I did it!

My goal this year was to ride 1,000  miles before Cycle Oregon - and I made it with three weeks to spare!

No rest for the weary, though! My new goal is to get another 250 in before we head out of town. That's a bit of a stretch, and I know it. Here's how I think it'll go:
     This week: Wednesday 15 miles, Saturday 86 miles (omg), Sunday 20 miles = 121
     Following week: Wednesday 15 miles, Saturday 50, Sunday xx, Monday yy = 65 + ?
     Final few days beforehand: Wednesday 15

If I do the miles as planned, that'll leave 49 miles for me to do that Sunday/Monday (it's Labor Day weekend already...!). That should be very doable - note there is an IF in the previous sentence, and a SHOULD in this one. We'll see how it plays out. I do have plans with my bike friends for a specific ride that Sunday, but I'm not sure about its mileage.

This coming Saturday will be my longest ride of the year (.4 longer than the longest Cycle Oregon day, though much much much flatter) - it's an organized ride, and I'm not going with any friends, so I hope that there are enough other riders to distract/entertain me as I slog it out. And I hope it's not as hot as it's been lately.. it's looking like high 80s which is ten degrees cooler than the LAST organized ride I did, so that's a positive sign.

In general, I'm nervous about my conditioning and stamina. I guess part of that is because it never gets easy, even if it goes faster! As part of a loop I did this weekend I revisited a hill I did this spring. At the time I remember I was in my smallest gears and going 3 miles per hour - my app thought I'd stopped moving! This time I was in harder gears and kept it above 8 miles per hour the whole time, so clearly I've improved! But I was sure happy when the light at the top of the hill turned red so I could recover.

I was talking to a bike pro today and she was impressed with my training - I've been doing just about 100 miles/week and running about 6 miles/week, usually with two days of little or no activity. She thinks it'll be sufficient for me to do okay on the ride. I sure hope so!

I also finally picked a bike seat. It is fine in the crotch and upper legs area (the woman I talked to today calls that area the blegs (butt/legs) - ha!). The seat makes my sit bones feel sore, but on the other hand I've been on a different seat every week all summer long. My butt has NO IDEA what "my" seat feels like. So, I bought the seat, have it on my bike and have a couple hundred miles to get used to it. Gulp.