Fast ride

4 peeps set out for this mornings 9:30 fast ride, Me (Chad), Erik, Janel, and James. The plan was for 30 miles or so. Temps were around 50 when we set off and peaked around 65, great weather! Looked a little rough this morning, but it really did turn out great. Up 100 to mile climb and back, hammering all the way. 100 was good, we pulled 17-20 mph for the entire thing until we hit the climb at the peak. Pushed pretty good to mile climb, but my muscles started burning so I slacked off a bit on Big Shannon. We hit mile climb and Janel and James took off up that, while Erik and I climbed a bit more conservative. After topping mile climb we hooked right (whoops) and headed down what we thought was Little Shannon. So after a 10 mile detour and a moment of thinking I looked at the GPS and realized we were going north, just a bit west of Kirby. We then threw away our man cards (the 3 of us that posses them, though I do temporarily loan mine to Janel on climbs) and asked for directions from various locals. After backtracking and finding Little Shannon we started making our way back. Erik had a class to attend, so he pushed really hard all the way back. James had work to attend, so he rode pretty slow. We pushed nice down Big Shannon and hit a recovery pace down 100. I was out of food and on the verge of a big bonk, but James came through with an extra power bar.

A good fast ride overall. We were averaging 17MPH until we made our screw up and took a right at the top of Kiger Hill. The roads were pretty gross too until the sun really came out, so riding a wheel wasn't an option. When we got home we all looked like we just finished mountain biking. 30 miles turned into about 55, and it was great.



GPS LINK