Flatter is Better!

Success, today. I rode the flattest course that I could devise, and it paid off. I covered 29.1 miles in 2 hours and 53 minutes, for an average (finally!) of 10.09+ mph. And that included a nine-minute pit stop. That's by far my best pace to date.

It makes me much more confident about my birthday ride.

I did today's in two loops, one of 20.6 miles, the other 8.5. Both loops start and end at my home. If I were to ride the pair of them three times in succession, the distance would total 87.3, which is 7.3 miles longer than my goal. So I'm going to look for a way to shorten the 8.5 loop by a couple of miles. Say, to 6.4. The pair of loops would then total 27 miles (20.6 plus 6.4) which, when tripled, would make 81. And that's close enough.

Which brings me to my ultra-simple training plan.

I'll ride twice a week, and, by selecting loops of the right length, increase the total distance incrementally (never enough to be intimidating). The rides would look like this (rounding off the distances of to 20 and 7 for simplicity of illustration):

20+7+7=34 (this Saturday, Aug 27)
20+20=40 (Tu, Aug 30)
20+7+20=47 (Sat, Sep 3)
20+7+20+7=54 (Tu, Sep 6)
20+20+20=60 (Sat, Sep 10)
20+20+20+7=67 (Tu, Sep 13)
20+7+20+7+20=74 (Sat, Sep 17)
20+7+20+7+20+7=81 (Tu, Sep 20)

The goal would be to maintain an average pace of 10mph for the entire ride, including rest stops.

No ride is more than 7 miles longer than its predecessor. And I reach the target distance a week ahead of time. Which means that if I find that the pace is becoming too great to maintain, I can put in some additional rest days. For instance, I understand that fueling, pacing, and hydration issues change as distances increase, and if I don't manage them correctly, I may not be able to keep on schedule. And I've been told that I should avoid any strenuous activity during the final week before the big ride.

Anyway, that's the plan. And we know about mice and men.