My 100 miler

I did a 100 mile ride today with Shaun from my house into the country outside Hendersonville. The biggest thing I learned today is that I shouldn't be doing 100 mile rides! Yes, I have an Ironman coming up, but obviously my bike endurance is not a problem if I can ride 100 steady miles with barely any training for the previous month. What I need to work on is speed. Riding 100 miles at 15mph is tiresome. Luckily, Jorge wants me to do mostly shorter duration/higher intensity workouts to train for IMAZ, which I think will suit my schedule and my needs as an athlete better than putting in huge volume. Who knows. It's all a big experiment and I won't know till I do the training and do the race whether it works for me.
On a brighter note, I am thrilled beyond belief with the quality of the cycling around here. The ride today was amazing! A great mix of hills and flats, tons of quiet country roads, pretty scenery. I can ride from my house and hit these country roads and have limitless possibilities for routes. This makes me VERY happy!! The only problem is the dogs. We encountered SO many unleashed dogs today. Shaun got one right in the face with a squirt from his water bottle and he stopped dead in his tracks. Very annoying and not something I would want to deal with on my own.
It's also very hilly here. Most of the hills today were perfect..not too challenging, not too steep, but made you work pretty hard. We hit some great downhills, too. The worst hill by far is in my neighborhood, so I get to do it all the time (ahem). I have never come as close to falling over on a hill as I did today coming up that bitch after 99 miles on the bike. I couldn't get out of the saddle, I was in my easiest gear on a compact crank, and I was going 4mph! It HURTTTTTTTTT!!!!!
Other than the last 10-15 miles, I felt really good today. I was shocked that I felt so good. Of course, I was a turtle, but still. I expected a lot more pain and suffering out there after being such a lazy turd all summer. I know that the main reason I struggled with the last 10-15 miles was that my nutrition sucked. I was stupid and didn't take enough Hammer Gel during the second half of the ride, and I was in need of more calories.
The route Shaun and I picked was a 85 miler we found on mapmyride.com that we figured we would just add to at some point in the day (or, more likely, decide we were tired and had gone far enough after 85 miles). Well, seeing as how Shaun and I can NEVER go for a ride without taking a few wrong turns, we ended up getting back to my house at 99.4 miles! I thought that was pretty cool. We just went once around the block to get our 100.
After the ride I immediately had a smoothie and then went to bed for an hour. I was exhausted. Woke up nauseous and ate some more food. Now I am good..sunburned but good. A great training day! Shaun is going to do great at IMLou. And we are going to eat our body weight in sushi tonight.