AZ Training Trip

When I say this outloud, I almost can't believe it, but I went to Arizona last weekend just to train. Sounds like I belong on the Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous or something, but the cost of the trip really wasn't all that much. When I planned the trip several months ago, I figured long bike rides were going to be brutal this time of year here in Chicago and I wasn't really that far off. The weather prediction for this weekend isn't making me look forward to my last long ride in preparation for this race. Sure, there's always the trainer, but....

Of course having someone to share the experience with makes it all that much better, so another fellow IMAZ competitor (SH) flew down to AZ for the weekend also. We arrived on Friday night and, trying to keep expenses to a minimum, we opted not to rent a car and decided to walk to dinner. This was Halloween night and I am now convinced that girls in college use Halloween to get away with dressing like hoochies. We also had some drunk college student talking to us as we walked past and actually burped as he was speaking. It was impossible not to laugh.

The two hour time difference screwed with us a little, but it allowed us to get a good night's sleep before the ride on Saturday. We headed down the street to get some bagels, bananas and peanut butter to fuel for the long ride. After clearing out the couple of ice machines the hotel had, our Camelbacks and water bottles were full and we were ready to go. It was already warm by Chicago standards - a balmy 68 degrees or so.

I'm not going to give a long, detailed description of the entire ride, but know these important parts:

• The Beeline highway has a very deceiving incline
• You get hot even in a dry heat
• Wind and desert can make for a nasty combination

Though the ride was not brutal, it was tough. The drastic temperature change from the 32 of Chicago to the 97 of Tempe was hard to deal with...and I love the heat. At each stop, we filled up the water bottles and Camelbacks with ice, but our fluids never really seemed to stay cold. Biggest disappointment: I don't even have any tan lines after being out there all day.

Had my brother come and pick us up for some dinner. It was great to see him and AZ seems to be treating him well. Dinner was fabulous and we ate every bite. It was our first real meal of the day. Another early bed time.

Got a little confused because now the time had changed. But it doesn't change in AZ. So weird, I walked around the rest of the day not really being sure of what time it was. We ran 1 loop of the 2 loop run course (or something close to it). No real challenging hills, but definitely some ramps that will probably not be all that fun come race day. It was fun to see so many other people out there - on what was Nov. 2 - outside enjoying the day. There was an Autism walk this day and had an amazing turnout! We thought about snatching some water from some of the sponsors, but decided to head over and grab some recovery food at the Einstein's on the way back to the hotel.

Sunday night brought us right back home. It was not as cold back home as I expected. Of course, I was hoping for freezing, sleeting conditions here while I was away!! This time, my bike and box made it back safe and sound (huge sigh of relief!) and now my hardest training weekend for IMAZ is complete.

Metric Melon

Last minute decision to do this ride...I'm typically not a "last minute" type of person, but a few other things fell through and even the original ride we were going to do today was changed after 7pm last night to be the MELON METRIC!

Close to home, weather predicted to be pretty good and a strong group of riders indicated today was going to be a good ride. We arrived, signed up and were ready to go BEFORE the scheduled time. The roads out here, we decided were excellent! Nice and smooth, pot-hole free. Nothing like the Spirit of Racine race that several of us did just the week before.

It was a little chilly starting out, I think the temperature was about 62 degrees. But it was supposed to warm up to 80 and I really didn't want to carry arm warmers around the whole day. Everything going well, get in and out of the first rest stop pretty quickly...on the way to the second stop (which felt like forever), we were witness to a dog running a biker off the road. We pulled up, watched as the irresponsible dog owner tended to her dog, not even caring about the cyclist, called 911 and told the guy to just sit. He seemed OK, helmet was cracked, but no road rash. Thankfully, he had ridden off the road in the ditch when the dog ran up on him. He knew his name, but not much else. The dog's owner came over to ask, "Did he bike you?" but she didn't seem to care about the fact that this guy had fallen off his bike and hit his head. It was weird. The ambulance got there and we headed back on our way, shaking our heads. Had that dog come up on us, it's likely several of us would've gone down.

We get to the next stop, quickly do what we need to do, and we're back on the road. Our pace is strong, but not overreaching for any of us. Then we realize something is wrong as we pull back into the first rest stop. Apparently, we followed the wrong arrows out of that second stop...how the heck were we supposed to know that?? They were just color-coded, but I guess there is one way to go for the century and another way for the 65 mile route...SHOOT! We decide to go back to the same place we just left in order to get the 100+ miles we were after.

A train of about 7-8 guys on road bikes pass us, I think we were slowing for railroad tracks or something. I notice a "fist bump" at the front of the line and now I'm irritated with this group. We continued to ride our pace and these guys were getting no further. It was like they just kicked up their pace to pass us, but then hung out. We didn't draft, but slowly passed them back. Once we passed, our pace picked up noticably. It was kinda like we had to put some ground between us and them to make sure they stayed back there this time. It worked. And it was a solid stretch of ride for our crew! We pass by the house with the attack dog and lo and behold, the dog is in the house...homeowner out front doing yardwork, eyeing up all the cyclists passing by.

At this rest stop, we feel like we're in the Twilight Zone - coming or going, we don't know what we're doing and everything feels like deja vu. As we're reloading our water bottles, I see some woman looking at JS's bike and commenting on how nice it is that his aerobottle is up front on his handle bars, making it easy for him to drink. She then says, and this is the quote of the day, "He even has a little sponge to wipe of his face!" She was referring to the yellow netting in the aerobottle that keeps the water from splashing out when you go over some rough road. I almost spit out my Gatorade at that comment. I had to walk away fast.

Now we were on the way home. We knew we'd be over 100 miles, but weren't sure by how much. We tried to lay off a little on this last stretch, but we really didn't slow down much. The roads on this last section were the worst of the day! I opted out of the group's transition run after the ride...I mean, my race is not for 4 more months! WHY ON EARTH am I out here doing 100 miles??!? Sheesh.

Great day. Wonder why I've never done this ride before.

4th of July Ride

This year, instead of the usual organized Metric Ride held in Joliet (I think), I opted to go for an "unorganized" ride. This was going to be closer to home, more familiar territory and give me the ability to control my own pace and distance vs. trying to hang with a group too fast for me. I didn't want to push too hard because of my upcoming race on Sunday. Technically, the day should have been a day off, but when you get a "free" day from work, just seems to make sense to get in a good quality workout!

It was nice to sleep in a little and the weather was just perfect for a ride! The group met up at 7:30am and it was about 61 degrees. It was chilly enough for me to start with arm warmers, but most of the group had short sleeves or no sleeves! We headed out on a nice, easy pace and chatted with each other for the first several miles. For the most part, the group was together for the first - almost half - of the ride.

A few of the stronger cyclists took off at one point and I wondered if this is what they always do as one by one, they just flew by me chasing each other. I started in on the chase and then held off - this was not the goal of today. I needed to save it. I slowed down to have the rest of the group catch up when I heard a loud snapping sort of pop. GH had a flat. It was a weird-sounding flat which I thought could only be made by a pinch in the tube. But how had he ridden 25+ miles without this happening already? It was his front tire and we were lucky that we weren't on a quick downhill at that moment. We found the spot where the tube looked like it had been sliced...a little over an inch long! We were just a few minutes away from the first designated stop - the Elwood gas station.

Heading out, we changed direction and realized we must've had a nice tailwind on the way out. The wind was too loud to talk to one another. We made a couple of side-by-side pacelines and were pushing at a pretty good pace. A couple of people were off the back within a couple of minutes. But we kept on...single pace line, double pace line, blah, blah, blah. Pretty uneventful.

Next thing you know, we're off the designated course a little and we have to ride back to the next designated stop - a 66 gas station - I can't remember what city this was. There are about 6-7 of us and we pull up to the gas station and no sooner did I unclip one foot and I heard some lady saying "yeah, I'm the owner here, get out." I thought maybe she knew one of the other cyclists and she was joking around, but then some of the responses made me realize she was serious! This woman came out and said "You can't hang out here!" Hang out? We weren't even off the bikes yet! So then TR said, "Well, what if I want to come in and buy something?" The woman responded, "Yeah, like you're going to buy something. What would you buy?" TR responds, "Gatorade." She says, "No you weren't, you guys get out of here." It was unbelievable. I was really thirsty, too...and I WAS going to go in and buy water. Instead of instigate her, we moved on up the street a little, just off the gas station property. We knew we were meeting the rest of our group here, so we didn't want to go far. Apparently, this wasn't good enough for gas station lady and she kept staring out the window at us. After about 5 more minutes, she came out of the gas station (no, I'm not making this up) and started waving her hands at us yelling, "I told yas to get out of here. YA CAN'T HANG OUT HERE!" Well, that did it and several of us started yelling back. I mean, she didn't even have any customers, why was she so against us just standing on the side of the road??!?! Then she said she was going to call the police. So I said, "OK, call the police, would you like to use my phone?" More yelling back and forth and she went back into the gas station. I should have asked her if she was on medication. We called the people behind and set a new meeting spot. It was maddening and hilarious at the same time.

I now couldn't wait to get to the next meeting spot because I knew I could get water there. The group sort of split some more, one turned off, a couple went home earlier, so our group was dwindling. Lots of talk about being kicked out of the gas station property. On our next stop, everyone was reminded that "YA CAN'T HANG OUT HERE!" Definitely a ride that will not be forgotten!

It's a Dry Heat

I was initially signed up to do the TriShark triathlon this weekend. However, a couple of months ago, an opportunity for me to get down to ride the Ironman Arizona course came up, so I sold my triathlon entry in lieu of going down to see what it's like to ride on the Beeline Highway. I've since found out that they CANCELLED the swim at the TriShark and made it a duathlon, so I definitely made the right choice in skipping that race this year!

I headed out on Saturday morning and arrived in Phoenix around 11am their time. The temperature had already climbed up to about 98 degrees. After a big fiasco in helping my partner in crime, SH, rent a bike, we hooked up with my brother who just moved to AZ last month for a short, easy early evening ride. Now it was about 102 degrees. We loaded up with all sorts of fluids and the ride was short but sweet. We were saving our efforts for the next day...the Ironman course.

The morning came all too quickly and we met up at the start of where the bike portion of the Ironman was to take place. Initially, I wanted to put in the full 112 miles, but the heat was a consideration as was the fact that this race is still pretty far away. So we headed out around 7:30am to log in some good, solid, steady-paced miles. The thermometer was reading about 82 degrees at the start of the ride. I could give you all the details, but let me just sum it up that the heat rose to about 102 again this day. We rode until about 3pm with the sun baking on our backs as we pedaled along. There is absolutely NO SHADE on all of this bike course. And I have to say, I loved every minute of it. 102 in AZ does NOT feel like 102 in Chicago. Heck, even 85 feels hotter here in Chicago. So I guess it's true, the whole "dry heat" thing takes much less of a toll on athletes. I fully expected to be wiped out after the ride, but that really didn't happen. I had much more to give and it felt great.

I love the Beeline Highway!

Udder Century

Probably not the smartest thing I've ever done...ride 100 miles the day after a triathlon. However, it really wasn't planned that way. I was planning on a little shorter distance, but once I missed the turn to do the 75 miles...well, I was sorta stuck.

It was a beautiful day out on Sunday. I saw lots of friends. I rode with a great bunch of people. Nothing to complain about except the fact that I was extremely uncomfortable. I haven't spent a whole lotta time on my TT bike, so after Saturday's race, I was sore. To add another, oh, I don't know 6 hours on my already, um, uncomfortable areas, wasn't really fun.

So the ride starts out and I'm feeling pretty tired...and I'm wondering why it feels like I'm just working too hard. Maybe I really expended a lot of energy yesterday and I'm just not ready to ride hard again. I don't know. At the second SAG stop, I decide to pick up my bike and spin the back wheel to check to see if it spins. It went about a revolution and a half. Shoot, I'd been riding with the back brake rubbing for about 40 miles!!! This happens every time I change from my race wheels back to my training wheels. You'd think I would learn by now to check this each and every time.

The ride got better then, but not very long. I decided I'd just go 75 miles. That's good enough. It's very early in the year. But I wanted to kill somebody when the guy at the SAG stop showed me where we were on the map...I had missed the turn for the 75 mile route. Now the only way to get back was to do the full 100. I was dejected. Guess I was just meant to ride the 100 this day, so I just tried to suck it up and finish the ride. I was definitely slower toward the end, but still managed to get in the full century. First one of the year! It was a near perfect ride...great combination of riders in the group I was with and absolutely perfect weather! Now, if I had only made that turn on the 75 mile course...

Solvang Training Camp - Day 4

Oh my gosh...I was in such a hurry to end that last post, I forgot one of the most exciting parts of the trip!!!! So we were at dinner, everyone was eating, chatting amongst themselves. Without a word, Robbie Ventura walks in the conference room with....FLOYD LANDIS! The applause started and grew loud. It continued for about a minute, then people began to stand up and clap louder. Floyd was now standing in front of the room with his back up against the wall and he had this childish grin on his face, looking somewhat embarrassed. The applause lasted for at least 5 minutes. Then Robbie says, "OK, Floyd will have more to say later," and dinner continued. At the end of the dinner, there was a rather uncomfortable Q&A with the campers asking all kinds of questions on the status, if he's riding, etc. Can't believe I forgot to put that in the last post.

Now we're on Day 4. This was the Santa Rosa Road Pack Ride. Listed as a recovery ride, we were going to practice bridging efforts, single and double pacelining and racing tactics. Again, it was cool in the morning and I was layered up. This was getting to be a nice routine. The pace of this ride started out really slow and I didn't mind. We practiced a lot of the pacelining that has been talked about. Even though you hear what you're supposed to do/say when something is going on in a ride, it's a whole other story to actually do or say those things during the ride. I was chastized for giving a signal with the wrong hand. The more you ride with the same people, the more you're able to predict what they're going to do or how they react to a situation (like a pothole).

There was one squirrely rider I didn't particularly enjoy riding behind. He was a strong rider, but not very predictable. I also noticed that he didn't like riding in the group. Most often, he could be found riding 200+ yards ahead of the group. I guess he just liked it that way. I was able to catch a lot of scenery on this ride and really listen to what the coaches had to say in regards to pack riding and technique. I was fortunate to have one of the mechanics, who lives just outside of Solvang, on this ride. He taught me a LOT about descending...this info would have been helpful yesterday is what I was thinking! But it was great info and I was able to practice it a bit during this ride. Though this was a "recovery" ride, there were still some challenging hills scattered throughout the ride.

We were told there was a short race included in this ride. Somewhere during the ride, there was going to be a cone or marker...then it would be a 2K race. Winner accumulates points for their team. I had no idea what to expect. We're all riding along when someone notices a 2K mark on the road. The pack takes off and I pump hard to stay with. I find a very nice draft behind two of the men in the group and I'm quite comfortable. I think to myself, "this is easy, I can sit here and conserve and make a surge at the end!" And my plan would've been perfect had there not been a hill just around the corner! Within the blink of an eye, the road went on an incline and the pack dropped me like a hot potato. The race ended on an uphill, so I never was able to catch up. Guess we know what my weakness is! Though it was short and sweet and I didn't manage to score any points for my team, it was one of my favorite parts of camp. It gave me confidence that I could jump off the line with stronger cyclists and pointed out where my huge downfall is. It was exhilarating.

On the ride back, several of us pushed the pace a little. It was a bit tougher than the "2 of 10" effort level outlined in our plan, but I was having a good time and I was really working on staying with the group on all the uphills. This is difficult to do without getting out of the saddle, but I tried my best. I was also trying to work in the pointers on going downhill and they seemed to make me more relaxed and comfortable on the descents.

We were back at the hotel early today and I had about 15 minutes to change and get ready to go to the pool. Not as many people went for the swim today, but I still had 2 other people in my lane. We did an excellent set of descending 100s and I felt really strong. We were only able to get in about 2500 yards today and then we had to get back for a Functional Training session.

Functional Training, as defined on the Vision Quest website is: Functional training (FT) focuses on the development and maintenance of core body-strength, agility, and flexibility—areas often overlooked by endurance athletes. These workouts are designed to enhance cycling, swimming, and running performance by helping athletes develop the strength they need to maintain proper form and thus maximize efficiency. We had Gardie Jackson lead this session and it was TOUGH! We held the session outdoors in the parking lot and it was beautiful outside. However, within minutes, we were all sweating and struggling to perform the exercises correctly.

I had about 30 minutes before I had to pile in the van for my second and final massage. I would be sure NOT to go to the same lady I did the first day! This massage was great. He worked my hamstring quite a bit and I felt very comfortable when he was finished. Upon arriving back to the hotel, I was just in time for YOGA class. Now it was cool outside, so we held this class on the deck around the indoor pool. It was nice in there...a little humid, helping you to stretch your muscles just that little bit more. Gardie again led this session and the guy can turn himself into a pretzel!

Once again, the day went by with so much activity that there really was no "down" time. The camp is now more than half way over and I haven't even had time to check out any of the tiny downtown Solvang area. A few of us went to a wine bar for about 30 minutes before dinner, but even that felt rushed. We had dinner, an update on team point standings and told stories of the day. The next day was going to be a metric century!

Solvang Training Camp - Day 3

These entries are going to have to get shorter! I just can't find the time to do this!!

OK, let's see - Day 3 - Mount Figueroa. This was slated to be the 2nd toughest day of the camp. We were climbing Mt. Figueroa which touts an 11.5 mile climb at an average 7% grade. What I didn't mention in my last post (because I was running out of time) is that when they were going over the agenda for today's ride, this brutal climb was the talk of the evening. People just kept saying how tough it was and that if you just stay clipped in and just keep moving the pedals, you'll be OK. Once you stop, you'd pretty much be done. For 11 miles?? Are you kidding me?

I woke that morning with a big lump in my throat. I did not want to ride. I was terrified. What if I couldn't make it up this mountain? Some of you may know this, but hills (especially mountains) are not my friends. Yes, yes, I need to make them my friends. This was why I came to camp, right??!?? Now, in Chicago, what we call hills are laughable compared to the hills and MOUNTAINS of California. What kept coming back to my mind was the race I did 2 years ago - Wildflower in San Luis Obispo. This half ironman started out with a terrible climb, but about half way through the ride, there's this climb they affectionately call "Nasty Grade". It was absolutely brutal. It's probably the reason I have no desire to go back and do that race. I remember just chugging up the hill for what seemed like forever (I think it was about 40 minutes), sweat pouring off me and just cranking on those pedals wishing for it to be over.

I shuddered to think of what an 11.5 mile climb was going to feel like. My roommate was also not feeling very confident about the whole ordeal. All the talk about it from the night before had us sick to our stomachs. We ate breakfast and headed out to the bikes. The experienced cyclists were talking, laughing, happy to be getting out for a third day in a row. I very quietly put my bag in the SAG vehicle and prepared my bike for the day's ride. "I don't want to do this, I don't want to do this" just kept running through my head. The morning was again, very chilly, but the SAG vehicles were going to meet us just before the start of the climb so we could take off the arm warmers, leg warmers, cloves, hats, etc. With all that climbing, we were going to get pretty toasty.

The groups started in a staggered fashion - 5 minutes apart - then we were to all meet at the start of the climb. Robbie Ventura was starting out this ride with us today and he had a way of taking my mind off the challenge at hand. Again, in the first 15 minutes of the ride, I dropped a water bottle. I guess having 2 pairs of gloves on makes it a little difficult to maneuver that bottle back into the cage! Thankfully, no one behind me hit it, so we just moved on. The 15 miles or so out to the start of the mountain was just beautiful. Very little traffic and the pace was easy enough that it actually gave me time to look around. It was easy to see why people would want to live there.

So now we get to the start of the climb. Every one started peeling off layers, but I had a bigger problem. I needed a bathroom break. Unfortunately, we were in the middle of nowhere, so I just had to ride up the road a little bit, get out of sight and go along the side of the road. (this pretty much happened every day of the rest of the camp) When you gotta go, you gotta go. I thought of my friend Bridgitt...she has no problems with this sort of thing.

The other groups started riding up within a couple of minutes of each other and again, organized chaos as cyclists searched for their bags in the appropriate SAG vehicle to put their extra clothes inside and grab whatever nutrition they thought they'd need during the ride. We filled water bottles and Gatorade bottles. Dave Noda was taking videos.

The groups lined up, fastest in the front, slowest in the back. I went to the back. The goal of today was not to do the climb fast, it was just to do the climb. I was extremely nervous about the hamstring because going uphill hurts. I did wrap the hamstring and put on compression shorts under my cycling shorts, just as I did every other day of the camp, but I was still scared about tearing it more or undoing all the progress I've made in the last 2 months. I promised myself I would NOT get out of the saddle. Yes, it sounds crazy, but I knew if I could stay in the saddle, I would save the hamstring. This is not a race...it's just a ride I need to finish.

I lined up with a couple other women who I hoped to try and ride with today...11.5 miles is a long way to ride uphill alone. It was time to go and the fast people were off (Gordo, Gardie, Justin, Matt and several of the VQers). Within seconds, they were out of sight. Also within seconds, I found myself in my lowest gear! Wow, it didn't take too long for the incline to start!! I was now at the very back of the group. I think there was 1 guy behind me (he had a flat)!

I was riding next to Heather, my roommate for the trip, and we started talking. The road was a slow, steady incline, but we soon got into a rhythym and started talking. We talked about her upcoming Ironman, our spouses, our career paths...it made the time pass. We were both pushing each other, but not really racing. Just a smooth, steady climb to the top! I can't even remember how far we were into the ride, but the road became muddy. Not just dirt covered, but MUD! I guess there was quite a bit of rain the week before we arrived and this section of the road had not dried yet. Uphill and mud is not a good combination! If you didn't have the gearing right, you'd start spinning in the mud, losing traction, and go down. YIKES! I started slipping through the first patch of mud. Then I could see Robbie Ventura, standing at the side of the road, on a corner, taking pictures and yelling to us to get to the right. Apparently, the right side of the road at this point was dryer and easier to ride up. I saw some big ruts I'd have to get over, so I stayed on my path. My roommate crossed over easily. Robbie's still yelling at me to get to the right....so I turned my front wheel and tried to ride over the big ruts. Uh oh!!

I lost control of the bike. The ruts were deep enough to turn my wheel for me, about a 90 degree angle to the right...I was headed off the side of the road. I braced myself. I hit a small embankment on the side of the road and flipped over the handlebars landing on my right shoulder. My right side now is pretty much covered in mud, as is the right side of my handlebars. But I was uninjured and I popped up, picked up my bike and started walking it up the hill to find a place without the deep mud so I could try to get started riding again. I watched my roommate ride off up the hill and now I was left to ride alone. Robbie came over to see that I was OK, and I was just fine...he was nice enough not to laugh.

I got to a somewhat flat spot to try and get back on the bike. It was tough, but I did it and tried to clip in. I couldn't do it. Neither one of my feet would clip in. Apparently, I had gotten so much mud all trapped in my cleats, I couldn't get my shoes to clip onto the pedals. One guy behind me saw what was happening. He warned me to get off and fix it now because I'd never be able to make it up the rest of the hill without being clipped in. I think we were still less than half way at this point. Figuring he was probably right, I got off the bike to try and clean off the cleats. Robbie Ventura rides up and asks me what's going on. I explain it to him and he promptly asks for my water bottle and squirts my right cleat to flush it out. I still can't clip in. He does it again...this goes on for about 4 times then he finally gets off his bike, reaches down and forces my right foot onto the pedal. He then looks at me and says, "now DON'T unclip that foot!" No problem, Robbie. At this point, I don't think it WILL come unclipped! Robbie rides off (making it look unbelievably easy) and I'm on my way again. Left foot still won't clip in, but I keep playing with it. I didn't want to waste any more time....everyone had ridden off without me.

Now was the hard part. I could see no one in front of me and no one behind me. I just kept pedaling steadily, though not going very fast. I looked down to check my mph and...UH OH! No Power Tap head. Sh*t! It must've fallen off when I flipped over my bike. I thought about going back to get it...that was about 20-30 minutes ago. I then decided that to ride back to try and find it then go back and continue up the hill would take too long. I hoped that after the ride, someone with a car would drive me back to the spot where I fell so we could go look for it. I just bought this 3 weeks ago and it's not so cheap to replace! Now I was bummed because I just lost all my data for the day's ride. We were entering all our data for this contest based on KJs, winner to be announced the last night. Since I just lost all my information, there was now no way I could win. Well doesn't this just SUCK!

I kept thinking about the lost Power Tap head for the next 20 minutes or so. I would look ahead and see the windy, uphill road carved into the side of the mountain. I kept thinking to myself, "we're riding up THAT??" But by the time I got to the part I was looking at, it didn't feel any harder to ride up than what I was already doing. I could see a biker or two up in the distance and set my sights on trying to catch up. It was perfectly silent out there, the only sound was my heavy breathing to continue uphill. The wind was non-existent. The sun was bright, but not overwhelmingly hot. I was sweating, but I've ridden in much worse. Maybe it was the lack of humidity, but temperature-wise, I was comfortable. Climbing, climbing...ok, passing a guy. I try to make small conversation with him, but we're both breathing much too heavily for anything more than a couple of short words. I keep going and finally get to pass another guy. I think to myself, "Woo hoo, I am not last!" I wonder how long it is until we finish.

Pedaling, pedaling, I now see my roommate up ahead. She seems to be looking very comfortable and strong. One of the coaches, Dan, comes back and rides with me for a few minutes. He graciously gives me some of the water out of his bottle ( I had none left since Robbie cleaned my cleat out with it). I was really, really thirsty. Dan coaches me along, tells me I look strong and gives me a few pointers about climbing. He came at just the right moment when I started to doubt myself and wonder if I was ever going to make it to the top. He has such a positive, friendly attitude and it was contagious. He was only with me a couple of minutes, I explained to him what happened with my Power Tap and he said he'd talk to the SAG guys to see if someone could swing back and look for it. I was hopeful they'd find it.

I kept climbing...caught up to my roommate, we chatted for a bit, and I think we had just 3 miles to go. It was tough, but I had paced myself well. Once again on the streets were painted with the 2K, 1K, 500m and then 200m marks. I just kept on grinding out the pedals and then could hear the voices at the top of the hill. When you're out in the middle of nowhere and it's so quiet, the voices travel. So they always sound much closer than they are! You feel like you're pedaling forever after you start hearing them, but they slowly get louder and louder until you can finally see someone up there, waiting to cheer you in.

I think Dave Noda was up there, taking pictures and videos. It was awesome to reach the top. I was so proud of myself I nearly teared up. I made it. It took FOREVER, but I made it. My roommate then reached the top and I congratulated her. We were so nervous coming into this ride and now we were both exhilarated. I filtered through the bags laid out so I could put on some clothes. I hear the descent is very, very cold. We all gathered for a group picture at the top and then several of us were preparing to ride down. I went to the water bottles and began to work on that left cleat that I never really was able to clip in. Oh - yeah, I also had to unclip my right foot using my hand....it was in there so tight! I drank a ton of water, maybe too much, but I knew I was dehydrated. I filled my water bottles and prepared for the descent.

I won't go into a lot of details, as this post is already too long, but the descent was terrifying. I don't know what was harder, the uphill or downhill. It was scary fast and my hands and fingers ached from keeping pressure on the brakes the entire way. The road was rough and had potholes in spots and shaded. If you hit a pothole while you're flying downhill, you're pretty much toast and I was a nervous wreck. I was definitely one of the last people on the downhill, perhaps too cautious. I did learn later that someone flatted going downhill and took a nasty crash. I was happy to have not heard that before I attempted the descent.

The rest of the ride was nice, but hurt as my legs were wiped out. I got back to the hotel, took a shower and headed out for the "Skills and Drills" instruction. We rode out to a school parking lot where we were challenged with a variety of things - picking a water bottle up from the ground, riding in a small circle several times without putting a foot down, figure 8s, 90 degree turns and turning to look back without veering off the side of the road. All good things to know and they're tougher than they seem.

Dinner was shortly after that...with a recap of the day and the agenda for the following day. I was happy that the next day was scheduled to be a recovery ride!!

Packing for Solvang

Well, I just finished packing my bags for my trip to Solvang for a Vision Quest Cycling Camp. This is the first (of I hope, many) cycling camp I've ever gone to. I've been fielding a lot of questions about the camp, but I really have no idea what we're going to do. Just 2 days ago, I got a sheet that approximated the mileage of the rides. Until I received that sheet, I thought we might be riding 100+ miles every day! I'm thankful that this is not the case. Oh, and guess who will be there...GORDO!

Solvang, CA is really hilly. I went last year with BC and met CL up there to do the Solvang Century ride. It's a HUGE ride...I think there were 5000 participants. It's very different in CA, much more bike friendly than here in the midwest. These people were telling me they get to ride outside EVERY DAY of the year. Can you imagine that?

You might have noticed the "badge" here on my blog to the right, listing my participation in the Solvang Camp. Click on that link if you want to find out what's going on with me and the rest of the campers. I've never had the opportunity to be a part of this sort of web portal, but it was put into place for the campers to communicate, upload the power files from our daily rides, etc. and download photos and videos. It's a really cool site! Hopefully it will give you a little taste of what attending a cycling camp is like. I've charged up my camera (it wasn't working for a while, which is why you haven't seen any pictures on my blog lately) and I'm hoping to get some good pictures to put here.

I'm nervous about going with the bum hamstring. In fact, I considered bailing on the trip all together. The last thing I want to do is ruin all the progress I've been making while straining up some stupid hill. I'm taking all the precautions I can and will be following specific instructions from my physical therapist. My rides not be the best they can in the hills right now, but getting out on open roads beats the CompuTrainer any day! I'm looking foward to the fresh air, sunshine and camaraderie of the other campers.

Trainer is bad for my wallet!

This week kicked off some mild base training. With that kick off, I've had to spend some time on the trainer. I'm not a big fan of the trainer. It's pretty boring, but when you live in the midwest, road rides this time of year are hard to come by.

I fill up my water bottles, get some clean towels and load up the DVD player with some inspiring material - an Ironman race. I'm on the bike now, intently watching IM Florida 2003. I'm caught up in the race and time is flying by. I watch as athlete after athlete crosses the finish line, smiling, pumping their fists in the air, happy to have achieved their goal. Then the DVD is over. This lasted about 17 minutes! Crap, now what? Looking out the window at the empty backyard certainly isn't going to keep me entertained. So I turn off the DVD player and start flipping through the cable channels.

Oh wait, look at this. Some non-stick cookware. Ooooh - look, he can pop out homemade bread easily. He puts a bunch of cinnamon rolls in a bundt pan and I imagine how good that smells while it's cooking. He bakes a sheet of chocolate chip cookies and they slide right off this mat thing he invented. WAIT - get the phone, if I order now, I'll get the extra baking pan PLUS a lid!
Flipping the channel, I find QVC. Well look at those beautiful sterling necklaces. Oh, and then there's the sparkly, matching bracelet. The prices are so cheap, what's to think about? Next come the earrings! Wow, those are all so great. I think I must have them. What's the item number? Wait, no. I don't even wear jewelry. What am I going to do with this stuff? Maybe I'll give it away as gifts. Maybe I'll just remember the item number and order at another time....

I grab the remote to get away from the jewelry and now I see the bowflex. Of course the male model has a 6-pack and is beautifully tan. And the woman also has a tremendous body. All it takes is bowflex and 6 weeks for you to look like that, you know. I start wondering where I can put this in my home. I could really use a bowflex. Look how cool that is. You can target all muscle groups. And it's only how much? Hey, that's what credit cards are for!

The next station has this putty that you can pretty much use for everything. You can use it to replace a chain link, coffee cup handle, and if you're really in a jam, you can use it to hold two big metal pieces together, each attached to a chain and you can haul a big truck! Oh yeah, that could come in handy. What's the phone number for that one?

Frustrated, I turn off the television. My ride is just about over, but I think I need to figure out something else to watch while on the trainer. It might be time to start bringing out some of the old movie collection. But even that doesn't sound all that appealing. I just can't wait for it to get warmer out again...

Labor Day Weekend

OK, so I'm a few days behind in posting! Sometimes this blog can feel like a JOB!



Anyways, some friends and I had made plans to go up to Madison to do a long bike ride over the weekend. I had been looking forward to this weekend and ride for a couple of months! It was a chance to get away, hang out with some really cool peeps, get in a nice, strong ride and then hang back and enjoy the city of Madison, WI. Even got to bring the baby with us!

We headed up on Saturday afternoon after I frantically ran around the house trying to pack up everything I might need. I think we were about an hour into the trip when I realized I had forgotten to pack my White Lightening. See, I discovered on my last ride that my cleats must've gotten all jammed up with mud and crud from the Accenture race. I had a lot of trouble clipping and unclipping the last time I rode. And I couldn't be sure any one else was going to have this stuff to lube up my cleats.

We pulled into the parking lot of the bike shop at about 4:57pm. Shop closes at 5pm. I run to the counter and ask the guy for the goods. He smiles and proceeds to ring me up. Just after me, a family of 5 walks in and starts perusing the bike selection. The younger of the 2 workers shakes his head and mutters "Why does everyone have to come in just when we're closing???" I smile at him and explained how I really hurried to get there. I don't think he was referring to me, though. I made my purchase and was out of the store by 4:59pm.

Check in the hotel, one of those Extended Stay places. They're the best. You get your own fridge, stove, microwave, the works. BONUS: They accept dogs. My phone starts ringing as others pull into town and we begin to make dinner plans. We hit a nice little pub in downtown Madison. We had a considerable wait, but it gave us all time to chat, laugh and pretty much make fun of one another. Dinner was excellent and I'm surprised we didn't get kicked out of the restaurant for throwing things across the 2 booths we were seated in. I think we were worse behaved than the college crowd!!

Off to bed, we had a long day ahead of us. We met in the hotel lobby in the morning and the riding crew headed out to breakfast. Those non-riders (spouses and significant others) were afforded the luxury of sleeping in! Breakfast was again a great time with much chatter and laughter. The server even broke down everyone's order to separate checks! Hey, we were the only ones in the restaurant, I guess he had time.

It was a bit chilly once we parked and got out of the car. Of course, in my haste to pack, I neglected to bring armwarmers. Well, the forecast was calling for mid to upper 80s, so I just hoped I could go with the plain old jersey. Sure, I'd probably suffer the first 20-30 minutes, but I guessed I'd be OK later on. Everyone checked in, filled their tires, gave the bikes the once-over and we were on our way!

This ride is a little deceptive. The first few miles are downhill with maybe a few little rollers. It was cool and I had goosebumps, which I was confident would be gone once we hit the first climb. I spent a little time riding with each person in the group, talking a little bit, just enjoying the day. It was fun to be out there...just riding, no real agenda. Without warning, there it was, the first climb. The crew became silent, we all shifted down to easier gears and started breathing heavy. I was pretty happy I brought the Merlin...much, much easier to use for climbing.

So this is basically what went on for the majority of the ride. Sure, there were a couple of great descents. In fact, on one of the steeper ones, there was a guy laying on the side of the road getting medical attention. Broken collarbone. I know I shouldn't break into turns on the downhill, but I get nervous and seeing this only freaked me out more. Better to be cautious, albeit a little slower, but be able to ride the next day. After all, this was just a ride, not a race.

The last couple miles of this ride is downhill. You can almost ride the last 2 miles without pedaling...almost. The finish came quickly! We all packed up the bikes and walked down for the post-ride spread. It was an absolutely beautiful day for a ride...warm, not too humid, sunny, not much wind, and it all seemed to go by much, much too fast. We sat down for a great little lunch and shared more stories and just got to enjoy each other's company for just a little bit before it was time to head out.

Looking forward to doing it again next year!

Ride to Red Rock

So after Steelhead, we had planned a quick getaway to Las Vegas. I've been to Las Vegas many times, but I've never really ventured off the strip very much. Over to the Hard Rock once, down to the Stratosphere once, but I've really spent most of my time up and down the "main" strip. This time, however, I was given a tip about doing a bike ride to Red Rock Canyon.

It was the night before Steelhead and Chuck mentioned it at dinner. I grabbed my phone and ran out of the restaurant to call my brother. He was leaving for Vegas the next day and I wanted to be sure he packed his bike stuff. It must've been 7pm and he was getting on a 6:30am flight the next day. I was lucky enough to get a hold of him, he said it sounded great, he'd pack his stuff.

We called to make reservations the day we got to Vegas. It was me and 3 guys over 6'3" and they sounded a little concerned that they weren't going to have 3 bikes large enough! I also asked that they put on an extra water bottle cage. Vegas was pretty hot and we didn't bring camelbacks or anything to carry fluids. The woman on the phone told me that we should not be drinking alcohol today or tonight (we were already several rounds in at Harrah's Carnival Court when I made the reservation). We were to meet at the Mirage at 8am.

I came back and announced to the group that we were booked. We celebrated by ordering another round of alcoholic beverages. I was concerned about everyone going out that night and trying to get up on time.

Rob, the guy from the bike store, picked us up and drove us out to the start of the ride. We put on my pedals I had brought from home (thanks to a tip from Chuck), made some small adjustments to everyone's bike for fit and we were off! This was an unguided ride, meaning it was just us. We got dropped off and we were free to do our own thing at our own pace. I was assured we wouldn't get lost and I hoped Rob was right!


I had to make a quick pit stop before we got started so we rode up to the visitor's center. And I do mean up! The center wasn't more than maybe 1000 yards away, but I was already breathing heavy before I got there! I went to the Women's restroom....locked. Uh oh. Not exactly any forest or bushes out there that you can do your business and be unseen (not that I'd do that anyway) and for a second I thought I'd have to do the whole ride with a bladder that was about to explode. Thankfully, the one of the other guys had to go, so we rode over to another building and found some open restrooms. Whew. That would have been a very uncomfortable ride!

Everyone was fresh and ready to go, albeit a little hung over and I'd say a little dehydrated. Up, up, up the road went. By the time we reached the mile point, I was already wondering if this was going to be fun for everyone, particularly the Saint. This was more difficult than I thought. We stopped at the first few "scenic points" so I could take some pictures and we could catch our breath and recoup. It was beautiful. And so very, very quiet. There was the occassional car with tourists inside, but this was a very desolate area. We joked about how there were probably bodies buried out here in the desert, a la "Casino".

We continued to go uphill for the next, I don't know 8-9 miles? Sweat was pouring off all our faces and we wondered why we were doing this to ourselves. I kept reminding everyone to drink. Although it was hot out there, the humidity was rather low so it didn't make you very thirsty. The bottles of water they gave us were also warm, which was a bit of a bummer.

Finally, we were at the highest point, though none of us knew it yet. We only knew it when we stopped for a quick break to drink, then headed back on to the road. We started flying down the road at high speeds, high enough to make me feather the brakes a bit to slow down. There was some gravel on some of the turns. Everyone had smiles on their faces when we reached the road that would dump us back into town. We stopped again for a quick regroup, drink of water, laughed and talked about how fun the downhill was, then we were on our way home.

The next stretch was on some newly paved asphalt. It was a great, smooth ride, although now we were riding next to traffic. There was sufficient shoulder to make it rather safe. This section seemed mostly flat, with a few gradual uphills going over a bridge (I think). But the heartrates remained low and as we rode back into town, it was all downhill. In fact, I don't remember ever riding so long where I didn't have to take a pedal stroke. I only needed to pedal a few strokes to get started after we had to stop at traffic lights. Oh, and this street had a bike lane almost all the way down. As soon as the bike lane disappeared, we jumped on the sidewalks. I didn't think it would be very safe to ride on that road without a bike lane and we were pretty close to being back at the bike store.

Everyone had a great time. For me, it was the highlight of the trip. If I could have changed anything, I would've made the ride longer. I also think I'd prepare my riding partners that the first half of the ride is TOUGH. Very tough! But it's worth it. We got back to the hotel, cleaned up and met again back at Harrah's Carnival Court to celebrate with a few cocktails!

The Horribly Hilly

I can't imagine anyone welcoming the sound of the alarm clock at 2:45am, even if they were going on vacation. Well, I wasn't going on vacation this particular morning. I was headed up to Blue Mounds, WI to participate in the Horribly Hilly Hundreds bike ride. There are 2 options, the 100K or the 200K. When I signed up for the ride, I eagerly signed up for the 200K, vowing to be strong enough to tackle it. But as the days passed, I began to wonder why I even signed up for this ride. I mean, not ONE of my races for the rest of the year has any hills to speak of. So long ago, I decided that 100K would be quite enough for me.

I met up with all the SCTC'ers: Brett, Tom, Chris and Laura. Charlie and Sevy were expected, but hadn't called anyone and we were well past the scheduled start time, so we wandered off to the start without them. There is a very long, somewhat steep downhill one must ride down to get to the start of the event. I remember my first time doing this ride that there was NO WAY we'd have to ride up this awful hill. But this time, I knew...better save some for the end.

It was about 70 degrees at the start and the fast downhill gave me the chills. No sooner do we turn the first corner and the ascent begins! It's all coming back to me now, around every corner, there is an uphill. So would be the theme for the day.

Just as I remembered, there really are no flat sections of this ride. You're either struggling, gritting out a long, slow incline, or flying down a hill at speeds that can make anyone a little nervous. Each time I came upon an incline, I practiced shifting down before my speed dropped too much. And every time, I ran out of "easy" gears, my speed would decline and I would begin huffing and puffing to climb up to the top of each ascent. My riding partner for the day, Whiz, was struggling right along with me and I could hear her breathing just as heavily and she'd let out the occasional grunt, especially up the most grueling of hills.

The steep hill up to the first SAG stop was miserable. As we slowly made our way up to the stop, we saw all the rest of the SCTC'ers cruising on down, going too fast to even recognize that it was us on our way up. I could barely yell hello to them as I needed to conserve all my energy for this brutal nuisance of a hill. And this was just 15 miles into the ride! Heck yeah, we can do this just 3 more times!

As the temperature rose for the day and the sweat poured down our faces, we continued the journey, all the while I was counting off the miles backwards in my head. "OK, only 42 more to go...OK, just 40 miles left..." I've done it before, I can do this again. This year, however, I used a road bike instead of a TT (or triathlon) bike. And in my mind, either I was more prepared for the day having done this before, or the road bike made the ride considerably easier. I only HAD to get out of the saddle twice the entire day.

We were running out of fluids quickly now and I reminded myself to conserve until the next rest stop. The last place we stopped was simply a picnic bench in front of a residence with a hose running out from the house with a sign saying "This is your LAST CHANCE for water." Whiz and I didn't miss that opportunity! We were determined to get this ride over with. I knew the end was near as I had stopped at this same picnic bench to refill my water bottles 2 years ago.

Before I knew it, I was turning right into the Blue Mounds picnic area where the ride started. I cringed as I realized the end was near, as was the most difficult climb of the day. I hunkered down in my seat, shifted down into the easiest gear I had, put my head down and focused on keeping forward momentum. This part nearly made me cry 2 years ago and this day, I was not about to let it get the better of me. I pushed on, slowly but surely at an embarrassing pace of 3.2 mph, veering around many cyclists turned walkers. Oh believe me, it would be so easy to walk up that last hill. But I cannot. MUST....GET....UP....UGH....THIS....HILL....I...CAN....DO....THIS...OMIGOD, IT'S SO HOT....KEEP...GOING....ALMOST...JEEZ!...THERE....

Then there were spectators. This year, there were no encouraging words scribbled on the pavement. I was bummed as they offered me much motivation 2 years ago. So I kept on, cranking, pushing, breathing, sweating, cursing, fighting back tears, shooting daggers with my eyes at the people cheering us on...I mean hey, it LOOKS a lot easier than it really is and I'd much rather have been one of those cheering spectators at that moment!

Finally, I saw it. The finish line. I could hear the woman with the bullhorn, cheering us on, encouraging us to finish this ride PEDALING. I saw Chris on the sidelines offering encouragement and I could only muster a small smile as I continued to torture myself up this obnoxious hill. WHY again did I sign up for this?? Just a few pedal strokes later, that was it, I crossed the finish! I stayed in the saddle for that entire last climb and the only time I felt the need to almost clip out was when a cyclist-turned-walker jetted out in front of me and almost made me lose my balance. And another year of HHH goes down in the record books. Wish I could say, "Cool, can't wait for next year!" but eh, not so much.

Luna Chix Ride

Today was the second "official" Luna Chix ride of the year! The Luna Chix are groups of women, sponsored by Luna Bar to help encourage women to get out and be active. We plan group workouts as well as clinics and seminars and raise money for the Breast Cancer Fund.

These rides are held in conjunction with the Downers Grove Bike Club. Karen, a member of both organizations, tends to head up these rides and I couldn't think of a more perfect person for the job!

Tonight, we had a great group! In addition to the 3 Luna Chix, we had about 5-6 Downers Grove Bike Club members, 2 women who came out to ride after hearing about it through another Luna Chic and we picked up a speedy guy along the way somewhere. This made for a good sized group - not huge, but not too small.

The ride starts at Waterfall Glen promptly at 6:15pm. Very quickly, two groups were established. The nice thing about this ride was that every one was very friendly and there were no egos getting in the way. All of us were out there for one reason: to get in a ride!

There seemed to be a bit of a headwind on the way out, but nothing compared to all the other rides I've been on this year. In fact, I was quite relieved as I was starting to forget what it feels like to ride when it's NOT windy! LOL! We rode down International Parkway to Joliet Road and turned around where we took the north side of the frontage roads for the way home. Tim, a Downers Grove Bike Club member, had a flat on the way out, so we just scooped him up on the way back.

The headwind I mentioned earlier must not have been all that strong because I certainly didn't feel a tailwind on the way back (isn't that ALWAYS the case??). We took the hills on...I'm not sure of the street name, but if you're a local rider, you know what I'm talking about...might be Madison. And then when we cross 83 and head on to Bluff, I really like to hammer that section (probably because it's downhill!).

Not sure how many miles we went, but that wasn't the point of the ride. The weather was almost perfect, in fact, maybe a little to warm as I was dripping with sweat after climbing a couple of those hills. But I couldn't be happier! It felt like summer outside and I've waited for warm weather for what feels like an eternity.

Great day for a nice, casual Luna Chix ride!!

Suddenly Windy Century

I woke up and jumped online to check the weather forecast for the day's ride. Though it was only 52 so early in the morning, the prediction was for the temperature to rise to 70. Great, I thought, this will be a nice, warm ride! However, I noticed the little pictures on the hour-by-hour forecast went from a cute little sun to the word wind. This wind was scheduled to start around 10am and last through the afternoon.

It took a little longer to get to the starting location than I had planned, so the nearest parking lot was already filled. I went to turn around when I noticed Chris chasing me down the street. He and Laura had parked in a lot a couple blocks down. Excellent! Since I planned to ride a majority of these miles with Laura, I figured it made sense to park near them.

Quickly, I found a spot and ran to the registration line, which seemed really long. While there I saw so many Salt Creek Tri Club members. It was awesome! I quickly gathered my wristband and course map, but they were out of cue sheets for the 100 mile route. I waited for about 10 minutes, but I knew people were getting anxious to start, so I grabbed a 75 mile cue sheet and went back to my car to get ready.

Many of the Luna Chix were riding today, and we were quite the vision in our bright Luna jerseys! As I was getting my things together, I decided it was much colder than weather.com had lead me to believe. I was shivering and my legs were covered with goosebumps. The wind was already quite strong and I shuddered at the fact that at some point, we'd have to be riding head on into the wind today. Maybe I should change plans and go for the 60 mile route, which many of the Luna Chix were planning to do...? Well, I just decided I'd make that decision when the split of the two courses came.

I went on over to Chris and Laura and Sally was nearby. Sally and I planned to practice some of our time trial riding today because of the race we are entered in next weekend. Sally didn't bring a jacket and was already calling dibs on my jacket when I was ready to dump it. With the cold air and the wind whipping around us, I wasn't sure I was letting this jacket go at all today! We were all at the start and started to roll, only about 20 minutes later than as planned. Within a block, Judy needed to stop because her cleat was loose. She took off her shoe and we saw that out of the 4 screws that hold on her cleat, 3 of them were missing!! And she had just been on a ride 3 days ago. It's a very depressing thought when you're prepared for a long ride and something like this happens that threatens to cancel the ride for you completely. Cyclists typically carry extra tubes, tools and pumps...but no one carries extra screws for their cleats!! With that, we left Judy to fix her cleat and she promised to call me if she wasn't going to be able to join us for the ride.

The ride started off and our group was pretty big...I'd say maybe 12 of us or so. The pace was pretty easy and the group talked and laughed as we rode along. Sally and I missed one of the very early turns, but thankfully, Laura caught that and we didn't go too far out of our way as we did last week. I cannot be trusted to be in the front of these rides...at some point, I become involved in a conversation or simply just riding and then stop paying attention to the course markings. So I dropped to the back for a while.

One of the draws to this ride is that they allow you a lap on the Chicagoland Speedway. The first thing you notice is how steep the banking is. It's really an experience to ride at the top, where you are riding upright, but the banking is so steep, it looks like you are riding at a huge angle. The next thing you start thinking is that it takes a lot longer to ride around this track on a bike than in a car!

We all stopped at the end of the lap to let the group catch up. At this point, I handed my jacket off to Sally. I was already getting too warm and when you sweat a lot and then ride into wind, well, that makes for a pretty freezing ride. Judy and Jeannie then caught up to us. Judy was able to fix the cleat and not cancel her ride after all. It was great to see that she had worked it out!

Shortly after leaving the Speedway was the splitting point. Riders doing 60 miles or less would turn left. Riders going 75 or 100 miles would turn right. But wait, Sally and I hadn't even practiced our TT riding yet! The wind was already tough, did I really want to ride 100 miles?? I looked at Laura and she firmly said, "I'm going 75." There was no changing her mind. Kelly and Griz also said "75." The rest of the group could not be convinced to go that long, so the groups broke up.

And then it was just Kelly, Griz, Laura and myself. I had no idea what happened to BC, but it didn't matter because I knew if he was in front of us, he'd probably be waiting at a SAG (support and gear) stop. And if he was behind us, well, he'd catch up quickly. That first stretch felt lovely...little did I realize we had the tailwind at that point. Once again, the talking and laughing initiated and we were all having fun again.

Then the course turned. The wind was at our faces. It was so strong, it screamed in your ears and it was now impossible to hear anyone talking, even if they were riding directly beside you less than 2 feet away. Our pace dropped dramatically and we all shifted into smaller gears. This isn't fun. OK, keep pushing until we turn! It was dangerous to try to stay aero because it felt like the wind gusts would push your wheel in whatever direction it felt and it caused you to feel like you were going to fall. Ugh, this is so hard. And then...a turn. Aaaaaahhhhhh....wait for the group to get together and complain about how hard that stretch was. Uh oh, another turn...into the wind again. Come ON! I cannot wait for the first stop. Not only do I have to go to the bathroom, but I need a break from all this wind. Then Laura screams to me - the first stop isn't until mile 28. WE WERE AT MILE 14!

It was at that point that I decided I would NOT be doing 100 miles today. In fact, I didn't want to do 75, I didn't want to do 60 and I didn't want the 43 mile route. No, this sucks, I want to go home. Problem is, I'm one of the most directionally challenged people on the planet and I have no idea how to get back to the start. Besides, if everyone else was going to continue...then I must. But not 100...no, no, please not 100.

Laura and I stick together for the next several miles. Finally, BC catches up with us...somehow we had missed him coming out of the Speedway. We rode with him a little bit and I tried to draft off him to protect myself from the wind. The SAG stop felt like it was never going to come, but finally, it did. When we stopped, my ears were ringing because of all the loud wind. We grabbed some food, refilled our water bottles and waited for the others to catch up. I was able to convince BC that 75 miles today would be PLENTY! While there, we saw Janis, Lori and Donna pull up! They were opting for a shorter route today.

Finally, we were ready to take off. We turned left out of the parking lot and had to wait for a ton of (not too bright) riders to turn left in front of us. Even with someone there directing traffic, it seemed like a cluster! As soon as we made that next left...again...wind. Strong wind. Gusty wind. It was relentless. I wondered why I let Sally keep my jacket because now I really wanted it! Within minutes, BC was pulling away and I tried to scoot up on his wheel. That worked for maybe a mile, then I watched the distance grow slowly between his back wheel and my front wheel. He's just much too strong for me. I turned to look around, but I had lost the rest of the group.

The next 20 miles or so were brutally lonely. The all-too-familiar feel of snot running out of my nose like there was no tomorrow irritated the crap out of me. I don't carry tissue with me, and even if I did, I didn't dare take my hands off the handle bars for fear of being blown over. On a positive note, I passed lots and lots of people on this stretch. Some were riding really heavy mountain bikes. Some had these big jackets on that blew up like parachutes as they were riding....as if the strong winds weren't enough, hey, yeah, let's add some more drag to ourselves!

I felt sorry for those people, but I felt sorry for myself, too. I don't need to be riding this many miles at this time of the year! What good is this doing for me, really? This is stupid wind. Every ride I've been on this year has been windy. I don't remember any other ride being this windy. The temperature was actually perfect...and if it hadn't been so windy, this would have been a fabulous ride. But as I kept on pedaling, and pedaling hard, I saw the speedometer read 9 mph and it was crushing. On a downhill, I felt like I could pick up some speed, so I'd pump my legs a little faster to gain momentum...look at the speedometer...14 mph. You've got to be kidding. That 20 mile stretch was one of the longest, toughest sections of any ride I've ever done. Not quite as bad as the section in Coeur d'Alene when I wanted to quit the race, but well, still mentally very challenging.

I finally reached the next rest stop and saw Chris. He was planning on doing the full 100 miles when the day started, but as the rest of us did, he revised the plan just a little because every single one of us was just taking a beating from the powerful wind. And even more challenging than that, Chris was riding alone. I'm sure he couldn't wait for this ride to be over.

This time, we didn't wait so long at the SAG stop. This was a good thing as when you sit still for too long, you tend to get cold. We made our way back onto the course and hoped the wind hadn't shifted. See, all this time, we were either riding with a strong headwind or crosswind. A majority of this home stretch should have been a tailwind.

And there it was....it was happiness! We were putting forth much less effort, but our speeds were now in the 20s. It was a beautiful thing. It was like the reward after busting our butts all day. At one point, I even ran out of gears. An effortless ride is a FUN ride! So now the talking and laughing once again continued. I was extremely thankful the course hadn't been reversed. It's so much easier to do the "tough stuff" first and then coast the rest.

We packed our bikes and went into the bar where they were serving chili after the race. We saw a few familiar faces! We traded our horror stories of the day and Donna told us of a cyclist who was hit by a motorcycle. Everyone was OK, but still not something you want to hear.

We stayed around a little longer, just taking in the environment and talking about the difficulties of the day. The rest of the Salt Creek people I had started out the day riding with arrived, so we had to capture this photo. We took this shot about 20 times...because I still don't know how to work my camera that I have owned for years now!

Happy to have this ride over with! Let's just hope Mother Nature is a bit more kind for the next one...

You Gotta Love Chicago!

You know, yesterday, it was a little chilly out, but nice, dry and sunny. I wanted to get in a bike ride in the afternoon, but I had dinner plans with some friends that I had to cancel already once, so I thought, "OK, well, I'll just do a ride outside tomorrow." The weather forecast was calling for lower temperatures and maybe some rain, but you know how weathermen can be wrong.

Well, I wake up this morning and look out the window to find this. Ridiculous! I have to remind myself not to plan any spring triathlons because this is the kind of weather I have to deal with. It is MID-APRIL! We've had only about a handful of outside-bike-riding temperatures so far. Today makes me even more sure I want to move out of the midwest. Guess I won't be riding outside today! In fact, the way it looks, I don't even want to plan a run outside this afternoon. Talk about ruining my whole day!

Easter Ride

For the past 3 years, it has been my tradition to get out for an early morning bike ride on Easter Sunday. I figure if I can get up and go early enough, I can get my workout in and still be back in time to still make it to the family celebrations. This Easter should be no different!

However, as all of you here in Chicago already know, Mother Nature hasn't been to kind to us in terms of spring-like temperatures lately. We were "teased" a little bit a few weeks ago with some extremely warm temperatures for this time of year, but since then, we've dipped right back down to the well-below normal range. After Saturday morning's run (last long one before Boston!), I headed right back here to the computer to see what the weather predictions were going to be like for Easter Sunday morning. It was supposed to be about 10 degrees warmer than Saturday morning.
That's not saying much - it was only 22 when we ran on Saturday! BRRRR!

I was planning on riding with the Salt Creek Triathlon Club that morning. But they've always had this "unwritten" rule...we do not ride if it's below 40 or if it's raining, we don't go below 50. Or so, at least I thought that's what the rule was! I waited patiently to see messages roll in about canceling the ride due to weather. Then late afternoon, a message came out that some of the members were out on a ride that Saturday morning (in 22 degrees) and said "Oh, we were fine!" This meant the ride would go on. YIKES!

Riding in cold weather is a lot different than running in it. The wind is a much bigger factor and my extremities get colder much more quickly....and they take longer to warm up once I get going. Saturday night before I went to bed, I started tossing out all the warmest pieces of clothing I had. Also packed up my last package of toe warmers as I was quite sure I would need them for the ride in the morning. By the time I was finished, I had quite the little mountain of clothes tossed onto the middle of the closet floor. Nothing matched, but who cares? I just wanted to be warm!

In the morning, I woke up and quickly ran to the computer to check again to see if, by some miracle, they would be canceling this ride. No such luck. And, sure I could just blow it off, but then it would bother me all day that others got out there and ride and I wimped out. So I put the first 2 layers of my clothes on and stuffed the rest into a bag with my shoes, drinks, helmet and gloves and tossed the bag onto the front seat of the car. I grabbed the bike to put it in the trunk and the frame was ice cold against my bare hand. And this was IN THE GARAGE! I thought to myself, "This is absolutely ridiculous."

I pulled up to the usual meeting spot about 10 minutes early and, to my surprise, I wasn't the first one there! Gee, I'm not the only psycho that's going through with this ride! We are one sick group of people! All in all, we ended having 8 people ride this frigid Easter morning. My fingers were completely uncomfortable for the first 20 minutes of the ride and then again when we started heading back into the wind. My toe warmers, though I could feel them wearing off toward the end of the ride, did the job. Other than that, I can't really complain that it was all that cold out there.

So chalk it up as another Easter Sunday with another long bike ride! Now, on to the festivities!

First Century of 2007

That's it, folks! My first century ride (100 miles) of 2007 is now history.

Waking up on Friday morning at 3:30am in order to finish packing, shower and get off to the airport was no problem. I was pretty excited and anxious to get out there to experience this ride. I was also a bit nervous because my past rides on hilly terrain have been challenging. Combine that with the fact that I haven't been out on a road with my bike since November and the ride feels intimidating. Since I was doing this ride with Camille and Bernie, two very strong riders, well, it could almost make me sick to my stomach. What I kept reminding myself was that this was just a friendly little ride with beautiful scenery and I was here to have fun!

The thing with flying with a bike is that it can present all sorts of obstacles. They want to look in the bike case, go through all your stuff (which they inevitably "mess up"), they charge you extra for the bike, it can take a lot of time and just generally has the potential to be a big pain in the rear! This was my first time flying Jet Blue - and by far the easiest experience I've had traveling with my bike!

We flew to Long Beach airport - I think they have exactly 7 gates and just 2 baggage carousels. Camille met us near the baggage claim with wet swimsuit in hand - she had come directly from the pool. Camille's workout schedule makes me look like a slacker! Bernie went to get the rental car while Camille and I chatted. I then went over to get our luggage, which, unfortunately was removed from the carousel because we left it too long (10 minutes??!?). One of the agents scolded me for leaving my luggage there too long. Yeah, yeah, can I just have my bag now? We drove off to Santa Barbara where we stayed at a Days Inn. This would make our drive to Solvang in the morning short and sweet. After a quick lunch, we put our bikes together and made sure we'd be able to fit everything in the van in the morning. We met up with Camille's friend, Pete, for dinner. The meal theme of this trip was definitely seafood. I had more fish tacos this trip than I've had in my life! We went to a place called the Endless Summer Bar-Cafe.

We were clearly not the only ones at this Days Inn going to the ride. As I sent out the door in the morning to check the temperature, there were other riders already packing their things into vehicles.It was quite chilly! It took a little over 30 minutes to get to Solvang.

There were already people taking off for the ride when we arrived. There were more cyclists than I've ever seen in one place! We took out rime picking up our registration materials and getting our gear together in hopes that it would warm up a little. I started this ride with a thin hat under my helmet, a thin Under Armor shirt under my short-sleeved jersey, arm warmers, toe covers and long-fingered gloves. In a sick sort of way, I wanted that first hill to come quickly so I could warm up. My fingers were pretty uncomfortable almost instantly. I would say that we were all uncomfortably cold for the first 8-10 miles. Then it seemed to warm up. Riding through the sunshine felt almost perfect. Then we came to the first round of hills. Within minutes, I heated up quickly and toyed with the idea of shedding some layers. But you don't want to do that too early because when you hit a shady downhill, it becomes cold in a hurry!

This ride was feeling incredible! I don't know if it was my new bike, Sylvia, the beautiful weather and scenery or just the fact that this ride sure as hell beats an indoor ride on a trainer, but I was having a fantastic time! Everything felt great on the new bike and though we were tearing up some brutal hills, I felt better than expected. At the very first SAG stop, the extra clothing layers came off.

About 20 miles into the ride, the wind came out of nowhere. And no matter which way we turned, it felt like we were riding straight into it. It was pretty draining. We caught on to the back of a pace line and let a guy with "Wild Thing" on his jersey lead us for what was much longer than any normal person would have pulled. But this guy seemed to enjoy leading us as he always slowed down when it seemed the group was dropping off the back of his wheel. We were riding at an effort that made me think we were going 20-22 mph, but I looked at my speedometer and we were doing a measley 12 mph! UGH! Well, being in a pace line was sure better than facing this wind alone, so as we turned the corner, I got out of the saddle to catch the wheel in front of me (Camille's). It wsa then that I heard a loud Pssssssssshhhhhhhhh and my speed quickly diminished. You guessed it, I had a flat. I yelled "Camille!" to get her to stop, but I didn't think she heard me. Bummer.

I changed the tube and had to fill it with a tiny frame pump. Yep, the same pump I stole off Sanford (Sure glad I did that!). I couldn't get the tire quite as full as I'd have liked to, but I figured it was enough to get me to the next SAG stop. I slowly got back on the road and pedaled furiously to catch up. I pulled into the stop and found Camille and Bernie quickly. They were already wondering what happened to me. It took me so long to get there, they thought I might've moved on without them! I went to the bike guys, borrowed a pump and filled the back tire up. I then rode over to fill my water bottles and... Pssssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhh! WTF?!?!??!!!!!

Bernie figured I may have pinched the tube, so he changed this one for me. (Thanks, BC). BC and I had each only brought one extra tube, and we used both of those, so I went back to the bike guys to purchase 2 more tubes...just in case. After what seemed like forever, we moved on. We had just about 40 more miles to go. More wind, more hills, but the warm temperatures and spectacular sunshine made it hard to not enjoy the rest of this ride. I was so happy to be outside in nothing more than shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. However, it did seem that I couldn't drink enough. I was constantly thirsty for the remainder of the ride.

We were warned of the "killer" hill that lay ahead of us, I guess around mile 80. It was pretty slow going and all the cyclists seemed to be moving in slow motion. I put Sylvia into the easiest gear I had and tried to hold a comfortable rhythym to crank up this hill. I was up close behind a guy wearing a Clif jersey, but I wasn't making any ground on him, so I decided not to try and pass him. Unfortunately, this guy decided to shift gears, pausing just for an instant and my front tire hit his back tire. Immediately, I was off balance and tried to correct myself by veering quickly right. And, more bad luck for me, I hit another rider and went down. Not hard, we were only going about 5-6mph, but just enough to embarass myself and give all the other riders a good chuckle. Yeah, very funny.

We headed into the last 10 miles of this century and saw a police car up ahead with a biker down. Not good. As I tried to keep my eyes on the road, I heard a sound that resembled a bottle rocket. And, you betcha, flat #3. I had now become quite efficient at getting the back tire off and changing it, but the cop told me the reason the guy in front of me fell was because he flatted during this same turn. That made me extra cautious for the rest of the ride. My knuckles were turning white on the handle bars! With 3 flats already, it wouldn't have surprised me if I had a 4th and I didn't want to be speeding into a turn if that happened.

Luckily for me, the last few miles were uneventful. They actually had a big banner with a "finish line" for the cyclists to cross. There, they handed out goody bags and herded everyone into this big courtyard-like area where there was a big barbecue going on. I couldn't believe how quickly the day went, flats and crashing included! It was a great ride that I hope to be able to do again in the future!!

Off We Go To California!

I meant to take a picture of the new road bike to show you all, but haven't had time. I picked her up (her name is Sylvia) last week and things have been rather crazy!

The first thing I needed to do was put some pedals on her. Sure, changing pedals is easy, you say. Well, I have had a bad experience in pedal-changing that involved stripping a crank and going on a wild goose chase that lasted several months to find a replacement crank to make that bike usable. Therefore, I was extra-special careful when removing the pedals from my old Trek (from here on out known as Sanford...as in Sanford and Son because the bike is a piece of junk). It actually went a lot smoother than I expected.

Secondly, Sylvia (the new bike) came with a 12-23 cassette. No, I'm not a gear head, but these are things you learn about very quickly when it comes to riding hilly courses. Because Sylvia does not have a triple chain ring in the front, nor do I want to get one, I needed to get a 12-27 cassette for this weekend's ride. In case you didn't know, Solvang is hilly. Like, we here in Illinois have no idea what hills are compared to what they have in California. You people who have ridden the Ironman Wisconsin course and think it's hilly have no idea what hilly is compared to the hills in Solvang. If you've done Horribly Hilly...well, you're close.

SO - that means a 12-27 is essential if I want to be riding the century vs. walking my bike for a majority of the ride. I don't claim to have any sort of bike mechanic knowledge, but hey, you gotta start somewhere. My buddy, CJB (also known as JQ) said he had a 12-27 he'd let me borrow for the ride. Sweet, I didn't have to scramble to find one. I drive over to his house only to find that, no, he DOES NOT have a 12-27, he has a 12-25. Well, I don't need that...a)I MUST have a 12-27 and b)Gus has a 12-25, and I could've just used that if I wanted to go that route. (Gus is my triathlon also known as a TT bike). More importantly, while I'm at JQ's bike shop (a.k.a. garage), he gives me a quick lesson in changing a cassette.

Mind you, this all happens in less than a week and I DO have a full-time job, ya know! I locate a local bike shop that has the cassette and get ready to do the dirty work. You get to use this fancy-looking tool with a chain hanging from it for this job. And, although I was given a very nice bike tool box for my birthday last year, it does not have the right size wrench for this task. I tear up every junk drawer in the kitchen and box in the garage for a wrench and come up empty. (Note to self: Husband is not allowed to TOUCH my tools!) I got so frustrated, I had to walk away and go start some laundry. After I calmed down, I went back on my hunt for a wrench. Found one, not exactly what I was looking for, but I figured it was good enough for the job.

I take my time, and in less than 10 minutes, the new cassette is installed. You've got to be kidding, that was quite easy! It was much harder to find a wrench than it was to change the stupid thing. I run to the garage, put the wheel on the bike and shift it up and down to make sure I did it right. Yep, it works. Well, you can't really do this incorrectly...almost idiot-proof.

Last piece my new baby needed was bottle cages. It came without any. For a century ride in the 80 degree weather we're expecting, I wanted two. Got them from the same bike shop I got the cassette and another 10 minutes goes by while I install those. Oh yeah, compact pump gets attached when you put on the cages...stole that off Sanford, too. Not like he'll be needing it anymore. He's headed for retirement!

After all the finishing touches, it's just a matter of taking the bike apart to put it in the bike box for the flight to CA. I've decided that I'm out of practice in the art of disassembling the bike. Again, not difficult, but there are all these cool little tricks that I've been taught (mostly by BC) that just make your life a little easier when you get the bike to its destination and have to put it together again.

I plan on bringing the camera to CA for the trip and hope to get a few good pictures I can share with you. I, in no way, feel prepared to ride 100 miles in the hills of California at this time of year (heck, I don't think I'd feel prepared at ANY time of year!), but I do plan to have some fun while I enjoy the good weather, beautiful scenery and wonderful company.