Eagle, ID — Since I’ve been feeling better and today was looking like the best day of the week, I decided to do a long ride. Yesterday, I joined the Intermountain Orthopaedic club ride on my PowerCranks and blew out my hip flexors. I only rode for 3:10, just a little bit longer than the 2:30 I did last week, but somehow it felt much harder. It must have been the erratic nature of the club ride with all the speed fluctuations that did my hip flexors in. So today I thought a long ride on normal cranks was the way to go.

I headed out at about 10:30 AM to do the Wilder/Payette loop which is just over 100 miles. I knew there was going to be a strong southeast wind today, but I still chose a this northwest route because of the scenery and lack of traffic. So I expected to battle a headwind on the way back, but I figured since it was only base miles ride, I could just drop it into an easy gear and crawl home, however slow it may be. The way out was fun with the tail-/crosswind. I doing 24-26 MPH on the way out to Wilder and most of the way to Payette. The temp was chilly at first but after a couple hours it got fairly warm.

Then after Payette, I started battling the headwind. It wasn’t too bad until the left turn on Hwy 52 towards Emmett. At that point it was a straight-on headwind. I only averaged 14.7 MPH on that stretch. It took forever! Then I had to go up Old Freezeout and down Hwy 16. By this point I was feeling the signs of bonking. I had eaten all the food I brought and was fantasizing about what I would eat when I got home. I also started to get colder, though I thought it was due to it getting late in the afternoon. I probably didn’t eat enough nor drink enough…I was too busy suffering! By the time I got within 5 miles of home, my legs felt like jello. When I got a flat at that point, I almost called Heather to save me, but I didn’t want to wimp out so close to home. Those last five mile were torture. I could barely keep my power above 170 watts. Now that’s pathetic!

When I got home, I quickly ate some food. I was still feeling cold so I turned up the house heat and took a hot shower. Even after that, my hands were still freezing. So I got in bed under a warm down comforter. It took me half an hour to get warm! At that point I realized it probably wasn’t just a normal bonk, but I was dehydrated too. Though I drank the same amount as I usually do for that length of ride, it was probably a combination of a light breakfast and dehydration that made me feel so awful. The ride totaled 106 miles and took me a sluggish 6:06 to complete. I was sure glad when it was over!