I did a nice 35 mile ride this morning out of Bicycle Toy and Hobby in High Point. Took around two hours, and averaged just over 17 mph. This was the last of the officially sanctioned pre-Tanglewood group training rides, and it’s good to ride at least one, I find. It gets me back in the groove of how to ride in a pack. I do so many of my rides solo or maybe with one or two other people, beginning a ride with 200 other riders is always a different experience. Tanglewood will be closer to 2000 riders.

I was a little worried that I was going to be late to the start. Yesterday afternoon when I was cleaning the bike I noticed that the front tire was flat. So I put an old tube in that I had patched after a previous flat, pumped it up, and went on about other projects. This morning I noticed that it was flat again. So that led to a scramble to get the tire off, and a new tube installed. I checked the old tube and it turns out I must have done a poor patch job, because it was leaking right at the patch. This time I just put a brand new tube in and it was fine. Since the ride was beginning at a bike shop I just picked up a new spare tube before the ride began. I ended up in plenty of time, and in fact the ride actually started about half and hour later than I thought. Thankfully they had some food and drinks, including coffee, so I munched on a banana and drank some coffee and all was good.

The sky remained somewhat cloudy for most of the ride, and it was moderately cool, so conditions were nice for riding. There was a little bit of a headwind in parts, but I didn’t think it was so much that it caused any terrible trouble.

For the last 13 miles I rode with a guy named Frank that I met on the road. We seemed to be traveling at a comparable pace so we worked some together, chit-chatted a little bit, but mostly just rode. It pretty much always works out that way for me on these group rides. It takes a while for the big groups to break apart and spread out. Eventually you find yourself out on the road with someone who is going about the same as you and you ride together for a while. You maybe get their name if you stick together long enough, and it makes things go a little faster. You can take a break and let someone else do the work at intervals, and plus have a little casual conversation.

My plan is to get another ride in tomorrow morning – solo again, maybe 50 miles. That’ll give me 85 for the weekend. Then I just plan to keep getting in good maintenance rides for the next two weeks and try to do some yoga to keep loose, and before you know it it’ll be Tanglewood time.

Here’s my usual request for support at the Tour to Tanglewood— Please Support me if you haven’t already by clicking this link. Only two weeks to go, so this is going to be my last big fundraising push. I’m planning on sending out another email blast to anyone who hasn’t already contributed to see if I can still make my goal. I think it’s do-able. I’m pretty well positioned, but it could go either way. To those of you who have already contributed, Thank you so much!