What doesn't make you stronger, kills you!

Is it really April? Because it feels like January!

Julie and I planned for a "short" ride of 33 miles down the trail toward Yelm. Julie requested a short ride because her legs were tired from all our workouts we've done this week. I fully expected her to drive to our meeting place, but when I arrived, there she was, no car in sight. I told her it would be 43 miles for her (not exactly a short ride by Julie standards). She seemed okay with that. We took off down the trail. Due to the bit of a headwind, (a COLD headwind at that, one of those winds that make it so you never quite warmup) we stopped at McDonalds in Yelm to have something warm to drink and get a little warmth. Since I'm not a coffee drinker, I had a hot chocolate. Unfortunately, hot chocolate has more calories. As we were sitting there warming our hands and feet (well, actually, everything), I noticed the reader board outside said, "20 piece nuggets $4.99". I told Julie we could have had the 20 piece nuggets for the price of our two drinks. Julie then made a crack about how my hot chocolate was probably about the same calories. She said that was the advantage of drinking coffee (she had a latte). There are less calories. True. So I had to work off those additional calories.

We had planned to take the road back. It's shorter, by 5 miles, than the trail. Instead we opted for the guaranteed tailwind of the trail. In fact, we commented that we would "Fly" down the trail! Since we did have a bit of a tailwind, I decided to push it. I think our average at that point in Yelm was 12.7. We cruised back through Rainier and then really stomped on the pedals to the bench by the train yard. Our average was slowly creeping up. We pushed it again to 103rd. By then my average was 13.2. Julie was having a harder time keeping up (I know 13.2 isn't that fast of an average, but you have to realize we are riding touring bikes with 700cX35 tires). The next mad dash was to 89th. Average was up to 13.3. Then it was 89th to the top of the hill at Rainier Rd. Average: 13.4! By then the wind had seemed to reverse itself because it was brutal riding along Rainier Rd. I was just trying to keep it above the average. We hammered two more sections until we parted at the bridge. The average remained at 13.4 for the remainder of the ride.

What began as a short ride ended up being 40 miles for me and about 50 for Julie!

Calories burned: 1,620!

Never a bad day to ride!