Century Ride

I haven't done a Century ride in about 2 years, so it was good to put in some long long long mileage again. I did the Montauk Century out on Long Island, so being Long Island, it was pancake flat from start to finish, until you almost get to Montauk and there is a long slow rising hill for about 2-3 miles.

The ride turned out to be a gigantic soap opera. The weather was cold and spitting rain for the first 50 miles, so that kinda sucked. @ the mile 50 rest stop, we were shivering and cold and everyone else had these sucken faces questioning what the heck they were doing out there in this terrible weather. Leading up to that rest stop we witnessed two people go down in front of us. The first one was not so bad and the gal got right back up, dusted herself off and kept going. The seconds crash was not as easy. This guy took a hard fall and was on his back gasping for air with blood coming out of his nose. We had NO idea if he was gonna make it. I think the wind got knocked out of him and he broke his nose. We don't know, but we hope it is NOT serious. I don't think he finished the ride. That crash shook us up a bit.

Fortunately after mile 50, things brighened up. The rain stopped and it got a little bit warmer. The wind also calmed down. It was still cloudy and a bit cold, but that fact that we could dry out and not be cut in 2 by the wind helped out the most. Then soon after that we made out way into the Hamptons were the grand houses were all lined with perfectly cut 12 foot tall hedges. I thought I was riding through a magazine article. That also helped brighten us up.

By about 75 miles in, we were ready to finish.

THEN! At mile 99, yes, mile 99!! One of my riding partners flatted. It had to happen to finish off the day. It would not have been a complete day without someone flatting. Actually, within the first 10 miles of the ride I witnessed about 20 people off to the side fixing flats. I think I saw about 50+ total people with flats along the course of the route.

As for my legs, that was the easiest 100 I have ever ridden. I was riding with two other rides on their first Century rides every, so I stayed at their pace. We did a 15 mph average, which was fine because it gave me 100 miles and didn't totally waste me for my first sprint tri which is coming up in 2 weekends.