A change in season...already?!

Last night, our ladies' group rode 25.5 miles in the rain. There were two tandems out for the ride, which means that the entire evening consisted of the tandems and those who could draft them - averaging somewhere around 23mph - shooting off the front and the rest of us falling off the back - at more like 17mph. While the tandem group FLEW out in front, the rest of us felt like we were slow and struggling to keep up even though we were pushing it pretty hard. I even rode the last 6 miles or so in my drops to try to make up some distance, but without much luck. Tandems are fast, m'kay?

I'm not sure yet, but last night may have been our last ladies' group ride of the season. How sad! What will I do now?! I would especially appreciate continuing a group ride of some kind for motivation to train for the duathlon on the 26th. Fortunately, the Rapid Wheelmen have plenty of other rides throughout September. One of the girls last night also mentioned that a cyclocross group is starting up on Thursday nights. Maybe I'll try that out. Do they let you ride cross on a mountain bike?

Cyclocross might work out well, too, because the state game area where I've been mountain biking closes to bikers at the end of August. It doesn't look like I'll be able to make it out there again before it closes. That makes me kind of sad, since I just started getting into mountain biking. So maybe cross is the answer. Or maybe I'll just focus on running and keeping up my road endurance for the upcoming race. Knowing that I'm not going to train as much as I probably should, that may be the best choice. Heh!