This is brain... this is your brain after you've cracked

Ouch. I've been doing one thing or another since Saturday, or I would have posted before now, but ouch. Saturday was the first time I've gone on one of the group road rides up here. It was crazy. We had a tail wind, so that helped move us along on the way out, but we were averaging well over 25 on the warm up.

I kept ending up toward the front and not one to shirk a pull, I kept pulling through. We hit the "steps" (or as I think they should be called, "the bitches" - if you've ever done Old Pueblo you know what I'm talking about. We hit the bottom of the first climb doing 30+ and I believe they kept it near or over 20 the whole way up. For any of my European readers, I do mean miles per hour, not kilometers.

I slugged up the climbs, and was settling in to a few hour solos when they stopped at a turn and I caught back on. I hung with 'em again until the accelleration into Morman Lake. We were doing nearly 30 and someone went off of the front and it was on. I wasn't too worried about being dropped there because I knew they'd be stopping just little bit further up the road for refills and the like. I came around a corner and saw somebody picking themselves up out of the gravel. Apparently in all the jockeying for position, two guys touched shoulders. One of them was right at the shoulder and happened to be in some cinders at the time and ate it. Had a really nice rasberry, but was back on his bike and finished the ride out.

After the lodge stop in Morman Lake, I hung with them to the next climb again and was shelled. I caught back on to a few more riders at Lake Mary and hung with them for awhile, but they were both running upper 20's trying to catch on to the last half dozen or so riders from the main group. I did one pull and my legs were done. Bid them adieu, and settled in for a solo back in to town. Just before I got past the lower Lake Mary, I pulled the plug on the ride and called in a ride back to town. I ended up with just under 2:45 moving and a touch over 53 miles. The last 11 miles took nearly 45 minutes.

Again, I say... ouch.