Being humbled

How many times am I going to do the old 'size up the other riders at the start of the ride' thing?  You know the one.......you arrive and don't know anyone.....so you look around to determine if it'll be a good group to ride with.  Will you be able to keep up?  Will *they* be able to keep up?  Will you be bored?  Will you be the slowest?  The fastest?  All that, just by checking out their body types and/or ages.

WRONG!!!

Got my ass kicked at the start of a group ride today by an older lady that I figured would be my saving grace.  I was only going out with her and two other men I'd never met-who both looked to be strong (and hey-I was right about those guys at least).  I *thought* I'd be fine.....reasoning that at the very least I wouldn't be the slowest.  Wrong.

Seriously, within 4 minutes of leaving the departure point, I was dropped.  Thankfully, one of the guys took pity on me and slowed down to pull me (ride out front to break the wind and make it easier on me).  Humbling.

Luckily, it was just that I needed more of a warm up before starting.  A race horse out of the gate, I am not.  So with time (and a gradual incline out of my way), I hung in there just fine.

The woman in question turned around after about 9 miles so that she could get a total of an 18 mile ride in.  The boys and I pressed on, and they took no mercy on me (but I LIKE that!).  I want to be pushed to my max.  I want to have that questionable feeling as to whether I'll be able to keep it up for the ride.  It only works though if you aren't maxed out the whole way.  Thankfully, we were doing some rollers and I had relief on the slight downs.  For the longest time we were FLYING (my idea of flying anyway) at 24 miles an hour.  I really didn't know what that meant when I was doing it, other than it took everything I had not to get dropped!  When I got home I looked up the conversion.  Ai ya yai!!!  We were cruising at over 38 kilometers and hour.  *THAT*, I understand!  Wow.

All in all, we did about 38 miles (61kms).  Although technically I should have been in the saddle for about 80kms on this week's long ride.....I'll take it.  My legs were DONE at the end of the ride.  I went to stand up for a climb and had nothing left to give.  Thankfully, we were within 1 mile of the finish by then.

Just have to keep this up, and it'll get better and better each time.

The last week had me doing two 75 minute spin classes on the trainer, a day snowboarding, an hour of Kenpo and a 1/2 hour run.  It's a start!  Trust me, with the beautiful weather we've been having, exercising isn't the top of the priority list!

(P.S.  I can't remember the last time I rode my bike in the rain or wet ground.  Probably in October of 2011?  I *really* hope it doesn't rain on Ride2Survive day, or I'll be in big trouble!  It just doesn't rain here to get any practice (I know, I know....tough problem to have!).  And on the rare occasion it does rain, you don't need to go out in it-because guaranteed the next day will be dry.  These guys don't even own fenders!  Don't worry, we still have ours from Vancouver, and will bring them with us *just* in case).