I almost… almost biked a hundred miles straight through. I mean… technically I biked a hundred miles in a day! Technicalities aside, I’m still proud of what I accomplished!
Start line at the ACS charity ride
This past Sunday, the American Cancer Society held their annual city-to-shore ride where cyclists ride from Philadelphia over the Ben Franklin bridge to a beach in New Jersey. It’s a 65 mile ride, or a metric century at 100km. I did a version of this last year when I rode for a different charity organization, and that was a lot of fun! This year, I wanted to try my hand at something a little more challenging, and signed up for the full century ride which included a 35 mile loop partway through the course.
The ride started out pretty great! It was a beautiful morning, I fueled appropriately and was hydrating. Halfway through, I found some riders, and joined them in a pace line which was by far the best part of the ride. We’d rotate leading the line for a mile pulling hard, and then draft for 3-5 miles (depending on the size of our pace line). Unfortunately, around mile 80 my lack of training started to show. I really struggled to maintain my speed and eventually tapped out at mile 94. I had 6-7 miles to go, but those were really hard miles with strong headwinds and I was spent. I had spent over 4 hours with a Zone 4/5 heart rate and my body said we’re done.
I got close. I was so close! But that’s okay! Objectively, if I look at my performance and what I had done previously, I absolutely fucking killed it! 94 miles? Minimal training?! Elevated heart rate for most of the ride?! What’s NOT to be proud of? Sure, I didn’t get a medal, but that’s okay. I’m proud of what I did, for my abilities.
And sometimes I forget about that. It’s always easy to compare yourself against others (social media certainly encourages this). But this ride definitely helped me remember to challenge myself and my abilities, regardless of what benchmarks or milestones other people have. Would it have been nice if I biked all 100 miles? Sure! Am I still proud of what I did? Absolutely! Did I get to ride with some amazing people and help donate to an amazing cause? A hundred percent.