I am so behind

Well my good gracious gravy I have ignored my poor little blog and it's been lonely and stuff. But! I'm about to make up for it - if blogger co-operates - and post a bunch of pics.

I'll start at the end.
On Saturday Bert, Ben and I did the Harpeth River Ride. We signed up some time ago cos Bert did it last year and loved it. After we signed up it was announced Lance Armstrong would be there so all of a sudden the ride totally filled up... =)

1500 cyclists descended on Nissan HQ in Franklin. Amongst them were Bert:


Ben:


and myself:

Look at that gorgeous bike! I love my bike.

Here, Ben has just said something really cheeky:



We lined up in our spots - Ben and I in the 44 miler spot, Bert in the 100 miler spot. When we lined up, who should we see but Tim Ross! He was riding the 44 too.


So we lined up, then listened to various speeches from The Harpeth Bike Club President, Some dude from Nissan, and Lance himself....who, if I heard correctly (and I may not have because the sound wasn't all that great back where we were....) gave a Nissan 350Z to his friend. So. Perks, I guess.

Anyway, then we were OFF! Well. The Adaptive Athletes and Wounded Warriors were off. Then the 100 milers. Then the 62 milers. Then, finally, us. WHOOT! Ben dropped me immediately. HA! =D

I met up with him at the first rest stop, 7 miles down the road. He'd kept up with the SAG wagon for that entire 7 miles. DUDE! He said he was pushing so hard at one point he thought he was going to vomit. He waited 15 minutes for me.

At the second rest stop he waited about the same amount for me, so I told him to just go ahead and do his own thing and I'd see him at the end. I felt like I was holding him back.

Ben, Tim and I rode together for a little while, but Tim and Ben dropped me. Later I saw Tim waiting for me by the side of the road. As I pulled alongside he said, "Ben dropped me. He said to me, "I'm sorry, Brother Ross, I've got to go" and he took off." Hahahaha! =D Very polite of Ben.

Just after the second rest stop - the one with the pink flamingos WHOOOT!! How can you go wrong with pink flamingos? My gosh that rest stop was AWESOME! Watermelon. Ooooohhhhhhh baby. And potatoes. I cannot BELIEVE how good potatoes taste on these rides. And olives. It makes me weep to think about how delicious it was. I had 1/4 of a pb&j that was yum. Good times, good times.

So anyway just after the second rest stop all of a sudden a bunch of people were stopped just around the corner. "Is this the right way?" they were asking. I looked for the road markings and all I could see was a bunch of whited-out stuff. I whipped out my directions and it was the correct way so I told them that. Then another cyclist coming behind us said "Careful! There's a bunch of tacks on the road!" Wait...what??? So I went back and the chap and I tried to pick up as many as I can. There were SO many, clearly deliberately put there. =( The SAG wagon chap came along with a good stiff brush to brush them all off the road.

I don't understand why someone would do that. It's so sad. Apparently they did it at two other spots on the 100 miler...which means they knew this ride was happening, they found out what the route was, they bought the white paint and the tacks, and they drove around really early in the morning working their evil plot so they wouldn't get caught. =(

Aaaanyway, so here I was riding with Tim and we come to this massive evil hill. We're huffing and puffing climbing it and all of a sudden we hear gunshots. Lots and lots of gunshots, one after the other. Bam bam bam bam bam bam bam - for a good few minutes. Tim comes out with a really funny comment (and how he's able to speak going up this hill I have no idea) that makes me laugh. It certainly made that evil hill much more enjoyable.

But then Tim drops me too and I'm wandering on alone, enjoying the ride. At about mile 35 my knee does something funky that I don't like and that keeps me worried when it twinges as I go up hills. It's just fine now though. At mile 40 I start getting tired. By mile 42 I'm ready to be done. I know the road I'm on and can just taste the finish line. And finally - I'm in! WHOOT! 44 miles, baby! The longest I've ever ridden. They give me a medal which I LURV and take my timing chip. I look around for Ben but don't see him, so ride up to the van and load my bike on the rack. Ben turns up - he'd seen me come in and followed me up - and I load his bike too.

We head on back to the tent for apres ride deliciousness. I was hoping for watermelon and some lettuce and tomato on a wheat bun. No such luck. Pizza and chips. Ew. Ben was ecstatic. I think he ate an entire pizza by himself.

We waited for a bit. Ben wanted to leave but I wanted to see Bert and Lance come in. As we were waiting Bert texted. He'd ridden with Lance for the first 30 miles - some of the way right beside him - but then had dropped out because he knew he couldn't do the whole 100 at that speed. We were all pretty dang geeked that he got to ride with Lance for a bit. =)

So we waited for Lance to come in:




After Lance came in I took Ben and the bikes home. The Zollingers, who were looking after Andrew...well, McKenna was...brought Andrew home. I was SO grateful! So Andrew and I dashed back to Nissan so we could see Bert come in. It was AWESOME! =) We were so happy to see him.

It was an absolutely fabulous day. One of the best rides I've ever been on. The volunteers were lovely and rest stops were SO good. We'll definitely do this one again next year. Only I'll do the 62. Or maybe the 100. Weeeeell, possibly not the 100. I don't do Pulltight hill.