Saturday Scott and I did the Heber Valley Century. It was my first 100 mile bike ride and it was HARD.

Earlier in the summer, when I got my road bike, I saw this century ride and I wanted to do it. I didn’t think we would be able to do it because some of our friends were getting married that day. Last week I looked at the schedule again, and figured out that we just might be able to fit it in. The ride started at 8:00am and the wedding was at 5:30pm in Milcreek Canyon. I figured we could go planning on doing the century, and if there wasn’t enough time we could just do the 65 mile ride. We ended up doing the 100 mile ride and we just barely made it!

The weather was beautiful. It was a gorgeous fall day. The leaves and the scenery were amazing. The course was nice, but it was hard. Scott has done 4 other centuries this summer, and he said this was the hardest course of all of them. There were a few big climbs and a lot of little rolling hills. I felt great until we got to mile 59. From mile 59 to 70 I really struggled. I felt exhausted and the course was very hilly through Wanship. Those 11 miles seemed to take forever. I kept telling myself that once I saw the mileage turn to 75 I would be home free.

And it really was true. The last 25 miles went by pretty quickly, even though there was one of the biggest climbs at about mile 85. I just put it in my granny gear and kept pedaling. It was a long steep hill, but I felt great. I knew once I got to the top it was all downhill back to the finish.

I was really proud of myself for doing it and completing the ride. Scott was an awesome partner. He waited for me and let me draft when I was tired. I had such a great time just being out there with him. It was really neat that we were able to do it together. I am looking forward to doing some more centuries next summer!

I have been wanting to do a century (100 miles) bike ride ever since I got my road bike this spring. There were a few I wanted to do, but none of them worked with my schedule. Tiffany told me about the Summit Challenge, a half century (50 miles) hosted by the National Ability Center in Park City. I figured a half century was a good place to start.

Linsdey is a road bike queen. She has ridden 4 centuries this summer, so I decided to ask her to do it with me. I knew that I would be slower than her, but I knew she would be nice about it and wait for me. She is so much fun to be with, so I knew that we would have a good time.

I planned to do more training on my road bike before the ride, but that just didn’t happen. I wanted to go on one long ride with Scott but we could never get it planned with school starting and everything. So, aside from a ride I did in Maui about 10 years ago, this was the longest ride I have ever done on my road bike.

I was happy with how I did. It started out with a long climb up from highway 224 up to Kamas. I felt great on that part. I expected it to be harder than it was. I just got in an easy gear and made my way up. I was slow, but I didn’t want to start out to strong. After that it was just a nice touring ride. The views and farm land were so pretty. I felt good on all of the middle of the ride. The last part of the ride was about 7 miles climbing up Brown’s Canyon. That part of the ride was really hard for me. I was starting to get tired and the climb was hard. To make it worse there was a serious headwind. I just got in my granny gear and kept on pedaling. I was sooo happy to make it to the top! Lindsey did awesome the whole time. She kicked butt on the last climb.

I was happy with how I did. I didn’t really struggle too much. If the wind hadn’t been blowing so hard I think I would have been fine on that last climb. After this ride, I think I am ready to try to tackle a century!