The day was finally here...... BIKE RIDE! A couple of us had decided a few months back to do the Southern Magnolia bike ride. Not sure why I kept calling it the Mississippi Magnolia.. ha Anyway, ride day was bright at early. We elected to drive on ride morning to the coast which meant getting up at 3:30 am for me and leaving the house my 4:15 am to meet my group in town to leave at 4:30 am. You got to love biking riding or running to get up early on the weekend.
Originally Frank & Krista had signed up for the 40 miler and Me, Melodye, & Sonya signed up for the Metric century (62 miles). However, Frank started having some back issues recently which forced him to back down to the 25 miler. When this happened I kind of took Krista under my wing. She wanted me to do one last long ride with her to prepare her for the ride. Well, I convinced her to do 50 miles instead of 40 that day. I needed 50 and I knew she could do it. We had a little issue on like mile 40 where she had a flat. I was so sad. We (Mel was with us on the ride) didn't have enough stuff to fix her flat so we ended up leaving her to go get car to pick her up. However an angel showed up and fixed her tire so she was able to complete the 50 mile training ride. I knew then I had to talk her into the metric century. There was no need in her backing down to the 25 with Frank and no need in her doing the 40 alone. She was ready and I knew she could do the 62 with us.
I tried to give gentle hints to her... well... maybe not so gentle.. ha However, she was questioning herself and her abilities. I kept telling her positive thoughts only! I even reminded her of the 4 pillars of strength (Physical, Emotional, Mental & Spiritual) from the moving Chasing Mavericks. Oh how I love that movie!!
Frosty from Chasing Mavericks
I wasn't absolutely for sure she was going to do the metric until ride morning. All week she had kind of been going back and forth between the 40 and the metric. I was thrilled when she even told the registration table she was moving to the metric group.
We asked a guy in the parking lot to take our picture before we started. Boy it was MUGGY! It was already like 78 degrees and 100% humidity! People standing around were all talking that had done the ride several years that this year was the hottest by far. One day even said that 2 years ago they all had on leg and arm warmers it was so cold.
Sonya, Krista, Frank, me, & Mel
I don't know how many bikers exactly did the ride, but I heard one person say that 500 had signed up. It was very crowded when we started! I couldn't even clip in my pedals because it was stop/start for a good little piece before you could actually ride. I could tell Krista was nervous. Heck even I get nervous when it's crowded especially with clip in shoes!
We were finally off and able to ride without total congestion. The first 20 miles were TOUGH. However, due to some great downhills after the long climb, we averaged 15.9 mph. I kept watching Krista with awe. She was really doing great! However, we had not seen a rest stop! Usually on long bike rides they have them like every 15 miles. Krista has not learned to drink and ride yet so I knew we needed to pull over and let her drink. I sure didn't want her to get dehydrated on us. So I told her at the top of the next hill we would stop. No need in stopping at the bottom. Trust me you needed that momentum you gained going down to help you go back up. :>) So we stopped and we were at mile 18. Another biker came by and told us that the rest stop was 2 miles ahead. So yep... the first rest stop was 20 miles into our 62! So we drank quickly and decided we would stop and stretch in 2 miles.
I was glad to see the porta john at the rest stop. :>) We all got off our bikes and grabbed some goodies and Krista filled her water bottle. There was a big group riding together that had stopped. We overhead them talking about which way they were going next. There were 2 roads ... you had to go down each of them and turn around and come back to the same rest stop. The ride map had you going down the road on the right first, but they said they were doing the road on the left first because it was the harder road and they wanted to get it over with first. Most of them were from that area and I had started noticing that the place look familiar. We decided to take their advice and do the road on the left first. It was 5 miles out and 5 miles back. and YES it was hard! Not as must downhill as we had in the first 20 miles. It seemed to be just a steady incline. I recognized the rode about half way. It was one of the roads that I had trained on with the Wiggins group to get ready for the ironman race last year. I went there several times because the elevation was very similar to Augusta. Melodye and I talked several times during this stretch of the ride. We both felt like Krista was going to kill us when it was over. hee hee But we were both also so impressed with Krista. She was leading our pack most of the time. We drafted off of her many times. :>) She hasn't learned to draft yet and Mel loves to draft so we took advantage of Krista being in the front. Thanks Krista for the strong pull! :> ) I'll say again.. the ride was TOUGH. Check out our elevation map:
Notice that good downhill... this is probably where we averaged that 30 mph! That might not seem fast to you, but on a road bike with skinny wheels coming down a hill that is fast and boy it's FUN. There were many rolling hills. Constant up and down. In the beginning I told Krista to not focus on the up but remind herself that after climbing we would get a downhill where we could rest. :>)
The next road was 10 miles out and 10 miles back. We took a nice little break at the next stop. Mel even did her usual laying on the ground to stretch her back.
All 4 of us at the rest stop... we were about mile 40 here I believe.. 22 more to go
Krista and Mel taking a break
Not sure if Mel was offering me her Oreo cookie or just enjoying being off her bike. :>)
We soon took off to try to get in those last miles. I was glad that for most of the day it was overcast. If the sun had been beaming the entire time, it would have been unbearable hot.
We had said we were not going to stop again and just ride to the finish. However, when we came to the last rest stop we were 12 miles out from the finish, Krista asked to stop to drink. I keep forgetting that not everyone drinks while they are riding. So we stopped one last time. My neck and shoulders were killing me. I was so ready to get the last 12 miles over. I need to go get properly fitted for my bike. I got fitted over 2 years ago when I first started riding by a friend who knows a lot about bikes, but I've never been fitted at a bike store. I know over time with riding your position of your seat and handle bars can change. They can drop from the simple pressure of your riding and not to mention the road conditions.. bumpy roads.... It's good to always make sure you are properly fitted. That is on my to-do-list very soon!
I never saw the camera person on the road coming in to the finish. I'm glad Robbie saw these pictures on fb and tagged us.
Frank captured several pictures of us at the finish line:
We received an email the night before the ride that the medals they ordered did not come in. They said they would mail them to us later. I did however get my finisher jacket and cycle jersey. I just love this jersey!
Mel and I both asked each other if we wanted to do another 38 miles to get to the 100 miles and we both said NO. LOL Neither of us were feeling 100 miles ...... especially not on those hills. ha However, I think if we had signed up for 100 and been focused on 100 miles, we could have done it. Our "mental" state plays a huge role in what we accomplish. For months I had been telling myself it was just 62 miles and not 100. I was only focused on finishing 62 miles. I'm a firm believe that our minds have to be focused on what we plan to accomplish. :>) Positive thoughts as I had told Krista all week before the ride.
Here's our speed chart:
Our overall ride time. I'm very happy with the time. I haven't trained much on speed in a long time. And doing this time with Krista, a first timer, was amazing! I love riding in groups. Makes the time go by faster. :>) Not to mention these 3 ladies are amazing women. My only thing I regret about the bike ride was the fact that Frank was not with us. I hate he's having some issues lately which has limited his biking and running. However, because of the kind of friend that he is to us, he offered to drive us to the ride. He waited until we finished and drove us home. :>) I don't know what we'd do without him always taking care of us! Thank you Frank!
Well... until next time. I've got a sprint TRI coming up in 2 weeks, Duathlon end of October and then a half marathon in Vegas in November. What's on your schedule?
D
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