Grill de Steak

I have a small dry-erase board that I keep on the side of the fridge to keep track of upcoming events for the week. I had posted our Tour de Stake bike ride for Saturday only to notice a few days later that our family comedian, Craig, had altered the event to Grill de Steak with doodling of the bbq grill & Heinz 57 sauce next to it. We all got a chuckle out of his humor & even went to the store to buy the steaks & 57 for the post-ride victory bbq.

I'm very interested to read what Chris posts about the Stake ride. I hope he's not modest & just puts it out there that he is THE KING of cycling in our stake. I heard rumors that "the pack" was going to attack some big head on a recumbant. I knew Chris was going to be part of "the attack". I thought with all the riding I had done with him that I was going to be able to hold his wheel & earn my spot in "the group". I also thought that since this was a Tour de Stake ride, where riders stop at every church building in the stake to eat & mingle, that if I did lose Chris, I would catch him if I skipped stopping at a building. Well, the ride was NOTHING like I had planned. First I have to say that Chris & I had not discussed "the game plan". We left the stake center in McMinnville just after 8am with about 50 other riders. The "big players" were out of the parking lot like a bullet. Chris & I exited about 15 seconds behind. About mile 8, instead of heading towards the first stop/building in Amity, the leaders u-turn in the middle of the highway & start heading towards stop 2 in Dayton. Chris sees this & checks the traffic behind & follows suit. I check & do the same. The road was a flat, straight shot. Without one word or signal to me, Chris went after the leaders like a dog who broke off a leash! Let's just say, I got dropped like a hot potato. The riders who were behind me had continued on to the Amity stop to eat a breakfast they had there. So, there were no riders behind me on this road. For the next 8 miles, I kept watching Chris fade away. Get this; I was riding 22 mph & he was still fading! My hope was that I would catch him at the Dayton stop. As I approached the church building in Dayton, I saw a couple of people, non-riders, sitting in lawn chairs in the parking lot visiting. No riders though. Instead of stopping, I kept going & in doing so, got off the route somehow & ended up taking a grand bike tour of Dayton, OR for 5 minutes before finding my way back on the route. I started on towards the 3rd stop in Newberg on this back country road I had never been on before alone. Did I mention I don't bike ride alone? I always ride with Chris. So, here I was alone in the country on a bike. No sight of other cyclists. It was a beautiful, sunny day. I kept hammering out the 22mph pace, amazing myself, because even when Chris & I ride together, we usually hold between 17-19 mph. My first 20 miles I did in 1:06! After making the turn on to highway 240, I had a good feeling I would be able to catch Chris at the Newberg building because I was in "home" territory. What I forgot was how heavy the traffic is on the 240 & kept getting buzzed by the trucks & cars. I missed a turn on the route somewhere & ended up taking other roads to get to the church building. Heck, maybe it would end up being a short-cut! NOT! The miles all came out the same & once I got to the building, was informed by 2 other riders who had stopped that my husband did not stop at this building either & had taken over the lead of & pounded "the pack" in the ground & was probably already back in Mac. I was really ticked that he hadn't waited for me there. I was frustrated that I was doing this ride solo. I came very close to just biking home from there. But, I decided to go hammer out the rest of the ride & get some face time with the roads that we will be on next Saturday for the Vine Ride. For the remaining 30 miles, I sat on that bike & fumed! I got past being afraid of the trucks & went right to being something Chris was going to fear when I got him in my sights! When I got to Yamhill, the 4th stop, I skipped going to the church building. I was just through the main intersection trying to navigate the route minus the turn to the church when my cell phone rang. It was the "yellow jersey" on the other end. He had finished in Mac. I still had 15 miles to go. He offered to meet me halfway & ride into Mac with me. So, I headed towards the next town, Carlton. I missed another route turn & had to stop & call Chris for directions. We ended up finding each other in town & rode together into McMinnville.

I did the 65 mile loop in 3:50. Would have been less if I hadn't kept getting lost & if I didn't have to work solo.

Lessons learned:
Talk to your riding partner ahead of time to establish game plan(s) for the ride.
Know the route.
Watch for the badly painted route signs instead of hydrating or geling as you come into towns.
Don't give up.
Good things come out of doing hard things, especially if you do it alone.
I can't compete with Chris' "A" game.

There are more, but I'll leave it at that.

So, we had our awesome steak dinner today after church. Next ride in 6 days...The Vine Ride.

The Scout canoe trip Chris was supposed to go on was cancelled due to lack of adult leadership. He ended up still taking Thursday & Friday off. Can you believe it? Chris NEVER takes days off unless he's traveling for family business, traveling for a bike event or actually riding in a bike event. It was pure relaxation just hanging out around home & working on the yard. We got in a good 35 mile bike ride one day on the road bikes. Then we took the kids to a state park nearby, Champoeg (pronounced shampoowee) & rode the mountain bikes on the trail there. Friday, we did a repeat of the Champoeg outting, but I ran instead. It turned out to be my longest run, 6.82 miles! Champoeg is an awesome state park. The Willamette River runs right next to it & the trails are really nice. There is a large campground there as well as frisbee golf which we saw quite a few people playing. Colin loved getting pulled around by Chris in the bike trailer. Chris paced me & Colin cheered me on by repeating over & over, "Oh yeah baby! Oh yeah baby!" Then he would mix it up & say, "Oh no baby! Oh no baby!" Cassie & Craig had their own little bike race going on. Chris coached Craig with some "insider" bike moves on how to beat Cassie at the finish line. I think Craig ended up winning, but I didn't see it.

I felt like I was back in Ft. Polk today at church. I substitute-lead the music in sacrament meeting. I taught sharing time for Jr. primary. There was a last minute sub for primary chorister, but she couldn't do Sr. singing time, so I ended up doing a combined singing-sharing time for Sr. primary. My team teacher taught our 8 year old class without me. Glad she was there! Lots of people on vacation.

I took a couple of Cassie's friends to the movies to see "No Reservations" last week. It was a pretty good movie. A good love story. Then Chris & I went out to dinner & to see the new "Bourne" with Cassie's friends' parents a couple of days later! It was fun to go out with other adults. It's been a while. We loved the movie & are happy that Cassie's friends have cool parents. Cassie & I are excited to take Chris' mom Kathy to see "Becoming Jane" this next weekend! Yay! Good movies are out!