Why Do I Ride..
in the horrible wind and not not feeling well?


Meet my beautiful cousins Suzanne and Liz. Our mothers are sisters and both lost their battle with cancer. I ride so we can do a five mile walk because we want to get some exercise, not because we want to wipe out cancer.

Making Strides for Breast Cancer 2009.

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50 miles in the canyon~

The last couple of rides have been in the east mountains. In the rain, wind and fog. I was never a fan of wind, but now that I am on a bike more, I really don't like it. I feel like I am being tested at every turn. I am either riding into a 20mph wind going a whopping 8-10mph, or I feel like I am going to be blown over with a 30-40mph crosswind gust.
Since Lake Tahoe has several climbs, we are training on hills. Our elevation gain is 3000-4000 feet from our starting point. At the end of the rides I am always grossed out by all the dirt that has managed to find its way to my body. Only 5 weeks... can't stop now.

We are always smiling and being nice at the beginning of the ride. You should hear us while we are trying to get to our next rest stop.

My half smile at the end.

I'm smiling because we only have 12 miles to go and most is downhill. :0)

Even if we do have to climb these mountains and we sometimes do not like it, God sure has done a good job with the beauty.

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The same mountains a week before. Yes it had snowed and it was a bit cooler.

And, The Thunder Rolls

I love the clouds... the cool breeze...
the rolling thunder... and even the rain.

However, I prefer that these events not happen on a Saturday when we are scheduled to ride 60 miles. For the second week we canceled our team ride due to bad conditions. The wind was fierce and the rain did not let up all day. Only 7 weeks until we go to Lake Tahoe. I am also signed up to ride the Santa Fe Century on May 17^th. We only signed up for 75 miles and do have a SAG to scrape me off the road when I fall over.

Kudos to my friend Cece. She participated in a triathlon on Saturday and cycled 17 miles in the rain. She is a better woman than I. XOXO

Diehard or Dumb?

There was a time in my life when Saturdays were for sleeping in. I wouldn’t get up until at least 8 (sleeping in for me) and would love having my kids crawl in bed with me so we could watch the latest Bratz cartoon. One of the girls would go get the box of Lucky Charms and we would eat them out of the box in my bed hoping one of the dogs would catch any stray cereal that would fall. We would start our day about 10 or 11 am unless we had a soccer game to go to. How my life has changed in one year. Fast forward…

The wind is howling on Friday night. It is about 9pm and I am getting my food ready for the following morning. PB&J, banana, cheese stick, recovery drinks, water, gels, etc. I take a sleeping pill and I am off to bed. The wind is so bad that my kids are in my room during the night scared because of the noise and the dogs are whimpering not knowing what is going on outside. Morning starts about 6:30 (slept in a bit). Eat an egg omelet (courtesy of my husband) load the car with food and bikes. I kiss my kids goodbye and let them know what time I will be home reminding them of what they need to get done while I am gone… dust, water, clean room and don’t forget to be good for grandpa when he gets there to be with them for the day. (MacKenzie is still asleep while I am talking to her). I am off by 7:50.

It is cold outside, it is terribly windy. I am thinking that while I don’t particularly want to ride in this weather, I will since I missed last week. I need to be strong since everyone else is. The consensus is that the weather is too bad to ride and we will try again on Sunday. Knowing that I will not be able to ride on Sunday I sheepishly ask a couple of other riders if they still want to do a short ride “since we are here”. The only takers are Melissa, Jan, Tom, Frank and me. We started with coffee at Starbucks hoping the winds would die down a bit. They didn’t and we went anyway. We rode 11 miles in 48 minutes averaging 13.5 mph. There were times I was freaking out at the crosswinds. They had to be blowing anywhere from 30-40mph. I was riding behind Melissa and noticed at times that her bike was leaning right while her body was leaning left. While we wanted to do at least 20 miles, we stopped because we felt is was getting dangerous. We did make it back safely.

Home was a welcome sight that morning. I kind of wanted to crawl back in bed and have the girls join me to warm up. Instead, we watched a movie and relaxed. Meanwhile, I am feeling guilty that I didn’t get my miles in and didn’t do any significant climbs. I was hoping the winds would die down so I could do some hills behind my house. The wind gods were having none of it. I ended up taking Bailey to her soccer game watching her play in the same miserable conditions.

Diehard or Dumb? I keep hearing the wind is your friend and it will make you stronger. Today I wanted to revert back to my old life. But, I am hooked to the road and will ride because there is someone out there who is fighting.

Look what the wind blew in. We make is back safely.