Hybrid Centuries 🚴♀️
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The century bug bit me hard, that’s for sure. I wasn’t yet fully comfortable on the hybrid when I began working up to my first century on two wheels.
Preparation was essentially the same routine that I followed when getting ready for the tricycle century: longer and longer Sunday rides; experimenting with on-bike snacks; and so on. The hardest part was learning to ride one-handed while I grabbed something to eat or drink.
One of my practice rides I have reason to remember well. It was in August; and one Sunday I went out on the levee. About eight or ten miles out, it looked like I was heading into a T-storm; and I decided to head back home. It was probably the worst course of action! I ran into some truly ugly weather: torrential rain; strong wind that threatened to blow me away; and fierce lightning.
I’m not exactly afraid of lightning. I enjoy a good lightning show; but not when I’m caught outdoors in it! Some of those bolts were very close; and I felt like a rolling lightning rod. It was a relief when I reached a point where I could get down from the levee.
On October 6, 2012, I did my first two-wheeled century. It was a frustrating day because of tacks on the bike path (a copycat case from that year’s Tour de France?)
I’m sure I remember having tire liners then; but those long tacks defeated them. First, my front tire went. Later, my rear tire went flat. Luckily I managed to get help both times. I was, and still am, all thumbs at changing tubes.
About halfway through this century, I stopped at a supermarket to buy food and water; and I holed up in the restroom to change my shorts. The weather was still warm; and fresh shorts sure felt good. About ten miles later I had to stop again to buy an extra snack; and by this point, continuing felt like a matter of sheer willpower. I had to coax one leg at a time to push and push again.
All the tire trouble had caused considerable delay; and although I had set out before daybreak, at 6:30 pm I still had some 15 miles to go. It was getting dark; and I had to stop to put the lights back on the bike.
Then the handlebar bag kept knocking the light off of the handlebars. I had to halt yet again to attach the bag to the bike trunk’s carry handle. By then, my legs were so tired that it was very hard to start up again after a halt.
It took me until 8:12 pm to hit 100 miles. Pedal time was 9:45:16, a vast improvement over the 13+ hours of pedaling that it took to ride 100 miles on the trike. The total time of 14 hours, 20 minutes would have been less if not for all the trouble with tires. I wanted to do better than that!
I began this ride at 4:40 am; and at 3:22 pm I was done. Total time, 10 hours, 42 minutes. How wonderful it was to finish when there was still daylight! And in less than 12 hours, too. I chopped an hour plus more than a minute off of October’s pedaling time for 8:43:33. That was a major thrill! But now, my sights were shifting to road bikes.