It's October...And I Was Cycling Outside!!!!

Well I think today was a first....I don't think I've ever ridden outside in October! Actually, that has probably less to do with the weather than the fact that, typically, I don't want to see my bike by this time of year, haha. This year is different though, I still want to swim, bike and run. A good sign I would think...

At first, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to ride today. Last night I had a wicked IBS flair up. URGH! Hasn't hurt that bad in a long while. I wasn't able to eat much today because it still hadn't settled. At around two-ish I got a message from IronGreg asking if I wanted to meet up for a ride. I decided to go for two reasons....1) my stomach seemed to have settled a bit and b) how cool would it be to go cycling with IronGreg?!

(He's going to kill me in his bike class next Tuesday for what I am about to write....but it'll be worth it, tee hee.)

I have to say that I am blessed with the number of experienced Ironman triathletes that I know and IronGreg is one of them. He's a great friend, Ironman mentor and I think of him as an Irongod because of how many he's done. (I should add that he gets embarassed when I call him that.)

So what's the big deal with going for a bike ride with him? Well I'll tell ya....

You see, I'm still pretty much a tri-newbie. Sure, I have a couple of seasons under my belt now, but seriously, there is soooo much to learn about triathlon, more specifically Ironman, and I've barely scratched the surface. In the endurance scheme of things, I've only just begun. I can see the improvements compared to last year (heck, I PR'd a couple of my races this year!), but compared to IronGreg, I'm a very very slow turtle, haha.

Let's take this moment to make a little comparison shall we: IrongGreg is about 6'2", I'm 5'2", therefore his bike is WAAAY bigger than mine and seems to go farther with one pedal stroke. His rides name, The Silver Bullet, mine? Eleanor. (Granted she is named after a very very fast car, so there!). His IMC bike time, 5:25:35, mine....8:07:03. He's done a ton of IM's, I've done one. He is an Irongod, I am an Irongoddess-in-training. haha. So you can see, there is just a teeny weeny diffference in our abilities, LOL.

To be honest, normally I don't get to ride with athletes like IronGreg - for obvious reasons. During the regular training season if i were to go riding with IronGreg, he'd be loooong gone after about 2 minutes. So today was very cool because he was going to ride my turtles pace. YAY! We met up at 22 and Springbank. There was a southwest wind blowing so both of us had to fight a headwind on the way to the meeting point as he was coming from the east, and I from the north. It was really nice out though so I didn't care about the headwind!

We continued south on 22. The wind seemed to die down a bit, which meant it was likely that we'd turn around to find the wind on the way back. Gotta love living where the wind changes constantly! haha. I was feeling a bit tired because I wasn't able to eat much during the day, and my stomach was starting to hurt again. Dammit! Not today of all days! We'd gotten to Redwood Meadows when IronGreg read my mind and asked if I wanted to turn back. I would have liked to ride further, but I knew that I didn't have enough gas in the tank for it. Major bummer, but what can you do?

Going north along there is always awesome cause it's slightly downhill. I love it. When I ride along there I dream of the day that I will actually be able to ride at that speed normally! Aaaaaah. I can even pretend I can keep up with IronGreg, haha. It was starting to cool down and I was thankful for having leggings on (at the start of the ride I was too warm!). On the other hand IronGreg didn't....so he did a little power pedal up the hill over the highway. I would have tried to keep up...but I am a smart girl, haha.

We made it back to town in pretty good time, even though the wind changed directions and we were riding into it again. I bid IronGreg adieu at my intersection and started up the hill to my house. The wind was blowing like crazy from the west now - I think my speed was about 7.5 km/h going up the hill! I figured I wouldn't ask Mother Nature to change the direction of the wind though because IronGreg was headed east and had to climb Cochrane hill.

I was so glad we went out today. It was warm and sunny for most of the ride and it was awesome getting to go out with IronGreg! It'll take a few years...but one of these days I will be able to keep up with him when he rides his normal pace! LOL. Hey, you gotta have goals right?!