"Ellen, don't fail me now!"

Bryan, the assistant manager at my store has been asking me to join him on a ride. I didn't have to work, it wasn't raining, so even though I had ridden 18 miles yesterday, I accepted his invitation for this morning. We met at a 7-11 (which happened to be RIGHT next door to a donut shop!), three miles from my house at 7:45. First thing to do was FUEL UP:

I knew we were heading down Niles Canyon and up Palomares Road. But I didn't know we were going to be doing a 32 mile loop TODAY! I thought we were just going to the end of Palomares and back. Whatever. I was game. I had a donut and there was a bag of Gu Chomps on my back and both of my water bottles were full. The 2.5 miles down Niles Canyon were no big deal, less scary than I thought it would be considering it is a two lane highway. As soon as we turned onto Palomares, everything changed. We would be climbing six miles, up to 1,200 feet. We started at about 30 feet above sea level. About a mile or so in, I did stop and catch my breath. That was the only time though. The rest, I just kept peddling, no matter how slow. And SLOW it was at times. Often I would look at my Garmin and I was going 3.5 mph. But, I kept peddling.

Bryan is 23 or 24 and Daniel is 19 and they're both as thin as rails, as you can see. Bryan is an avid cyclist and Daniel is pretty experienced as well so needless to say, there was no way I could keep up on the climb. I know it just takes practice but I sure felt slow on the hills. The rest of the time I had no problem at all staying right with them. It was a beautiful ride with the fog keeping us cool.

We finally made it to the summit (1,200 feet) and we stopped to enjoy the view and have a little snack.

Daniel & Bryan hammin' it up!

After the summit, naturally it was downhill for a while. The road was wet from the fog, water was dripping from my helmet and my tires were wet. I didn't feel super comfortable flying down the road so I kept it around 30 mph. Again, it takes practice. By about mile 17, I was completely OVER peddling up anything that appeared to look like an incline. When we finally got onto Foothill and it flattened out for a period, I got a burst of energy and cruised along at a pretty good pace though. With eight miles left, I had to admit I was TIRED! The good news though, the rest of the way was going to be flat. For some reason, about this time I noticed the boys were letting me ride in the front. The boney-ass'd S.O.B.s were drafting off my big ass!! Every time I looked over my shoulder, there was a tire very close to the back of mine. Interesting, huh?

After hitting the 7-11, I rode my three miles back home which made my ride a total of 38.5 miles. Luckily I had lunch plans with my Mom for her 77th birthday or I would have crawled right back into bed. I took a nice hot shower, which my muscles thanked me for later, and went out for some nice pasta and conversation with my Mom.

Okay, now for the BEST part of the day. I pulled over to give this little guy some love. He actually let me pet him. It was hard for me to break away and continue down the road. I adore cows, especially baby ones. I'm SO glad I don't eat them. Isn't he cute???

I hurt in more places than I would like to right now. I told Keith I feel like I ran an ultra. My arms, shoulders, legs, hips, abs and back all hurt. Not the bones, the MUSCLES! I hope I'm not more sore tomorrow. I have to work all day.

Will I do this ride again? What do you think? LOL

Until later.............