Elephant Stew

I had my longest bike ride of they year on Sunday. 40 miles from Sylvester to Ty Ty. Fred was kind enough to schlep our bikes over there, and we met Shannon and Rue at the old train in Sylvester.

Shannon started out like a bullet, so I hooked on. She soon turned around and asked if I was drafting. I said, uhhhh, yeah. She said, you shouldn't, you should do your own work.

Doh! That's not my usual MO, but ok....

Fred hung back and coached & encouraged Rue. This was Rue's first long ride, she hadn't ridden more then 15 miles previous. Fred had hooked her up with some LOOK pedals pre-ride and she was also on a new-to-her road bike.

Rue is a super strong runner, as is Shannon. Won't be long before Rue and Shannon are both leaving me behind on the bike if I don't keep riding thru these cold months.

The route from Sylvester to Ty Ty starts out on Route 112 and has some good rolling hills on the way to Ty Ty. Why I call them "good" I don't know. "Evil" is actually more accurate.
Ty Ty has a good curb store with a decent indoor bathroom and good snackies. We had a good break and I was re-energized on a nice sugar high on the way back to Sylvester.

The route was an out and back, so it shouldn't have been steeper on the way back, but it WAS.... there were more climbs AND we were into the wind on the way home. Very challenging as I was doing my own work this whole ride. No drafting, remember.

At one point on the way back, a Subaru wagon all painted up with bike racks on the roof passes me. Its a team car. Wait. Wait. Come back... Instead, he goes by me and slows to talk to Shannon who is a good ways ahead of me. I figured it was someone she knew from Tifton.

We got back to the train and I found out that the team car had slowed and talked to Rue and Fred behind me and asked if they were ok and if they needed anything. They declined any snacks or water. Shannon said they asked her the same thing and told her they were down in Ty Ty trying to start a chapter of SORBA. Dirt bike dudes. They must have known that I was no longer a friend of the trees after last weekend's adventure on the FlintRiver Trail...
Either that or I had the death look and they didn't want to haul me and my bike back to Sly town.

The good thing is, I finished the ride under my own power. No drafting.

You can eat an elephant, you just have to chop it up into small bites.

That's the way I will approach my training to the TOSRV adventure in April.
Riding longer mileage now then I am comfortable with in anticipation of a back to back century.

I don't need no stinking team car. Screw you SORBA dudes.