making lots of trips to the bathroom

I spent most of the ride with Jo and Leslie (trekhawk), and also had the pleasure of riding quite a bit with Sarah and Sue and Kim. Only saw Veronica once on the ride - she had left us all in the dust . I would occasionally run into some of the other TE gals - and it was great seeing all the AV jerseys on the road. We received a lot of compliments on the jerseys from other riders. Too bad we didn't have some sort of card or handout with info on how to order.......

Riding up and back to SLC with Sarah and Bubba was great. I had the whole back seat to myself. It was fun chatting with both of them - but I think at one point Bubba and I put Sarah to sleep talking about endangered species and eminent domain (I can see you all yawning in agreement). I get similarly disengaged when Andrew talks about his work......

We arrived at Sue's beautiful home about 9pm - just in time for burgers and beer. The mojito was yummy - and it's probably a good thing we ran out of tonic water given my dehydrated state. I don't think I could ever match Brian's exceptional skill at making homemade beer, but I will take a shot at making some mojitos this weekend........

and the chocolate - yummy! I especially liked the white chocolate with peppermint pieces that AG sent. Sue sent us all home with a bag of chocolate. Mine melted on the road trip back - but I still managed to inhale most of it.....

[snapdragen]

We're going to need to work on a team jersey for jobob, TrekHawk and BikerHen - TEAM SANDBAGGER. Just can't guite think of the right graphic . . .

.....................

[yellow]

snap, it's too small for my eyes to see what the snail is towing! Help us out here!

[snapdragen]

snap, it's too small for my eyes to see what the snail is towing! Help us out here!

He's riding a razor scooter. Here's the whole picture. Really has nothing to do with sandbagging, I just love the visual....