Our first training ride

Susan and I have done very little training for our upcoming bike tour in May. Granted it is a flat ride, but they are still 50-60 mile days and that is a lot of hours in the saddle. That said, we finally decided to get semi-serious about getting in shape. We took our first ride from the new lot we bought close to Travelers Rest in the Carilion subdivision. We now know the difference between riding at the foot of the mountains and riding in the mountains.


OK, Travelers Rest is still not at the top of the mountain, but is way higher than we are now, and flat is not even in their dictionary. We left our lot and immediately begin to climb up from the river on River Bend Road. Then we went down Keeler Mill Rd and crossed another river and then another. Every river crossing meant a valley that you had to climb out of. We then crossed the same river 3 more times. We would climb to the top of the hill only to give it all back as we sped towards the river simply to slow to a crawl as we climbed up the other side.

We wanted some exercise and we got it. The country side was pretty and the weather was cool so it was a great day to ride. It was only 13 miles too, so it wasn’t a long day either. That combined with an 18’er the next day at home we at least felt like we were starting to get some saddle time.

On a sad note our biking partners had to cancel on us. We are going to miss’em but have decided to go ahead with the trip. This was the only time we could put together a biking trip this year so we decided to stay with the plan.

Here is the ride profile.  The first half was tough!

(double click for complete view)