Leaving in an hour for our final training ride for the STP

Five years ago, almost to the day, I finished my final training ride for my first Seattle to Portland bike ride--the STP.  That was about two years after I moved to Whidbey Island.  I had been hearing about the STP from time to time during those two years, and decided after my first year that I might just try this thing.

So I bought a bike, a cheap one.  Steel, heavy, cheapest parts available.  Got on it, and rode all over the place in the spring and early summer of 2009.  It was hard, and mostly lonely, work.  I was not a cyclist.

The STP is not the most difficult of bike rides.  The Cascade Bicycle Clubs sponsors others that are more challenging, and there are other organizations out here that sponsor other rides that are also more challenging.

But, for me, the thought of riding my bike 200+ miles in two days was beyond my imagination.  I had a lot of doubts, and was a bit afraid of not being able to make it.  The morning in 2009 when I left Seattle I almost turned back and didn't try. I had told many people I was going to do this ride, partly to force myself to actually do it when the time came.  Couldn't back out when I had told so many people. 

I got there, very sore.  Open blisters on my butt the whole second day.

And when I crossed that finish line I was a different person.  I was no longer a college professor from Illinois.  I was a retired PNW person who had moved here to be able to take advantage of all of the outdoor opportunities this part of the country offered.

I had not wanted to retire to simply not work.  I retired to be able to learn new things, accomplish new things.   I had already learned to dance, and could do this well, and had done a lot of hiking, and had enjoyed that a lot.  But this, the STP, was different.  Because this was something that was quite far out of my previous comfort zone.

The next summer foot surgery prevented me from doing it again.  But in 2011, my son Jules and my son-in-law Sean did the STP with me.  Vicky was there at the finish line to celebrate with us and to drive us home.

Her plan for 2012 was to do some riding with me in the early stages of my training for the 2012 STP, and then I would do the final training on my own.  But after a few rides together, it became clear that she also could become a cyclist in her 60s and could do the STP.  So she, titanium disk in her back and all, bought a bike and off we went.

That year we trained together, and did as much riding on our road trips as we could.

In 2012 and 2013, Vicky, Jules, and I did the STP.

For awhile last year, during our training, Vicky and I thought it would be our final one.  The training rides we were taking were hard.  But as we got closer to the actual STP, those thoughts went by the wayside, and we decided we would keep doing them in future years.

This year we decided we would try a different approach to training--one that was not as brutal.  We didn't do any hard, long rides.  Instead, we did a large number of shorter rides.    What I and we had been doing in previous years was similar to the training guide provided by the Cascade Bicycle Club, and there is no doubt it worked. 

But this year we tried a different model.  In the 90 days since we did our first ride of 2014 we have done 52 rides, averaging 24 miles/ride.  We have taken only three rides longer than 60 miles.    We have taken only five rides of 50 miles or longer (compare that with the Cascade training guide that recommends 24 rides of 50 miles or longer).

We have taken 2 1/2 times more rides than we did in 2012, and have ridden 200 more miles.

Will it work for us?  We'll know in a week.  But we feel stronger than we did last year, our bodies less run down, our joints healthier.  Maybe, for people in their mid-60s who have not been cyclists, and who don't aspire to riding faster than 12 mph, something like what we are doing this year might be the best.    Our speeds over the three main training courses we have developed have increased dramatically in the past three months.  Whether that will translate into a fun STP for us is the question.  We know we can get there.  We just want to get there feeling good!

Regardless of how it turns out, this 90 days of training has been a great experience for us.   It has required some significant discipline to ride almost every day when we are home and the weather is acceptable.  And we know that it is a type of training regimen than one can only do if you are retired (the Cascade training guide is designed for people who are still working and have to do a lot of their training on weekends).

We are excited for next weekend to finally arrive when we leave Seattle on our bikes.  And we are excited for the next two hours to come--when we finish this year's training.  It's a beautiful day here.  Where else do we want to be today except riding on Whidbey Island together--catching glimpses of Mt. Baker and Mt. Rainier, of Saratoga Passage and the Strait of Juan de Fuca, of the Cascades and Olympics, of lush woods and open farm meadows, and dodging deer?

Gotta go get my Chamois Butt'r on.  We're ready to go!

 Two hours later:

A photo of us in our front yard after this final ride: