Good times, bad times... it all works

Don't wait for something big to occur. Start where you are, with what you have, and that will always lead you into something greater.  -- Mary Manin Morrissey

This past weekend, I rode the Rosedale Ride, a pay ride to support the Rosedale school for challenged individuals. I have ridden this ride a number of years, since Team In Training opts to use it as a supported training ride; which was great for me this time around, because I haven't seen some of these folks in a while. They offer 40-mile and metric century (62.5-mile) options, and I chose the longer route ahead of LoneStar 70.3 in two weeks.

Driving over to the start and looking at the flags blowing, I knew I would be changing the 90s off the bike and going with the 58s. Just too windy to risk it. Met up in the parking lot with the TnT folks.  I think I was the last 60-miler to get started because I was too busy talking with some TNT friends who were doing the 40, so that was kinda funny when I got up to the rope and they let me squeeze under it. But it didn't matter too much, because I caught up with the crowd pretty quickly. I caught up with Jeff, Amy and John. Once John figured out I was going to push it a little harder than the Team folks, he and I cranked it up. We ran around 20-22 for most of the first half of the ride. About midway John hooked up with a friend of his and took off. I knew I had to run Sunday, so I let them fly without me.

Just before the New Sweden church, I ran into Carl, Tom and and some Team newbies I didn't know. Carl was going to pull one young lady in - ride in front and take the wind so she wouldn't have to work as hard - so Carl and I rode side-by-side and jaw-jacked the rest of the ride. Really good to catch up with him and ride with him again.

Sunday was the Capitol 10K, the biggest 10K race in the state. So I was out there with 23,000 of my closest friends -- REALLY close at the start! (just for the record, she backed into ME!) I was hoping to just finish better than the 1:16 I did last year. It was cool at the start, but once I actually started moving (7+ minutes after the gun we crossed the start line) I started sweating pretty quickly. And once again, traffic bottled up a bit at the bottom of the hill of Enfield going over Lamar, and again at Enfield going under MoPac. Once past that though, it thinned out a little bit - enough to where I felt like I wasn't going to trip over somebody racing past me. I managed 1:08:27, which was about 7 minutes faster than last year, so I was pretty happy with that.
Oh, the bad times? -- Got home from the Cap 10K to find the water heater had busted and water everywhere in the garage.

I got a lot of comments on the cycling jersey this weekend, so I am going to see what it would cost to get some printed, assuming there truly is enough interest.