Being a part of the 17hourtrainingday.com team this year has been the best stroke of luck I have ever encountered. When Steve asked "Do you want to do an Ironman" and I said "Definitely" I would have never guessed that I would embark on so many awesome adventures. Michelle, AKA PIC (Partner in Crime) lost her job (and luckily never found it) and although she didn't sign up for Ironman (though we begged her), she has been completing most of the training with us, cause she's a bad a$$, and we're going to make her sign up for an Ironman next year. She's so studly that her first 70.3 was at Kansas and she is headed to Clearwater because she cranked out a 5:03 and nailed second in her age group. Oh Yea! So, Steve called and said, "put your big girl panties on 'cause Wednesday we are headed to Wiggins." Wiggins? Like out in the middle of nowhere Colorado Wiggins? Like your somewhere between Kansas and Nebraska and you can't even see the mountains any more Wiggins? Yup, that's the one.

So Wednesday morning we loaded the bikes into Steve's truck and headed up to Boulder. Carole (Team Mom of Team Trakkers) was so kind to let us park at her place and even tagged along a little on our ride, although we started out much too slow for her since we had a long day ahead of us.

We headed up the diagonal and then went east on Hwy 52 where we rode STRAIGHT (like only two mini turns) for the next 78 miles. It was insane. I kept taking pictures, but they all looked the same.

Here's a great one, look we're on a straight road and PIC thinks she's on fire so she riding so fast to try to put out the flames.

Oh look, another straight road now Steve is pulling, but he's being normal...no fires to put out

Check this one out, it's amazing, we are on, you guessed it...a flat road, and welll, that's pretty much all I have to say.

Here is Steve smiling, probably because the road is so flat...

Our first stop was after 80 miles in Wiggins. It was HOT, somewhere in the upper 90's. We refilled all our bottles, ate nuts and jerkey, stocked up on Snickers bars, and hit the road. We had made it to Wiggins, now could we make it back to the truck?

The way back was a blast. I was lovin' this ride. We took turns pulling anywhere from 1-3 minutes, except as the day got longer so did Steve's pulls. The road was just flat with some nice steady easy ups and downs. Being on the TT bike was great because I now know my bike fit is puuurrrfect (courtesy of Steve).

Around mile 115 something happened to me. I had a bikers high! Kinda like a runners high. I took a couple pulls and I pulled too hard and started to go off the front. Steve yelled at me and I apologized. But I was still so excited, giddy, and happy. So, I started singing. I figured that we all had our iPods in, no one would hear. Well, I'm pretty sure they could, and that I entertained everyone for about 20 miles. I'm not such a good singer, especially when I can't even hear myself. Man I was having fun.

You'll never guess what's behind me here...flat road!

We had this awesome section that was 21 miles long and we covered it in exactly one hour, like to the minute. It was pretty cool to be cruising along at 21mph 100+ miles into the day. We stopped with 47 to go, and then with 25 to go. Those were more emotional stops than they were physical stops. There does come a point when you are close to the conclusion of something big where you are just ready to be done for the sake of being done.

That's PIC and I screwing around before Steve can catch us and tell us to start pedaling again. Don't PIC and I look like a bag of Twinkies...two in a pack, totally identical!

We rolled back into Carole's neighborhood 9 hours after we left. We had covered 156.2 miles with about an hours worth of stopping. Great day. Great accomplishment.

This was a good stepping stone for me. On August 1st we have a 225 mile ride planned with the 17hourtrainingday.com team. It has been our goal from day one to double the distance of each of the Ironman events. Biking 225 is the last "distance double" that we have left to do. I was a little daunted by the sheer numbers, but after the 156, I knew I had 70 more miles in me, so I gained a lot of confidence for that workout that is coming up.

On the way home we were giddy, and Steve had just about enough of us girls! Why he continues to tote us around everywhere, I don't know...he must think we have some talent or something!

A huge Thanks to Debbie for watching Annie, and to Troy for kinda being a single dad for the day so I can be a triathlete.