once a jolly swagman, seated by a billabong...

...under the shade of a kookabah treeeeee/and he sang as he sat and waited while his billy boiled/You'll come a-waltzing Matilda with me"

Yeah, those aren't the right words. But those are the ones I sang over and over and over and over and over again during the last 25-or-so miles of my 43 mile Elves & More charity ride yesterday. Followed by the chorus (which I got right), then this same verse again. My apologies to Australians--it's the only verse I know!

The ride went reasonably well, considering that I had to contend not only with rolling hills, but also a soul-killing headwind. I averaged 14 mph on-the-dot, which is half a mph faster than last year. Of course, I did 20 fewer miles this year, missing all the "real" hills, and I was riding with (read: being pulled along by) a group for the first 6-8 miles and trading off with another girl for the 20 after that. Still, any improvement is good, conditional or otherwise.

I started off riding in a group of five women--3 regulars from the Saturday ride (T., E., and K.), another club member whom I only know from the Sunday club ride (speedy K), and me. We met at a bike shop and formed a convoy of sorts to drive out to Montgomery, since I was the only one who had been out there before. It was weird, leading that line of cars, because I only know these women from club rides. The whole time, I kept wanting to do ride things...call out debris, signal turns with my arms, yell out "everyone make the light?!" :)

Anyway, we got there safely, got our first poker cards, and headed out. Speedy K led out, setting a pace of about 16 mph--uphill. I kept up for about 35 seconds before dropping off and vowing to catch up on the downhill. After all, I had about 75 lbs on everyone in the group...descents are just about the only time that's an advantage. Sure enough, we (K. behind me...our levels of road training and speeds were well matched) caught them on the downhill, hung with them through the next turn and into the headwind. I struggled valiantly to stay on the wheel of E., but it was all I could do. Then we hit this nice, gradual 3%-ish incline that went on for about 900 years, and my legs started to flag. I stood up, I tried putting my hands in the drop bars to cut the wind...nope. They just kept getting farther away. Somewhere around year 700 of the climb (okay, okay...minute 10), I gave up and figured I'd catch them on the downhill. Except that there was no downhill. It went flat, and then it went up some more, and then there'd be a woefully short descent where my momentum was totally stolen by the stupid fucking headwind, and then I couldn't even see my group anymore.

This was when I started singing. Though I didn't have my monitor, I could feel that my heart rate was up somewhere between "holy shit" and "stroke", so I needed some way to monitor my level of exertion and keep a steady cadence. Singing works well for both those things...the music has a beat, and if I can't breathe enough to sing, I need to slow the hell down. So, I started with Jesus Walks, relying on its military cadence in my head to establish rhythm. I'm sure I sounded ridiculous...me rapping is like Kanye West singing "I Feel Pretty". Anyway, it did what I needed it to do. This got us through to the first rest stop, where the Speedy Three were waiting. As it turns out, T. and Speedy K. had spotted some riders they knew and raced them to the stop, so even if I hadn't been the completely candy-assed climber that I am, I probably wouldn't have been able to hang on for long.

After a few minutes of rest, a banana, and a cookie, we once again set out as a party of five. This lasted about a mile and a half, then we were two again. By this time, I didn't mind. I went into the ride knowing that everyone I was riding with was capable of going faster than me (even K., actually. She was having an off day due to a couple injuries and more mountain than road training.) I had a feeling that they would eventually drop me, and was ultimately fine with that. I didn't think it would be so quickly, but I hadn't counted on the wind. I can handle hills OR wind, but not so much both. Them's the breaks, you know?

Once I had resigned myself to letting them go, I was able to ride my own ride. Which is, spinning up hills at 8-12 mph and wringing as much momentum as possible from the descents. I found this easier to do than riding in the middle of a pack, particularly my pack of little birdie women (no offense meant--I wish I was one). It definitely conserved energy to ride in the group, but I found myself getting frustrated when I had to put on the brakes on a descent to avoid ramming the tiny uber-fit grandmother in front of me. I wasn't a good enough climber to keep a satisfactory pace pulling uphill, so I didn't feel comfortable getting out in front on the descents. Still, I was finding it harder and harder to get enough momentum to hang onto the back of the pack on the inclines. I'm sure this also had a lot to do with my inexperience with paceline riding in general, and I think that's something I'm ready to work on. In any case, I was much more comfortable in my little group of two. While I did pull most of the time, K. was more than willing to take a turn when I needed her to, and it was nice to have someone to talk to (when I could talk).

We met up with the three leaders again at rest stop 2, where they decided to go do the 63-mile route with the guys they had been racing. After joking that I would not do the 63-mile route in that wind even if a truck was pulling me, our group officially split into the Speedy Three on the 63-mile route and the More Leisurely Two on the 42-miler.

K. and I took turns pulling for the next 15 miles, patiently then not-so-patiently waiting for the tailwind to kick in. We were going the opposite direction, right? There was a headwind on the way out, right? So where was our tailwind? I WAS PROMISED A TAILWIND, DAMMIT. Instead, what we had was a strong crosswind, more headwind, and tantalizing and cruelly short bursts of what might be a tailwind if it would only stay long enough for us to consider it. And many, many repeats of the first verse and chorus of Waltzing Matilda, which had replaced Jesus Walks as my song of choice.

Somewhere between rest stops 3 and 4, I started to lose K. Because she couldn't wrestle in my weight class if she was soaking wet and strapped to an anvil, she was having a harder time in the crosswinds than I was. It wasn't easy for me to hold a line in some of the stronger gusts, but she was getting blown all over the road. I pulled off an waited for her once on a rare flat stretch, and she told me to go ahead without her. The tailwind finally kicked in for real on the last 10 miles or so, we met up at the last rest stop, and K & I finished pretty close together. I crossed the finish line at 12:29, and cheered her through about 5 minutes later. If she hadn't stopped to check on another rider, we would have finished at nearly the same time.

After I changed clothes and filled out my poker hand (which sucked--I had an ace and 9 of clubs, jack, 3, and 5 of diamonds), K. had left and I hit the free lunch. The weather was beautiful for sitting around, so I decided to wait for the other girls to come in. I figured they'd be along fairly soon, since they were faster. At 2 pm, I decided to head out and ask them how it went at the Saturday ride. As I pulled out of the parking lot, I was thinking that it would be just my luck for them to be coming in now, after I had waited for nearly two hours. Wouldn't you know it, they were! Not a half-mile out of the parking lot, I spotted them on the other side of the road. I turned around at the next light and made it back in time to greet them at the finish. Talked to them for a few minutes, then I headed home.

So yeah...it was a good time. The weather was perfect except for the godforsaken wind, and it was nice having a group to ride with, even for a little while. I didn't think the ride was as well organized/executed this year as it was previous years, but it was still a great event. And I was faster this year! Woo!