My directive for long rides was to ride with/chase people faster than I and end rides exhausted with my "tongue hanging out". I have been avoiding it now for 2 weeks and finally sent out the following last minute e-mail to a biking team I loosely belong to.

"I have been told that if I want to ride faster, I need to chase faster people. So my newest goal is to try to keep up with your weekend rides by 5 minute increments. 1st ride, don't get dropped for 10 minutes, 2nd ride, 15 minutes, etc.

So is anyone riding on Saturday? If so, what time and from where?"

I secretly hoped that no one would respond and I would have the perfect excuse to just do my thing. Then Ryan responded to meet me at the Dog at 7:30 and followed it up with a VM to Ruth (who is in Oregon) to make sure I got the e-mail. So after a late night, I got up at 6:00, very very nervous about the ride. Ryan was super sweet and offered me some terrific coaching tips. He even stayed with me for the first 35 miles and even though I was having a great time learning a lot, near the end of his time with me, I was looking very forward to being dropped and left on my own. The second half was much tougher and I was pretty tired but made it home and got in a 3 mile run. I did notice that I kept scraping my left foot on the ground and needed to lift my legs more.

I then went to a hair cutting appointment (almost falling asleep) and then took a nap. And slept for 3.5 HOURS. OMG.

59 Mile Ride @ 03:50:00ish
3 Mile Run @ 00:30:00