The End, and the Beginning!

On Monday, I rode out to the Ashworth Park trail head and rode my bike out to Clive and back. Instead of going home on the trail, I hopped off at Grand and 63rd and decided to take one of the side streets to give myself a little hill action. Worst idea ever. There were two pretty steep hills in a row and I barely, just barely made it to the top. There I was huffing and puffing and threatening to fall over.

"Oh, boy." I haven't trained enough, and I certainly have trained on enough hills. All of the bike trails in central Iowa are flat: damn you rails-to-trails! My longest day was only 60 miles, that's 27 miles less than the longest day on RAGBRAI. In short, I am going to die. I mean, there is a 1-mile long hill waiting for me out there.

Not only that, but I am pretty sure I am going to lose the RRC. Steven and I are pretty close in the point total, I did not lose 4% of my body weight. I lost 1.38% of my body weight. Good thing I have great tent putting up skills and I love to buy beer.

I would love to make a bunch of excuses, but remembering the words of Steven's father, I will desist. Instead, I will look on the bright side. The RRC got me motivated to workout when I would have otherwise lamed-out, and that's awesome. I am not as in shape as I would like to be for RAGBRAI, but according to Lexi, "well, you can't win everything or no one will want to compete with you."

Here's the final RRC Update.

Sunday: rode to the Cumming Tap with TWT, Frank, and Lexi. I had helped Frank buy a bike in the afternoon, but it wasn't ready yet, so he borrowed Lexi's back up bike: a gold-tone Motobecane circa 1976. Everyone had a nice time on our little Sunday outing, primarily because we are all motivated by beer. 17 miles: 1 point.

Monday: bike ride/crisis of confidence. 18-ish miles, 1 hour: 1 point.

Tuesday: 45 minutes of elliptical, 10 minutes core-training: 1 point.

Wednesday: 45 minutes of elliptical: 1 point

Thursday: 30 minutes indoor cycling (the Heartbreaker was in the shop): .5 points

Saturday: jogged 1 mile just to check in with the bum hip (still a bit wonky), then did a 60 minute Spin class. 1 point.

RRC Point total this week: 5.5
RRC Point total overall: 23.5

Days until RAGBRAI: 0
Miles ridden: 545
Miles ahead: 442