120 Miles

So yesterday I took the 120 mile bike ride off of my bucket list.

Now let's elaborate.

Coach Calhoun drove past us on the ride.  That was cool.

The other part of the ride was the inevitable meeting of two mortal enemies, the biker and the driver.  I had no run-ins but others did.  One rider caught up to a driver and called them an asshole for getting to close to them on the road.  Another guy gave an ice cream truck the finger for doing the same thing.  That's a juicy part of the story I guess.

The other juicy part of the ride was the eating.  I asked for advice about the ride and the only thing that others told me was the importance of eating.  So I ATE.  I had a bowl of oatmeal and a couple of bowls of cereal for breakfast.  At our first stop I had a rice krispies treat, a few slices of oranges, gatorade and a power bar.

I had similar food at the next stop.

The last stop was the best though.  The last stop had candy.  I'll take six pieces of candy, thank you very much.

The ride was apparently one of the harder centuries that could be done.  I agree.  It was hilly for a lot of sections.  One road, Joshuatown Road, was brutal.  It had older pavement, up and down hills with lots of weird hairpin turns.

When you are unfamiliar with hills you have to be a lot more cautious because you don't know where potholes or uneven surfaces are.  You don't know where driveways are, nor do you get a sense of the speed you can and cannot go through the turns until you actually go down those hills a couple of times.   Once you have gone down the hills a couple of times they become comfortable.  On roads I am familiar with, I know where ALL the potholes and drains are. 

The ride was a lot of fun.  It is quite an accomplishment, because a century is to a cyclist what a marathon is to a runner.

One thing about the ride was that I was constantly surprised by just how few miles we had gone.  I felt like we were at mile 30 when we were at 24.  I felt like we were at mile 85 when we were at mile 75.  It's not that I felt like I was so tired. I felt like we had just gone so fast.   

My legs were somewhat tired starting at about mile 75.  Around 100 you stopped wanting to go up any hills. 

I am in good shape, so the ride was, although not easy, very do able for me. I would love to do another ride.

We saw lots of pretty places.  Riding down on the shore by the Connecticut River was really beautiful.  We went over a causeway and it was so nice having the smell of the ocean and the scenery of the marshes, water and beaches.

This part of the ride was also really windy though.  Headwinds make things really difficult, as I am sure you can imagine. 

Riding on a bike path on an I-95 bridge going over the Connecticut River was a great view.  It was amazing just to look over and see all of the boats in the water.  

We rode to Gillete Castle State Park, which is a place that I have always seen signs for but have never been too. 

Also rode past the road my grandma lives on.

Lastly, The ride started at 7am, which meant I got up at 5:30am.  The nice thing about riding on a Sunday is that there is less traffic.  The nice thing about the morning is that it's cooler and that the sun isn't out.  The sun and traffic didn't begin to bother me until the last 35 miles.

I had a lot of fun.  Glad I have gone on such a long ride and I hope to go again.  Also happy to take something else off of the list.