Two mileage records in two days

Posted by Rachel 

Yesterday on the way home from work I reached a mileage milestone. One that requires no physical fitness whatsoever:

(Dont' worry, I was driving and Travers took the pic. No lives were risked to obtain this image). 

This is pretty exciting/scary, since I’m due for some serious recommended maintenance as well as replacement of two recalled parts (if you follow the news at all, here’s your dead giveaway that I drive a GM car). Hopefully the car lasts a lot longer, since I’ll be really sad if my next purchase is a car instead of an upgraded bike.

So onto training, which is what this blog is supposedly about. A few weeks ago, Sandi (the crazy one, see her bio) got this great idea that we should do an all-women’s metric century. Since I hadn’t exceeded 18 miles on the bike since the half IM 6+ months ago, I thought that maybe tripling that distance wouldn’t be such a brilliant idea (runners have a 10% guideline, not a 300% guideline). Not to mention that the longest ride I had EVER done, even in the throes of half IM training last summer, was 62 miles. But it’s not like I’ve been sitting on the couch watching TV lately, and there was that marathon two weeks ago which I assumed could provide some translational fitness. So I surveyed around and got some results, and since my mom and husband didn’t think the idea was THAT ridiculous I figured what the hell. Also, the ride is called “Cinderella” and all of our ride update emails were from Prince Charming, so how could I really refuse? So this morning when my alarm went off at 5:15 am, I got up and packed enough food to feed a small village. This is my strategy when I’m out of shape for running, as well- just pack a crapload of food and hope for the best. Overall, it was very educational doing my first organized ride.
Here’s what I liked:
1.) There were 3 rest stops along the way with food and beverages, and it turns out then when you fuel and rest a lot it’s much easier to survive the bike ride. (Food theory confirmed. I will continue to consider the design of an aerodynamic baguette carrier for my bike.)
2.) I learned that contrary to my previous belief, I am actually NOT the worst cyclist! That was pretty encouraging.
3.) SAG vehicles come rescue you when you’re in despair. Like after our riding buddy got three flats and could no longer ride her bike (although it turned out that we were literally, unknowingly 0.5 miles from the finish line. We could have walked there faster than it took the SAG guy to go up to the next light and turn around. If you couldn’t tell, we’re directionally challenged).
Here’s what I didn’t like:
1.) When it’s a ride and not a race the roads aren’t closed, so basically it’s a whole ton of people in a little tiny bike lane pissing off drivers for 64 miles of road.
2.) People for the most part lack etiquette as well as just straight up common sense.

Here's your proof that I actually finished the ride!

So to summarize this way too long blog post, it was great to complete my longest ride ever even though I wasn’t winning any awards for speed in the process. Afterwards we went to Will & Sandi’s, ate some deep dish pizza and drank wine (actually remained more sober than expected after a long workout), and now I’m writing this blog post in an effort to stay up until 10 pm. I will also point out that I looked at my phone at 9:30 and had an invitation from a friend to go out and get drinks. I assumed the invitation must have been from hours ago (after all, it was almost bed time) and I felt guilty that I missed it, only to realize that the message was only 19 minutes old. Such is the life of a triathlete in training :)