Got up early today, and headed out to Louisburg for today’s training ride.
THE TRAINING ROUTE
– Today we did the “Louisburg to Henderson” route, which was approximately 40 miles. It was cold today, and I was happy to have grabbed my sweatshirt jacket at the last minute.
– Just north of Rolesville, I got a call on my cell phone from Joe, and he did not sound good. We had both partied heavily last night, in honor of his birthday, which is actually next Friday, and were out until about 2:30AM. Right after he said hello, I lost my cell phone service. (Later, the captain told us it gets like this the closer we get to the ride date, and the farther we travel out into the country to train.)
– The rest of the way there, I wondered if he was calling to tell me he was too hung over to make the ride today, or if he was calling to tell me he’d be late. After a few more folks arrived, I borrowed someone’s phone that still had service (Yeah, Verizon!), and reached Joe, who also had Verizon. He told me he was on his way, but would be late. I was more than happy to wait for him, as he’s been so supportive of me over the last few weeks.
WHAT I LEARNED
– We can catch up with a least one person on the team even if we leave 20 minutes after everyone else.
– What it feels like to have a huge truck within 5 inches of your shoulder as it zips by you on the highway. Not a comfortable feeling!
– How good it feels to go after a “lost biker,” and find her! At our halfway point (20 miles), poor Michelle missed a turn, and went an extra two or three miles. She stopped to ask directions, and asked, “Can you tell me where Rosie’s is?” The lady who answered was quite rude, “It’s back the other way, a long way!” (Turns out that’s where we’d started at — 20 miles back to Louisburg. She should have asked, “Can you tell me where the Wildflower Café is?”) Everyone gave her the biggest cheer when she finally reached the pitstop. “Go Michelle!”
– To drive Joe’s big-ass truck. He got a flat tire within the last mile or two, and I went ahead back to our starting point, loaded my bike into my trunk, and then went back to rescue him with his truck.
WHAT HURT
– Nothing really hurt today, and it wasn’t nearly as tiring as that 42-mile route we did out at Lake Wheeler last weekend. It had “the famous Louisburg hill” in it, but it was a long, not steep, hill. I really felt all the muscles in my legs being worked, and it felt good.
HOW I FEEL
– Good that I was able to “give back” some today to Joe.
– Good about this route; I really enjoyed it today. Also, it’s part of the actual route we’ll do during the ride, so that was cool.
– A little disconcerted in that I thought the actual 4 days of riding would be something like 95 miles each of the first 3 days, and the remaining 30 or 40 the last day. Someone said today, though, that it was going to be more like 85 miles the first day, 110 miles the second and third day, and 25-30 the last day. Don’t like the sound of those second two days!
I stopped at the grocery store on the way back from the ride, and then had lunch at home. I took a luxurious two-hour nap.
I put some chicken in marinade, and ran down to Blockbuster while it marinated. I picked up the DVD of Mostly Martha.
At about 8:00, I started cooking the chicken on the grill. Robert arrived just as it was finishing. We had that, and a baked potato and some apple sauce. The chicken was delicious.
We watched Mostly Martha on my computer with the bed pulled up to the monitor. We got to bed at about 11:30, and MMMMMMMMMMMMMed.
Robert got up in the middle of the night, around 2:00, went next door, rang the doorbell several times to no avail. He came back into the house, and as he was coming upstairs, he heard moaning, or vomiting, or coughing next door. He went back out, rang the doorbell again, and eventually shouted up at the open window. A girl came to the window, and he asked her to please turn down the music.
In the morning, I will ping the homeowners association and the board for the owner’s contact information.