Countdown to Triathlon – 146 Days, 20.8 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 78 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

The Journey - Installment Seventy-Eight

On the morning of the first day of the bike ride, everyone was up early and we congregated in the hotel’s lobby for a continental breakfast.  We prepared ourselves by stretching, loading up our back pocket with snacks and filling our water bottles.  We were given a laminated card which would be fastened to our bikes by zip ties.  This card would be replaced each day of the ride by a new one which would list the route for that day.  The card would include each turn we would make and the mileage to the next turn.  This first day was to be the State Capital Building, Sacramento to the Hawthorne Hotel in Napa, 83.5 miles total ride.   We were again reminded to watch for the small neon crosses which had been painted on the edge of the road at intervals along our route.  It was stressed to us to remember to keep hydrated and eat energy generating snacks frequently.  There were some pep talks, someone gave devotions and we had prayers to send us off and for our safety.

Here I am getting ready for the ride.

(Just kidding)

Barb and Lisa all ready to start the ride.

We had our pictures taken in front of trailer that carried all the supplies and tools.  We were informed that the trailer had been donated to Focus on the Family by Ritchie and also all the tools donated by Park Tools Company.

 Here is the group posing in front of the donated trailer. It is not a good view of the trailer, but it was huge and was our constant companion at the beginning and end of the day.  Besides tools, it contained all of our gear from the hotels and all the extra snacks and supplies that the accompanying mini vans did not contain.  It was a welcome sight at the end of each day because when we saw the trailer, we knew we were finished riding for that day.

        2^nd row far left, standing, the lady with the braids, Toni from Kansas.  She rode the Kansas ride, our Northern California ride, and the Colorado ride in July for the Silver Anniversary of Focus on the Family.  At the time she had five children, all girls.  Would you say she loves to bike ride?  Third from the left is yours truly. The blonde next to me is Lisa.  Next to Lisa is Terri from Modesto who will become a good friend but Lisa and I didn’t know her yet when this picture was taken.  The second lady from Terri is Yvonne.  I’ll be mentioning her later.  She was amazing and we learned that she taught spinning classes in her home town.  Third from the right with the white shirt is the lady from Arnold who had to drop out of the ride.  These are the main ladies that ended up riding with me.  I won’t mention the men because we rarely saw them except at the beginning and end of the day.  They got on their bikes and disappeared from view.

        We said good bye to the lady from  Arnold, California.  Remember, I didn’t want to ask her to ride with me in the weeks before the ride because I thought she would have legs of steel since she lived and biked in the mountains.  She developed problems with her blood pressure and couldn’t ride. She came the night before hoping that her health would allow her to ride, but it was not to be.

        After pictures, we set off toward the State Capital building which would be our starting point,  1400 Tenth Street,  Sacramento, California.  I commented to Lisa that we had to ride to the capital, which was 2.57 miles away and that wasn’t even considered part of our ride and was not listed on the route card.  It was extra riding.  It reminded me of the lady in Riverbank at the Wine and Cheese Festival in October of the previous year who commented about a couple of extra miles not being of any consequence.  I had to surmise, “What’s a couple of extra miles when one will be riding over eighty miles.”  As it turned out, there had been a typo on the laminated card and our total distance for the day ended up being 92 miles.  Maybe it is a good thing we didn’t know that we’d only be short eight miles of reaching 100 miles or a Century Ride.