It was one of those rides

I rode my bike yesterday, I know nothing out of the ordinary but it seemed to have a slightly different purpose. Yes it was still training but it was one of those rides that I have before events. No music, a ride just spent in my head. To do this it was even a rail trail ride where I didn't even have to worry about fast moving objects.

As the season is winding down but I look at the craziness still to come I had some decisions to be made. First up was this weekends o-cup in Kelso. I was all in and then eventually was sitting on the fence. I had options of the race or a really long ride, I debated back in forth. I brought up the rule I created for events last year. If it takes me longer to drive to the race than the actually time it would take to race I have full thumbs up to skip it. I drive fast, self processed speed demon, but even smoking it down and jumping on the 407 I'm looking at 2 hours. I ride pretty fast but not crazy fast but either way it's never taken me longer than 2 hours to do any Ontario Cup race. HMMMM. Of course the coach gave the hint to me that endurance racers (which apparently I am) do long rides!!! So with Mountainview 9 hour coming up in a week I'm passing on the trip south.

This lead to the next thought on races. Why do I do the long races? Why do I do something that makes me exhausted for a solid week? Something that really hurts on good days but when the weather turns bad becomes a complete sufferfest and down right miserable. It's pretty easy to push yourself through the rain in a sub 2 hour race but knowing that you still have 6- 12 hours to go what will you do? It's a mental game, again one of those reasons I do these "get into your head" type rides. Why do I do this to myself, I do it for me. To see what I am capable of during the race mentally and physically. The bonus of being pretty good at it and finishing on the top of the pile is just that, a bonus.

I know that things will be pretty low key next weekend but I'll be honest I'm hoping that there will be at least one or two riders who will give me a go at the 9 hour. After the Summer race, my nose is still a little numb, I need to get my head recovered fully to move onto the next step for the season. I've got a million thoughts going on right now for a few different races and as much as things have flown by there are events all the way into November, including a few in the States that I've been scanning. Road trip? Long races? Cross? I'm not making any decisions for another week or two. Or at least another pot of coffee.

As for the ride, it's amazing what you can fit in in an hour recovery ride. Time to stare at maps, plotting out a 4.5 hour ride. Looks like it will be a solo ride for the Chuck Norris bike and me on Saturday.