Alls well that ends well

Yesterday I hopped on the bike and rode a kind of odd route. I didn't follow my normal routes but just kind of felt my way through some neighborhood streets. I wasn't feeling very strong, so I just put in around 13 miles.

I felt like I had to get some miles in because I didn't think I would get to ride today. I was supposed to have a breakfast business meeting about the same time I normally ride with the Sunshine guys. Turns out it rained anyway so I wouldn't have gotten to ride with them after all.

However, things cleared up and I knew that if I planned to keep this new exercise routine going, I was going to have to get in the saddle. So, I left the house with the idea that I would complete the USACycling Professional Road Race course. I modified it only slightly so that I could use my home as the starting point.

By the time I hit Old Buncombe road, I was feeling pretty bad. I could tell that I have not been riding as much. My legs were screaming at me before I even got out of downtown. I almost turned around and went back. But I had done this before and I knew my legs would come back to me.

By the time I reached the base of Paris Mountain, my legs were getting into shape. I knew it was going to be tough, but I pushed on up. I was about 3 minutes off of my best time as I climbed the back side. On the way down the front side, I tucked in and had a blast carving the asphalt. I only clocked 45 mph, but it was still fun. One of these days, I am going to hit 50.

Coming back into town I really started wearing down. I knew I still had about 7 more miles to go, so I just sucked up and kept cranking. Finally, after riding for an hour and a half, I came home. Not having watched the computer during the ride, I wasn't sure what my stats would be. I figured it would be an average of 15.5 mph. I was very pleased to find that I had averaged 17.1 mph!

Next week, I am going to give it a better go. I only rode 52 miles this week. That is down from over 100 miles back when I was training for the metric century. I would like to see if I could break back into that target.