Training...the long days are almost over!

This past weekend was really hard! I have been battling a cold for the last 3 weeks. Seems I get a couple days of feeling good...then it hits me again. It was my last set of long days, 112 miles on Saturday (the first 56 with the racers who had no race on the calendar) and 126 on Sunday. Sunday was "Bike Across Florida" (BAF) , which starts in Titusville (on the east coast)and heads north of my hometown of Winter Park and then on to Crystal River on the west coast. I left the house in the dark and rolled towards Titusville hoping to intercept the BAF lead group. I missed them by a couple of minutes...and spent the rest of the day catching people who had been dropped from the group. It was really a solo effort, as I only passed 8-10 other riders all day. The BAF course included a loop around Central Florida's famous "hills"...Sugarloaf Mountain and Buckhill Road. I hit the hills at mile 95 and my legs were pretty shot. The southeast wind was howling and I knew it would not be an easy ride back home (to the east). I needed to get home, so I hadn't planned to stop. 1 Gatorade, 1 Cliff bar, 2 Jocolat Larabars and a couple bottles of water. I barely made it! 126 miles in 6 hours and 20 minutes...the hard way! It was a good "mental toughness" day...alone and against the wind. I am sure there will be days on this trip that will be much harder! Thank goodness for aerobars! The bike is back with Jere @ Loco Motion this week for a new bottom bracket. I can only imagine how crazy listening to the old one creaking for 32 days would have made me.