Okay, today was supposed to be a pre-ride for our upcoming I Love the Tavern Tri that is next Sunday. Great, I wasn't familiar with the course, just that freakin' hill we went up and down like dementia patients yesterday. Hey didn't we just go up this hill, why no I don't believe we did, well we better go up it, hey didn't we just go up this hill, why no, I don't believe we did, well be better got up it.... Point being, I needed to ride it and get a strategy together. I knew how to handle that hill, but the rest of the course was a mystery to me. Robious Road is definitely not something I relished riding. It is busy, narrow in parts, has 288 intersecting it and is just plain scary....
Anyway, we get there, my stomach is literally hurting because I am sizing everyone up around me and thinking, I am not amongst my peers. I need people on tricycles to make me feel comfortable. I am gonna get left in the dust like a bad habit. No, no, no, I am too scared to do this. Remain calm, look like you know what you're doing, you belong here, this is what the little man in my head is trying to tell me.
Laurie, who is leading our ride today, gets there and is just one heck of a nice lady. I start to relax with her welcoming demeanor. When I see there is someone on a mountain bike, I know I won't be left alone in the back and relax some more. There are a few road bikes like mine and tons of rockets like my husband's. You have the loud braggadocio guy who says he is "gonna hammer it" and other people I notice looking a bit nervous like me with every loud proclamation he makes. So I start to relax a little more, I might not be so all alone. No there aren't any three wheelers. Just then my husband whispers to me that there are a lot of people on my level of riding. I still won't stand straddled over my bike like everyone else. I am afraid I will do something stupid and fall, so I stand holding my bike against my leg, trying to give myself a pep talk about how things will be great. Laurie asks for volunteers to lead the front, fast bikers, the middle bikers (which I figure I am a part of) and the slower, newer bikers. Okay, I relax even more. So we all don't have to ride like Lance to be in this group, alrighty then, I'm good or something sort of like good.
We start and I am up front with the leaders of my pack, we travel that blasted Robious Road, which was just as scary as I had imagined it. I see all manner of road kill and see myself on the side of this road, Xs for eyes, arms and legs stiff in the air from rigor mortis, tongue lolling out of the corner of my mouth. So I start to pray, I bargain with God, Dear Lord, if you let me live through this Robious Road part, I will never take your name in vain again. Little did I know what would come flying out of my mouth while I was trying to take that hill again. I told my husband, I was like foul mouthed teen, cussing under my breath, Gd d*mn, son of a b*tch, and other assorted expletives, (feel free to insert your favorite swear on my behalf) when I started to climb it. I kept reminding myself, stay in your saddle til you hit the white driveway, then stand and hammer it the best you can. My legs are saying, are you freakin kidding us? We did this 9 times yesterday, do you really expect us to do this again???? Yes, of course I did. I did make it, not as grandly as I had hoped, but I did, and started pedaling like a maniac once I got to the top. I wonder to myself, whose bright idea was it to pave a road with hills like this woven into it?
I make it back, I rode the 19 miles in around an hour. Not bad I think to myself. It's the first tri I will do with a distance longer then 12 miles, so I am stoked, especially with my legs being as trashed as they were from the day before. If my legs were fresher, if I had that adrenaline rush you get from the competition, it might be faster. Here's hoping, but then after the whole pack of Tri Club members get back, Laurie announces we are going to run the 5K course. Alrighty then again, let's go. The run was a non event for me. I had to stop at one point and stretch out my left leg. It was bothering me. I hadn't properly warmed up and stretched, so I did it mid run. No problem, I finished and caught up with the group. Laurie announces we are going to do an abbreviated swim. So instead of the 750m, we swam for 20 minutes. Ten minutes up, ten back. As I am getting out onto the dock, someone screams, "get out of the water, there's a snake!" I did the Christ walking on water thing I got out so fast. I think I sprang from swimming horizontally to standing on the dock. And I was afraid of piranha fish!
When we were sitting in the car on the way home I said to my husband that we just did a dyslexic triathlon. We biked 19 miles, ran 3.1 and swam for about 400 or so meters. We were supposed to just do a stinking pre-ride!!! Ah well, I survived road kill, knee problems and snakes. All of that aside, I can't imagine how mundane my two hour marathon training run will be tomorrow....
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