I am traveling for work this coming week which is kind of poor timing as I’m just getting into real training and now planning to race IM Chattanooga just 4 weeks away. But I also can’t complain. I was starting to go a little crazy with everything being all swim/bike/run, it’s a nice change to get away without a bike and talk about things that don’t involve triathlon.

But, because it will be several days without riding, I had a mini-bike camp this weekend. Lucky for me, on Sunday I was instructed to accompany Nate on an “all day biking adventure”. Surprisingly, I knew what this meant. For several weeks now, Nate has disappeared on Sundays leaving early in the morning and rolling into the house around 6 pm with a giant smile on his face. Who is smiling after 130 miles on your butt? He talked and talked and talked about his favorite lunch café, ice creams, and touring Antietam battlefield. This has happened multiple times, so I was pretty excited about seeing what this ride was all about.

The ride really was all it was cracked up to be. I drank a latte and ate crab cake eggs benedict just past 55 miles, then we did some super steep climbs and hopped onto a small winding road through Antietam Battlefield which was the coolest, then stopped for ice creams and a honey bun right about 100 miles. We were feeling so good, we took the long way home! But, as we all know, these highs are usually followed by some pretty significant lows. No one will be surprised that right around 115, just 15 miles from home, I could still taste the honey bun in my mouth, I started getting REALLY grumpy. Everything Nate did annoyed me and I started questioning why we ever got married. Every word he spoke was irritating and I let him know it. Very politely Nate asked if we could stop at a bathroom a mile up the road and when we stopped he whipped out a can of coke I didn’t even know he had and more or less poured the thing down my throat.  I was back to my old self within minutes and laughing all the way back to the house.

It really was such a great day and it’s amazing that we can do rides like that without completely shattering ourselves. I was definitely tired and I wasn’t excited about a recovery swim immediately after the ride, but it felt good when it was all over. And the burritos we got after everything was over never tasted so good.

I almost said that I couldn’t wait to do the ride again, but I have a feeling I could be eating my words next weekend when I’m back from my trip, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it.