Heart of Virginia . . .

Yesterday I did my first official century ride. But, this post really isn't too much about me because I was much more impressed with my riding partner. See, I had been mulling over doing this century ride because I had never officially done one before. And, even more than that, if I was going to ride with the TriGirls that day, I would have had to wake at 4:45 to make it to our rendevous spot which is 45-50 minutes from my house. If I rode the Heart of Virginia Century, I could sleep until 6:45. The only problem was I didn't want to ride alone. So, on Friday evening I almost jokingly asked my awesome husband, Derek aka Big Dog, if he wanted to ride the metric century the next day. I figured this way I would have compnay for at least part of the ride. Derek's only been on the bike once in the last month and the most he's ever ridden has been 72 miles -- given the fact I was only giving him one day's notice, I thought the metric would prove to be the perfect challenge. The Big Dog thought differently. He said, "Hell no I'm not doing the metric. If I'm going out there, I'm riding the whole thing." Well, I questioned whether that would prove to be the best idea, but I believe in him so I said "awesome!".

We planned to stay together the entire ride. I'm a little faster than him, but we really wanted to share the whole experience together and this was supposed to be ridden at an "easy pace" for me. The morning of the race was pretty cool and the skies looked a little dark, but there were no storms overhead so we loaded the car and headed out. About a mile from the house, Derek said he forgot his jacket. But, he didn't think it would be a problem so he opted not to turn back for it. As soon as we got to the race site, the skies opened up and the rain began to fall. Derek was bummed that he hadn't turned back for his jacket.

The race was a "show and go" meaning you could show up within a certain window of time and just take off when you were ready. We were supposed to "show and go" between 7-8 a.m. But, I wasn't too worried about making it through the 100 miles before the 5pm cut off so we started our ride closer to 8:45. About 6 miles into the ride, Derek got a flat tire. I said, "No worries. That's actually kind of good. Let me change it so I can get the experience!" So, I got a hand's on tire changing lesson. While we were there, the SAG vehicle pulled in and they pumped Derek's tire and gave him a spare tube just in case he got another flat on the course. After 25-30 minutes we were back on the road. For all of 1 minute before Derek realized his front tire was also flat. Seriously??? This time Derek took charge of the changing and changed out the tire in about 15 minutes. The SAG vehicle never had time to pull away so again, they pumped Derek's front tire and offered him another tube -- just in case. The SAG crew was great but before the guy left he said, "you know, at this point you probably won't be able to get the full 100 in today." WHAT?!? Okay, I understand that we were the last century riders to take off on the ride and that it was now close to 10:00 a.m. and we had only gone 6 miles, but there was no way we were not doing 100 miles!

Derek and I took off and despite the pressure I felt from the SAG guy to pick up the pace, I tried to hold back so that we could ride together the entire day. Everything was going really well until mile 15 when Derek called out that he had another flat. You've got to flippin' kidding me???? At this point, I started to doubt that Derek's bike was going to carry him through this ride. It seemed that entirely new tires were in order and that was something that we just didn't have. Internally, we were both cursing up a storm, but outwardly we were trying to stay calm so that we didn't worry or take away from the other's experience. Derek thoroughly checked his tire and found a large metal splinter that had punchtured the tire. We patched the holes with some black electrical tape and put his last tube into action. We agreed that if he got one more flat, he would pull out and would drive to every rest stop to check on me and cheer me on. Off we went again.

We blew past the first two rest stops since we figured we had gotten enough rest spending at least an hour changing tires! Everything was going really well despite the fact we had to fight a CRAZY amount of wind!! I couldn't even get in aero position because the cross wind gusts would come on so strong it was difficult to maintain conrol of my bike. And the headwinds!! Dear God, why is it that you always get a headwind on a kickass hill??

We were about 55 miles into the ride and everything seemed to be looking up. Derek's bike was holding up, we were in a section where the wind had died down and there was only 6 miles until we hit the lunch rest stop. But, as we passed over some railroad tracks I lost one of my water bottles. Derek was behind me so he called out that he'd pick it up. As he stopped his bike and unclipped, wouldn't you know, he broke two screws off the cleat in his shoe!!! Now his cleat was just spinning on the bottom of his shoe. Are you flippin' serious???? How much more bad luck could this poor guy get? Totally not fair! The constant obstacles were almost laughable -- except it really wasn't very funn. I tried to pick up Derek's spirits by telling him that he was providing me with the best training for IMFL that I could ever have! The lesson must be that no matter what happens on your bike or with your gear, determination is what will see you through to the end. Derek managed to make it to the next rest point and took one screw out of his right cleat and put it into his left cleat so that he would at least have two screws in each. This at least enabled him to lock down into his pedals.

We took off on the last leg and I said a small prayer. Well, not really a prayer. I thought "Bring it on MF'rs. Do what you've gotta do, but we're finishing this ride even if he has to run his bike in Flintstone style with bare feet and two flat tires." Yeah, I guess that really doesn't qualify as a prayer.

Either way, my mojo must have scared the riding Gremlins because the rest of the ride went off without a hitch. There was one sketchy dog moment -- actually the dog wasn't really scary but a rider had been bitten pretty badly earlier in the day by a loose dog and I was a little freaked out by it. When I saw another dog on the course, I asked Derek to ride ahead and shoo it away. He rode by it and said "Go away, Cujo." Calling the dog Cujo didn't really help ease my nerves.

In the last 10 to 15 miles of the ride, Derek was getting pretty tired -- as he should have been. He said he felt he only had a little more left in him -- but he kept on going. I was absolutely blown away by him. I mean, I've been training for almost a year to ride this distance. By now, I SHOULD be able to ride 100 miles. Derek was doing it out of pure will and determination. I was in complete awe of his perserverence. I don't think I could have done it if I were him. Actually, I don't think I would have even tried. I would have thought, "I could never do that" without even giving it a shot. When we rode into the parking lot -- having finished the entire 100 miles (take that SAG guy!) I was so proud of Derek I almost cried!! Yeah, I'm glad I got my PR and a century under my belt, but even more so, I'm glad I got to do this with my guy. If you didn't know already, he's pretty damn awesome.

Congrats Big Dog! I love you . . .