Peach of a Century Route Map

Here is the route that we rode on Sunday...http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/354253

CENTO, CEM, CIENTO, CENT, HONDERD, HUNDERT...

Whichever lanuguage you say it in it's still 100...MILES...on a BIKE. OYE.

I had some goals for this year:

Train for and participate in a Duathlon - done (2x - YAY).
Ride a Vancouver Bicycle Club Time Trial - done.
Ride a full century - OMG...DONE.

I had some idea what to expect, but really I set my expectations a little on the low side. Hills, yeah, I knew there would be hills...but I forgot to factor in the fact that we would be in the Willamette Valley and there would be wind.

Mile 0 to 22ish - pretty uneventful.

Mile 22ish - 55 We had a tailwind for the most part going all the way to Stayton. It was pretty flat with few hills. We did have a decent steep climb around mile 45 or so and I was starting to get a little cranky, I needed a rest stop. I'm used to stopping every 20 miles or so, but it became clear that wouldn't be happening. Early in this route the 62 milers split and we met up with them again before heading back into Stayton for the rest stop aaaahhhh, food and beverages!

Mile 55 - 77 We left Stayton and went into the hills. It stayed that way for what seemed forever! There were short steep hills there were hills that were steep and longer...hills, hills, hills! No matter what the size the hill there was WIND also. I passed no one and plenty of people passed me...spinning away! WHAT THE HECK?! I wanted to push those people over. I was getting less happy by the pedal stroke...what a sad, sad commentary.

Finally, as I approached the top of what would be the last big climb of the day around the 73-74 mile point  Tom was ahead of me waiting as I was grinding my way up the hill and totally demoralized - and spent. I had suffered the classic BONK.  I was ready to stop, but at this point it was just best to continue on as the finish was less than 30 miles away. Once I reached the top of the hill and nearly had a breakdown. In the midst of all my blubbering about being tired and all Tom rifled through my pack to get me a pick-me-up...I took on some GU and tried to regain my composure. I started to feel a little better - probably because I had a few minutes to just rest, but that lasted about a second. I was playing around with my computer and in my tiredness I reset my computer. All zeros came up...that was it...I LOST IT. If you know me, you know how important numbers and statistics are to me. Averages, mileage, time...everything GONE. This happened less than 30 mile from the finish. Stupid loser sticky GU fingers! The only thing good about this part was that from this point it was downhill into Silverton. Over the next 3 miles and approximately and 12 minutes I managed to get over the fact that I had messed up my computer and looked forward to a little nourishment and a few minutes off my bike. What I really needed was a rest.

The last 23 miles were okay - no real climbs or hills, but a lot of wind. Headwinds, crosswinds...from the right then the left. We had it all. There were few moments when the wind was actually at our backs...oh to have a tailwind...aaaah...those were few and far between.

So, even though I had reset my computer my "Distance 2" only had 12 miles on it, when we started the day, so I knew that we should have been coming up on the finish at anytime since we were so close to 100. NOPE - how about 3 extra miles to get back to Chemeketa? Well that sounds like fun! Yeah, so 3 miles isn't that much, but after many miles of climbing, headwinds, crosswinds and oh, the distance itself 3 miles felt like an eternity!

Overall, neither of us had a mechanical. My chain decided to not engage going from the big ring, but that was it. My pedals squeak, but that's more of an annoyance than anything.

I can't really say that I had fun, or that it was a good time...maybe in another day or two. All I can say is that it was a good experience and I got to be on my bike the whole day! That was a long 8+ hour day! We rolled into Chemeketa and started loading up our gear and changed in the parking lot (thanks to Tom for being my shield) and mosied over for a piece of PIE. MMMMM...a big fat piece of peachy goodness!

I'm sure that there will be other century's to ride...don't know which one, but I know that riding century's at the end of the season is definitely doable.

Here's looking forward to the last organized ride of the season The Harvest Century - 75 miles!

DEA featured in the UK's Financial Times...

Last week Tom and a few of his fellow DEA bike commuters were part of a photo shoot for a UK based newspaper. He was pretty excited about the photo shoot, but no one could say for sure that the article or photo would appear in what we now know is the Financial Times.This morning I received this link in my inbox from Tom...it's not entirely accurate, but then what newspaper is?

DEA is very cool indeed...

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c5eec898-ac5d-11de-a754-00144feabdc0.html?nclick_check=1

A Day at the Zoo

Make a Smilebox photobook

Vacation Week Comes to an end...

This last week has been nice...just hanging out with Tom and relaxing and rescuing the roses and other plants around the house from the overgrown weeds. I knew that the week would go fast and I'm really not looking forward to going back to work on Monday, but that's still a couple of days away - so I'm going to enjoy the rest of my time at home with Mr. Tom.

On Monday we went to Toutle and rode the Tour de Blast route to Elk Rock. I wanted to see if I would be able to ride up to the point that Tom rode to when we did this ride in June (Robin & I turned back at Hoffstadt Bluffs). WHAT A GRIND! Really, that's all I can say. It took us 3 hours to get to the viewpoint at Elk Rock and then the ride back to Toutle was half the time! We were really flying - which was pretty draining because we had to pay so much attention to the road, traffic, debris etc. I would have to say that the day was pretty successful, but I didn't pack enough food so we made a stop in Kid Valley at the gas station to get some junk to get us back to Toutle. I am determined to do this again next June, if not sooner - so that just means a lot of training so I know that I can do and maybe even a little better than this time :)

The new Predators of the Serengeti opened last week so we took max to the zoo and checked out the new lions along with a small horde of people. It was pretty cool...with the glass that separated the people from the animals being so clean we got some pretty good pictures of the lions walking right up to take a closer look at us people. THAT was pretty cool! I have yet to finish my smilebox for that trip, but I'm getting close!

If only time would slow down just a little bit. As I get older I'm enjoying being home more often and going to work less. Retirement seems to be a long way off still....will I make it?

Must work on work attitude...good luck to me!

Vacation...

Today is the first day of vacation and I'm ALREADY tired. I probably did that myself, by riding every single day this week, including today. So yeah, 92 miles in 6 days...some sleep in between and hanging out at work. I'm a little tired I guess. So we went for an easy ride this morning which for some reason took some effort on my part, but I'm glad we got out.

Later this morning some cyclists starting going past our house - the Vancouver's All American Tri, Du 10K & 5K was today! So the Bike course went down our street so Tom went out with the cow bells and cheered on the riders we figured they must have been just over half way done when they passed us...the riders were surprised, but loved the bells and encouragement. The 5K would have been fun, but I'm glad I forgot that this event was today :)

New Cycling Shoes

When I ride to work - I typically will just pack one pair of shoes for the day.

Yesterday as I was packing up getting ready to head out for work it did not occur to me that I might need another pair of shoes. It also did not occur to me to ask Tom to bring me a pair of shoes...I had given him a short list of items that I would need to repack my repair kit (darn flat). It only occurred to me as I was getting changed into my cycling clothes that I did not have any comfortable shoes to walk around in while waiting to start the Time Trial. Oh well. I improvised...nice look huh.

This shot is just in case you want a closer look at these gams. I think that the bright socks really make the outfit.

Facebook Loser

I don't even know how many Facebook Friends I have,

 but I'm pretty sure that I'm a loser...

(click image to expand)

 

Labor Day Fun

Had a pretty good Labor Day weekend. Spent Saturday and Sunday be-boppin' around with Tom visiting the 3 wineries that are fairly close to our home and enjoyed a nice Cellar Club dinner at Bethany Vineyards Sunday evening. The best part would have to be the group ride we had with a bunch of people from Felida!

On Labor Day we arranged to meet interested people at Fruit Valley Elementary School and took off for Frenchman's Bar. There were 14 of us total - which was an awesome turnout! We had a variety of ages, skill levels and types of bicycles...with a couple of people on borrowed bikes! The goal was to ride as a group as much as possible, but we had a couple of speed-demons off the front, but that was okay...the day was about having fun and getting out on our bikes. After leaving Frenchman's Bar a few of us decided to head to Starbucks at Esther Short park. There we had some good conversation and treats to cap off a perfect day! The weather cooperated for the whole time that we were together and even after we went our separate ways at the end. Tom and I had some sprinkles as we were getting close to home, but that was it!

I have been wanting to get a bike club of sorts together and have the blog up and running since the beginning of the year...it has taken this long to get a group of people together for this ride, I'm hoping that it won't be 9 months before we get the next group together!

If you are interested in checking out Felida Cycling go to www.felidacycling.blogspot.com it is a work in progress, so check back often...you never know what you might find!

Officers net Clark County gator after 3 days - KOINLocal6.com

Trying out posting news articles to my blog...so I suppose the next step is to click on the link!

Officers net Clark County gator after 3 days - KOINLocal6.com

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