The 91.5 Mile Ride

72 Miles Into the Ride

This week I was blessed with two friends who filled in when my training buddy and friend wasn't available. Susan and I went out for almost 20 miles yesterday, and Laurie and I went out for 20 miles today. I didn't ride ALL the miles I planned because I opted for much needed sleep, but it was AWESOME to spend some time with some awesome friends.

I think I mentioned that Sue and I rode 91.5 miles last Saturday. It was quite the ride!!! Of course there were tears, as that seems to be my trend lately, but there was also laughter, silence, talking, and lost money.

When we go out for these rides, we always take 'lunch money' with us. The idea is to ride to a half way point, get some much needed food and then ride on. Well, last week was no different. I threw 40 dollars in my back pocket, fussed around with stuff for a bit before we started riding, and then we took off. We rode about 35 miles, when we decided to stop for lunch. Our server brought us some sandwiches and potato salad, followed by desert and regular coke for me. The server then brought the bill, at which point I noticed my $40 was gone, nowhere to be found. Some might say I was trying to get a free lunch out of Sue, but Sue knew better than that, I think...

Anyway, we hopped on our bikes with the intentions of making it five miles further, turning around and then stopping again, in Loveland, Ohio for some Italian ice (I swear, riding does come with its perks), however, as we were nearing our turn around point, I asked Sue if we could go to the next town. I mean, who wants to turn around in the middle of nowhere? Sue agreed, because I promised the town was only three miles. Well, that is where the first fail appeared. We rode on, and the next town didn't appear for five more miles, which meant, by the time we were done, we will have ridden 90 miles. Oh, and the town was so anti-
climactic that Sue made some comment about how well worth it those last five miles were. Whoops... I knew at that moment, we should have turned around at 40.

We turned around and headed back to the car, only 45.75 miles to go! We decided the Italian ice place was our next stop, and rode on. We both ordered the medium Italian ice which was almost as big as our heads! It was so delightfully delicious, and the perfect snack to get us through about 12 more miles.

The Best Dr. Pepper EVER

This is the point at which we both started to slow down. The Italian ice did the trick, fueled us for awhile but we had over 50 miles on our bikes at this point, and we knew we had 40 more to go! We stopped again at 72 miles to try and find my 40 dollars, because we were both convinced I had dropped it at that stopping point on our way out. Much to my dismay, the $40 dollars was nowhere to be seen, and so we rode across the river to get another snack, on Sue. Notice, at this point, Sue was funding my ride... At the snack stand across the river, we got the most delicious Dr. Pepper I had ever consumed. It was perfectly sweet, and went down like that light beer on a rough day after work, meaning very easily. We took our typical selfie and moved on to finish the ride. We slowed again...

We rode, and rode, and rode, and rode, basically in silence for the final 17 miles. I decided to teach myself how to ride without holding on to the handle bars, cyclists passed us, we passed cyclists, and then we saw the car. I honestly think both of us wanted to shed a tear because we finished the darn ride. My deal with Sue was that when we got to the car, she could leave her bike and I would pack everything up, after all, she funded my bike ride.

Sue got in the car, we drove in silence for about 25 minutes, until I was ready to talk (Sue was silent almost the entire ride home), at which point we planned our meeting time for the triathlon the next morning...

And so the story continued...

The Finish Line Pic