What's black and blue and red all over?

Me!

I prayed for rain, thunderstorms, a tsunami and the like, but the rotten weather wouldn't comply. Instead of a torrental downpour on Saturday, we were graced with wonderously clear blue skies and cool temperatures.

The ride to the Amanas was on.

Swim was swim. A new session for sure; only two of us left in the "not afraid to put our face in the water" level. But it's still the same drill routine and I'm in need of some change.

My other half has given in and joined the Y. A good thing too, since I've brainwashed him enough sign up for the Pigman as well.

Saturday morning he prepped our bikes and off we went to the Y for a swim prior to our departure for the Amanas.

After swim I did everything I could think of to delay the inevitable. We biked a few blocks to the Czech Village and fueled up on coffee, donuts and flaky apple streudel before making our way past the city limits.

The news had said to expect gusty winds and they were right. Though cross winds threatened on occasion to push us farther into lanes of traffic, there were times that the winds were at our backs, making us fly.

We lunched, wandered through the village and tried some cheeses before parking ourselves on a sunny bench. Exhausted still, I caught a short catnap, and then downed a quick iced mocha, hoping for energy to get me through the return trip.

We hopped on our bikes once again and turned onto the main thoroughfare home.

And up a 3 mile hill.

Into 20 mile an hour head winds.

I made it half a mile (I'm probably being very generous) before I pulled completely onto the shoulder to sob.

My loving husband walked me through a plan of attack, setting small goals to get us to our destination, and teaching me how to ride half a tire's length of his back wheel.

It was nearly dark, the street lights flickering on, as we entered the park next to our house nearly 4 hours later.

My legs were bruised from whacking myself with my pedals.

My arms were burnt into a nice farmers tan.

But I made it.

Calm, cool, confident.... and a little bit panicky

TOSRV is a little less than a month away and I have yet to ride more than 20 miles in a single day. Much less than the 100 miles required.

I haven't ridden in two weeks for various reasons. One of which is the wedding cake I just finished delivering and setting up.

Which brings us back to the confidence that I am trying very hard to exude in an attempt to cover the panic that's simmering just below the surface.

Tomorrow, at my request, my husband and possibly some friends will bike to the Y for the usual Saturday swim, followed by a ride to the Amana Colonies.
Potentially 60 miles round trip.

I haven't looked at the forecast because I don't want to know anymore than it's going to hit the low 60s and be sunny. But right now gale force winds are bowing the prairie grass to the ground, making me a little concerned about my bright idea.

Here's hoping for a calm ride.

Once more, with feeling...

It's amazing, the greening that is going on right now. I swear that my garden was a dull pile of brown dirt just a couple of days ago. But the Hostas are insistently poking their creepy little worm-like talons up out of the ground now. Bushes and trees are starting to take on the green haze of early leaf buds. My favorite, the tulip trees, are getting ready to explode with their lush, pink chunky blossoms.

And as I bike more and more, I am beginning to appreciate the little things that you don't really notice when you're traveling by car. The croaking toads that I had mentioned earlier for one. The canopy of trees that cover a street that you bike up for another.

I took a new route home from the Y on Saturday: Bever Avenue.

It was a different type of hill than what I had been riding. Mostly they had been long and slow. This was a little more rolling. Different on a Saturday morning than the normal busy weekday, I decided to take it on since it was an unknown. If I had been hoping for an easier rode home, I was sorely disappointed.

After a decent swim workout, about 1000 yards, my legs were already on the tired side. But there was the promise of fresh chocolate croissants from one of the best places in Cedar Rapids: Croissant du Jour. Well, they are certainly the best places in Eastern Iowa for croissants, as far as I'm concerned.

So I pushed on.

Bever Avenue turned out to be a different sort of hill challenge: shorter, slow climbs, mixed with short downhill spurts and an actual traffic light.

Thankfully, the last stretch was a flat/downhill combo, before it came time to tackle The Hill.

Yes, those are capital letters.

I'm paying The Hill the respect that is due. It's the last hill; the hill home.

I have not made it up to the top since that one time, so long ago that it's now only a vague memory. I have, however, learned to respect it and what it can teach me.

Small goals are my way of conquering it now. Each time, half a driveway more until I stop. The last drive on the right before the first cross street was my best.

Somehow, somewhere, on these few trips to work or workout and back I have learned how to attack. Maybe it was the dreaded spin class where I learned it and the addition of the clips have helped put it to use in the real world, I don't know. I attacked the long, slow hill up Blake a couple of weeks ago, making the first time I made it up without stopping ever.

I did it again, though this time I was aware of what I was doing, up the last portion of The Hill.

And it was an amazing feeling.

I'm down to one stop on The Hill. That's the most that I will make anymore.

Yesterday, I was to that last drive on the right, ready to throw up, when I figured I would try to shift down one more. And to my amazement, there was one more gear to go down.

And one more.

And one more.

And one more still.

If I had been better aware of the gear that I had been in, it was entirely possible that I could have gone on to Ridgemore, and then on to Terry before crossing the buckle in the road that I consider to be my finish line: the line where the road levels out and begins to slope ever so slightly back down to my street.

I guess I'll never know if it could have happened. But it will happen one day. And one day soon.

My breath was hard, my legs jello-y, as I flopped down onto the couch in my living room, begging for my chocolate croissant and the cup of coffee.

The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a man's determination. ~Tommy Lasorda