Tour de Fun 50K ride

The beauty of Facebook is that it makes it easy to be peer-pressured into an event.  A few weeks ago this happened for the Tour de Fun bike ride.  A friend posted a picture after packet pickup for the ride and showed how cute the event t-shirt was.

The FB post that captured me and had me deciding to ride 12 hours before it started! 

That proceeded to getting pulled in to join on the ride with two friends.  I made it to the race site nice and early for registration and got signed up.  I got my number situated onto the back of my jersey and then proceeded to get my bike set up for the ride.

The 50K ride started at 6:45 and just before the start I found my two friends.  The start is in downtown Rogers and there are brick cobbles which always make me nervous.  We got started with a wave to Janet's husband who was taking photographs for the event.

Here we go! Wearing my International kit to support the start of World Cup! 

The first mile of the ride is pretty much downhill with little pedaling required so you aren't really warmed up when you hit the hills into Prairie Creek.  The girls and I separated slightly on the hills so I was looking for a spot to pull over and regroup when I spotted a $20 bill lying on the ground.  The money was near a drive thru ATM machine so I pulled through and picked up the bill.  What a find! The girls passed me so I hollared that I would catch up with them shortly.

Biking across the HWY 12 bridge

We continued on the curving hills and enjoyed cycling across the HWY 12 bridge over Beaver Lake.  It was a gorgeous morning and the lake was beautiful.  We hit the 50K turn and knew we had about 5 miles to go until our turnaround point.  My friend Jeff Spencer came up along side me during this section and so we pedaled and chatted for a few minutes.  We hit the turn around point and we all stopped to refill our bottles and eat some of our nutrition.  We were back on the road a few minutes later and made our way back the way we came.

I forgot about the long decline we had coming out of Prairie Creek but definitely felt the incline on the return trip.  I was going along and couldn't understand why I felt so slow until I realized that it was an incline!  It was quite the relief to realize I wasn't as slow as I thought! The final mile back into town is an uphill that is pretty draining.  I was glad to get up it and make my way back to the finish line.  I finished about a minute ahead of Jamye and Janet and cycled back to join them.  I think they got stopped at the stoplights getting into town.

Finish time! 

After wards I racked my bike at the car and fixed myself an Abloc Nutrition chocolate milk for recovery.  It was fun to enjoy the beautiful weather and chat with friends near the finish area.  However I eventually had to head home and get some real food in me! Below is a Flipagram video that Jamye put together of our day!

Post by Jamye Perry.

What makes you stronger!

This morning was the Bentonville Half Marathon training group's third group run. At just the 3rd week of the program, we are at a distance of two miles. For many in the group this is their first time to commit to a running program and two miles is a challenge. 

The route that we tackled included the Compton Gardens portion of our local running trail.  This section of the trail also happens to be part of the last mile of the race course too.  The fun part of this route is that you get to run downhill only to hit the turn around point and go back up! Before each group run, our coach Mike Rush goes over pointers and call outs for the participants.  Today he talked about a key form mistake a lot of us make...running with tension. His tips were to make sure you dropped those shoulders and relaxed the tension in your back. 

Once we were out on the run the Rush team split up through out the group to encourage and support the participants. I ended up with my buddy Jody and we had fun encouraging others as we ran. We tried to say good job or something similar to everyone we passed. When we hit the hill we were the chattiest ones trying to take people's minds off the hill. Sometimes running can be mental and you just need a distraction! I tried my hardest to get someone to cross the top of the hill with their arms up a la Rocky but got no takers. 

After running the training group in, I had 2.78 miles on my watch which was way less than my target mileage for the day.  I took a quick break to use the potty and get a sip of water then headed back out.  Originally I wanted to add on enough to hit 5 miles and I headed in a direction to accommodate that. Then I decided to continue on to hit 6 miles and ended up making it to 6.5 miles with my route choices. I quickly headed home and got Sidney geared up to run with me.

Sidney got a new gentle leader harness for Christmas and these are the best harnesses for her. She loves going on runs and just ran with joy the minute we got out the door.  I needed another 2.5 miles to hit my 9 mile goal for the day.  The thing about running from my house is that there are hills in every direction.  I decided on a route that would take me down and then back up one of the biggest hills.  Going down was a breeze...but coming back up was slow going. I swear my dog stopped a couple of times and looked back at me with a look that said, "seriously are you even moving!" I was slow but I conquered that hill.  

That's the thing about hills...the more you train on them the easier they become.  Hills truly make you a stronger runner and that is why Mike Rush has the training group run on the hills in the course. Back to Mike's tip about relaxing the shoulders and tension...I noticed on my run with Sidney that no matter the terrain she ran with joy and happiness. That pup had no tension in her little body! I should take lessons from her, especially since she beat me up that hill!