125 mile ride

Holy crap! That’s a lot—at least for me!

Ok, I admit for those of you 125 is nothing, but if you’ve ever ridden with me I see 100 and I shut down. Something inside me says, ‘Not one more revolution—you’re done.’ ‘You said 100, here we are. You better call someone to come get you.’ So for me to go that far and still feel like I could go more—is a big deal in my books.

During my first year of riding on a ride I saw the 100 on my odometer. Not knowing what I was doing I stopped my bike and got off. I still had 4 miles to get back but my mind and body (mostly mind) said ‘That’s it! You’re walking back.’ I will never forget Drill Sergeant Paul, with his large commanding voice, next to me screaming “What the hell are you doing! You are NOT done. You do NOT get off your bike on a hill. Get back on!”

Anyways, I degrees. On Thursday I road the God’s Country Century. Elk River to Zimmerman up to Cambridge and back down to Anoka. I’ve done part of this route before but have never done the entire course. I started from my house and headed north. I love my location, but it’s not bike friendly by any means—so I waited until the morning rush was over. I have to say, riding during the middle of the weekday has to be the best time to ride (unless it’s during rush hour). No one is in a rush, people are not pissed off due to the stress of their jobs. Everyone obeys the 3 foot law—hell they even give you 5 feet! The only thing bad about my ride was the morning talk radio I was listening to—can they please just play music? Seriously, I don’t care what you have to say about Lindsey Lohan.

Everything was going great. The weather was perfect. The roads were clean and smooth. But, while I was going up this small hill at about mile 50 “Baby Got Back” came on the radio. The black women in me—yeah we all have a little of that in us—said ‘oh no they did not!’ so I attacked that hill. It was true motivation.

Now, one would think that guiding four guys across the country only momentary getting lost once or twice you would think that I could navigate myself based on my own handwritten directions—you would be wrong. Instead of heading north I went south thus putting me in a town that was not on my map. Thanks to modern technology—the nav button on my cell phone—I found another road that would take me to Cambridge—what I didn’t know was that it was a 4 lane highway! HOLY CRAP that was scary! I got off that road and into Cambridge like I was sprinting to the line.

I stopped at a Subway to get lunch before I headed back. It’s a little uncomfortable to be standing inline with cycling shorts and your hair worse then it was when you rolled out of bed and your eyes bloodshot from the dirt that slipped though the crevices of your glasses. Thankfully the guy behind the counter was friendly and asked where I came from—this took a little while to register. I told him from the cities and that I was 65 miles into my ride. He said, “That’s a 45 minute drive in the car.” I responded, “Oh, really? I wouldn’t know, I’ve never driven up here before.” He told me that a guy comes into Subway every Sunday from the cities and puts on about 14,000 miles a year. HOLY CRAP! That’s a lot of miles! I don’t think I put in 14,000 miles on my Jeep and my bike combined. I guess I need to step up my miles.

Anyways, I got back and felt surprisingly really good but not with a few extra detours and battled with the evening traffic.