100 miles is the longest distance that I have ridden in one day. There are longer rides that I have considered doing, but whenever anyone asks me about them, I always answer “I want to do it, but I’m not ready yet”. A safe answer, that doesn’t really answer anything.
LOTOJA, is the race that is brought up most often in this area. A 206 mile race from Logan, UT to Jackson, WY that for the past 29 years has been the standard that some cyclists measure themselves by. Past participants of this race are easy to spot in their cars by the white stickers that adorn their rear windows.
Truth is, any distance over 100 miles intimidates and scares me. I know I’m not fast, and thought of spending 12+ hours on the bike fills me with dread.
That being said, I may be considering a 200 mile race in the very near future…
Saturday Morning, Greg and I decided to go down to the local shop – Epic Biking - to ride in their weekly shop ride. About 10 of us rolled out from the shop at 7:30 AM, and almost immediately, the group split into the fast riders, and the rest of us. Due to a couple of misunderstandings - the fast group thought that we all knew the route they were taking, and a directional mistake in the slow group – we ended up going in the completely opposite direction from the fast group. It wasn’t a bad thing, as we ended up going out to an area that I’ve never ridden – let alone driven – through. A nice 57 mile ride was had.
A side note, I decided that I want a Garmin GPS for the bike. I would have liked to map the route that we took, and I have the ability to do so on my phone, but I rarely do so, because I either forget to start the app, or I don’t want to because of the potential of draining the battery on longer rides.
Back at the shop after the ride, several of us were discussing upcoming rides and races. Someone brought up the Epic 200, which is coming up at the end of August. My reaction was that I am not even close to being able to handle 200 miles in one day.
Sunday night, I had a craving for some homemade ice cream (vegan, of course. I may post the recipe on Friday). Greg and Stephanie stopped by for some ice cream (as payment for giving me some vanilla extract, since we were out), and he brought up the Epic 200. We have a couple of centuries under our belts this year, and Greg is thinking that 200 miles is not outside the realm of possibility.
It still scares me, but having someone besides the voices inside my head telling me that I can do it (the voices tend to be very negative), almost makes it seem possible.
So, I may be riding in the Epic 200 this year. There is still the cost of it, but considering that I won’t have to get 2 hotel rooms – as with LOTOJA – since the start/finish line is 10 miles from my house, it is considerably cheaper.
More to follow?
2 comments:
You can do it Kendall - no problem! by the way, all those LOTOJA stickers, I'm convinced the vast majority of them are relays.
Kendall, looks like they've added a 160 mile option as well. I've done plenty of centuries as well, but have not tried anything longer than ~120mi. Looks like a good way to break in since it's fully supported. Did you get a sense from the Epic group rides how many people have registered?
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