The Last 7:00 Ride of 2011!!!

I have to say I am delighted to report that I finished my last seven hour ride of Ironman training yesterday. In the words of my brother, it was EPIC!!! There were highs, there were lows, there was extremely bitchy behavior (by me), there was long ride-induced dementia, and of course there was the food of the Gods, SNICKERS!!!! 

I woke up at 5:30 am and went to Boulder. I was rolling at 6:59 am per my plan. One minute early in fact, because that's how I roll. Some people call it obsessive, I call it planning for optimal Ironman training success. I rode by myself for two hours. Nothing of note occurred except that I really, really had to pee once, could not be bothered to hide, and dropped trou at the side of the road. I hope you enjoyed that, vehicle traffic on 95th Street. 

Then I picked up my brother, a.k.a. my glutton for punishment for the day. There was some organized ride going up Lefthand Canyon so we headed down US 36 to Lyons and then we started climbing. And climbing. And climbing some more. I had never done that loop from that direction, I must say it is significantly harder, although there aren't as many steep pitches. At one point I totally wussed out and yelled at my brother and soft pedaled for a bit.

But the payoff was worth it. Here is the view at Brainard Lake.

I just love it there. Since I spend most of the week at Sea Level every week, I was highly amused that I rode to 10,300 feet. Or I just thought I was an idiot. Hard to say. Me at Brainard with the 10,300 feet of elevation sign...

It took a lot of restraint not to jump into the lake. Especially since when we got there we had been climbing for 3.5 hours. And we were loopy as crap.  I honestly don't know how we didn't. Scott knew I was in desperate need of Snickers so we started our descent and ended up in Ward, part Nirvana, part hippie burnout heaven. Compared to Brainard it was a bit of a letdown. Check out Ward.

But it was worth it. They had a new kind of Snickers I had never had - almond! It was so good. I don't know how I even took a picture, since I ate it in about 20 seconds.

It may have been the best Snickers I've ever had. So then we are like 'heck yeah, we get to descend for a while and then we're done!!' And then we got a nice headwind so we had to pedal hard all the way down. I took a nice pull so I actually didn't feel terrible. That was surprising!

At the very end when we were almost done I had a great idea that we should sprint for a minute. What a jackass. I think this pushed my brother over the edge. This is how he ended his day.

He did great though. This was his longest and farthest ride to date, and it was a son of a gun man. No joke.

My legs felt pretty busted this morning but I managed to ride 65 with some more climbing, which seemed pretty cute after yesterday. I am feeling pretty good actually. And now we are on the downhill slide towards the Ironman. Happy day!!!