An autumn weekend

Saturday - My last Century of the Year
Harvest Century 103.24 miles

I talked my buddy Mark into joining me for this *little* ride. Around mile 90 we both came to a consensus that I'm an idiot.

Mile 1-16.5
Sucked serious a$$, We wanted to start early as to not ride with the masses. This meant departing around 7am when it was a bone numbing 38-40 degrees. I had wool socks with adhesive Little Hotties, cycling shoes and neoprene bootie covers. My hands had wool glove liners, more Little Hotties followed by another wind blocking glove. I lost feeling to all my extremities within the first 5 minutes. I think the worst part was frozen face. There were times I thought I lost my nose. I'd find it only to shoot out a massive snot rocket from the never ending snotfall I was producing. Luckily my core stayed pretty warm with a Craft baselayer Luna L/s Jersey and a Sugoi wind blocking jacket.
Mark had his own issues with the cold. The beginning of the ride was by far the worst.

Mile 17-40
The sun had now been out for awhile. We had been riding for awhile. Temperatures started to rise, this was a very good thing. This block of mileage came with a lot of fun rollers. This is the third year in a row I've done this century. This year they reversed the route. It was really nice to hit those rollers early on and not have to deal with the normal massive afternoon headwind in Yamhill county.

Lunch! The event was fully supported which included a lunch stop. I was considering drinking my malto for the entire duration. BUT when tempted with REAL food a normal person will eat REAL food....so I devoured 1/2 a sandwich, yummy trail mix, a cookie here and there and an AMAZING chocolate caramel candy. Mmmmmm.

Mile 40-70
Lunch bit me in the tail. I have a few problems eating real food with riding. First would be digestive. I am slow and lethargic while my tummy works on breaking down the yummy goodness I had just consumed. Do you know how hard it is to ride aero while digesting? Do you know how many watts you can conserve riding aero? It was a B$%@ to have to sit up for the next 20 minutes, The other downside is the highs and lows of real food. The first 10-20 mins I was slow due to digesting. Then I got a massive sugar high that lasted all but 15 maybe 25 minutes. Then I got my LOW. Lows suck.

Mile 70- aid stop - Canby Ferry
I think riding the Ferry is the #1 selling point for this ride. It's so much fun and the climb up and off the Ferry is AWESOME. Maybe 1/4 of a mile straight up. A lot of people fall off their bike or have to walk it, that's rather amusing to watch. This aid station also had chocolate milk. Who doesn't drink chocolate milk on a ride? Here's a pic of Mark and I before we got on the Ferry


Mile 71-83
Afternoon was upon us and it was now pretty warm out. I tossed the Hotties, jacket, bootie covers and the wind blocking gloves. The base layer would have gone if I had an extra pocket. Mark was kind enough to carry my booties. This section was pretty non-eventful, just more miles to ride into.

Mile 83-103
We stopped at the last aid station for sugary goodness. Along the stop we ran in my friend April and her gf Melissa. We decided to the ride the last part together. That ended up not happening as somehow Mark and I pulled away after 5 or so miles. We decided to ride the end easy. Well actually the whole ride was done at an easy pace or watts should I say. But during the end fatigue was starting to hit both of us pretty hard and easy was now becoming difficult. I should have stuck to my malto plan because the highs and lows I got at the end sucked serious a$$. Around mile 94 I started to get dizzy and shaky. The wind had picked up and I felt out of control in aero; yet sitting up took too much energy to deal with. I sucked down some more malto which helped get me out of my dark spot. Around mile 96 we were both is a world of fatigue misery. We focused on the positive to enjoy the last bit of the ride. It was a beautiful day out and we were no longer cold. Due to the weather changing this would be the last long ride out doors until next Spring. We appreciated riding into the sun and actually going somewhere...instead of spinning for hours on end in a small claustrophobic room.

103.24 - THE END - Which came with a delicious BBQ hamburger and a piece of pumpkin pie! April and her friend finished shortly after. Recovery came with good food and good friends.

Ride data
103.24 miles - 6:16:10 ride time
Max speed 38.2/avg speed 16.7
Max HR 173/ Avg HR 145
Max watts 384 (this is messed up because my power tap was in sleep mode when I climbed up off the Canby Ferry. Grrrr), Avg normalized watts 154 (how was almost 10 watts higher than my IM race?! I was taking it much easier, or at least felt like it), Avg watts 131

The rest of the evening I followed Kona on Ironman.com while downing 2 bottles of Cliff Bar wine (I had help:)) - good stuff! Yes, you two will look lit after riding 103 miles and several bottles of wine.

Big ups to Chrissy Wellington for breaking the woman's Kona record and doing so with her notoriously big smile. Craig Alexander rocked the big island winning IM Kona for the second year in a row. Amazing performances!

Sunday - 2 hour LSD run on the Wildwood Trail

Mile marker 18.5 - 6 miles in - 1/2 way turn around. 12 miles/ 10 min avg
The run was much more difficult then it should have been. I was a bit surprised that my legs felt fine. It was my energy that suffered. I was tired. A century ride and several bottles of wine the day prior was not supportive of the run. My upper GI had issues as the red wine decided to come up for the duration, ugh. Lungs didn't feel so hot either. I have yet to adapt to running/cycling in 40-50 degree weather. The only saving grace was running Wildwood. I may have felt crappy but I stayed happy as the view was phenomenal and sounds of nature were uplifting. I love my city!