After I wrapped up the tri season and the marriage (October 1) I had a few road bike rides on the calendar. I have to admit, when Maggie and I got back from Charleston I was a bit tired and not crazy about heading out of town on a long bike trip, but I had made promises and was in the car headed down to Tupelo before I could back out. There were six of us for the first annual Man Ride. We arrived into Tupelo late on Thursday evening and checked into one of the strangest hotels I have ever seen....America's Best Inn and Suites. We were checked in by the most friendly and bizarre person...Randy is a sight. If you ever make your way down to Tupelo make sure to stop in and say hello.
Well, we got up on schedule Friday morning, started packing up the sag car and got ready to head out on the bikes for the first 90 miles of the trip. The morning sort of languished as we got ready to go. When we finally got on the bikes we were about an hour behind schedule. On of the riders had planned out a meticulous schedule for both days which included our water breaks and lunch breaks. Being an hour behind schedule getting started had me a bit worried since we are late in the fall and night comes earlier and earlier.
We finished breakfast and headed out on the bikes. Everyone was pretty excited about the ride so the pace picked up early on. I kept suggesting that we should check the speed but everytime someone got to the front they pushes the pace. There was a stretch where we were averaging over 21mph. I knew this was going to hurt on day two. We had a good and very quick morning ride. We hit our lunch break and only stopped for about 30 minutes before we were back on the bikes. The afternoon wind had picked up and the ride for the second half of the day was a steady and gradual uphill into Collinswood, TN. Needless to say this absolutely smoked the quads.
We spent the night in Collinswood and got a great night of sleep thanks to a found hotel. Early the next day I got up and headed out with McPhee (who was battling a quad injury from weeks before the ride). The second day, on paper, looked to be a much harder day. First, it was a 110 mile day but the climbs were a lot bigger. McPhee and I put down a good, steady pace all the way through the lunch break. We were feeling pretty good at this point. We took a longer lunch and waited for the group to catch up. Took a nice lunch, caught up on the morning travels and headed out for the last 60 miles. The up and downs, even though they were bigger, were a great break from the previous day which was a steady grind. We made it to the end of the Natchez Trace, stopped for a picture at Loveless Cafe and then powered on for the final push. We headed from Loveless Cafe to Tin Roof 2 for our celebratory party. This last 15 miles or so was very tough due to an extremely steep and long climb, coupled with a lot of Saturday afternoon traffic. When we finally made it to Tin Roof 2 we had a great welcome party waiting for us. All in all I was thrilled to have done the ride. In a 200+ mile ride there are some dark and mentally challenging times...I am just thankful that I had committed guys there with me to help get me through.
The following weekend I had another ride on the schedule. This one was with Shane Giardino and his Nutro team. The final metric century of the year was to be a tough ride for me. It was in Ashland City which is anything but flat. In fact it had 4,000 feet of climbing with two monster climbs towards mile 55 and 58. This wasn't a "race" but when you put this many guys together it naturally becomes one. We led the second pack of riders for the whole day. We finished the ride with an average pace of 18.2mph which was more than I wanted for a course that had this much climbing. My legs were certainly weary after my nearly 300 miles of riding in less then 10 days.
From a training standpoint it is great that I had these rides on the calendar. I have fought the end of season struggles that most of my fellow racers face. Now it is time for me to get my ass in gear, get back in the pool and put the running shoes back on so I can get really ready for 2012.
