For five months, I’d had today circled in the calendar: Mountain Equipment Coop Spring Century Ride. I’d talked about it with the club members, made plans, etc. Then it occurred to me on Friday that I hadn’t gotten the usual email from the organizer on the week of, telling me to pick up my bib number at MEC on Thursday night. I wondered if there was some new privacy restriction where I needed to check a particular box to get emails from them. But when I went through my email and our financials I realized that I’d never actually registered. I had registered for the Gran Fondo Badlands and for the Tour de Victoria, but not the MEC rides. So, I registered last night and drove the 130 kilometres to the event start this morning.
There was a sizeable crowd for both the 60 km and 100 km distances.
Adam was there from the club. He was a frequent attendee of the Zwift nights this past winter. He was still suffering from the crash he had fat biking at Nose Hill this past winter.
The day was a bit windy, but it was coming more or less straight out of the west. Since the route was north-south, that meant a crosswind.
I was on my own, and worked to my limit. I stopped at every aid station and paid close attention to my drinking (a bottle of electrolyte drink between every station) and eating. I managed to average 28.5 km/h and finished in 3 hours and 42 minutes. Not my fastest 100 km, but fastest on my own with that kind of wind.
I had a good time, and really enjoyed having my Roubaix back after it’s front brake caliber replacement. I am still really digging the blue and yellow colours!
One of the thoughts that I had during my three-plus hours on my own in the saddle today, is that we have now been in Calgary for five years. A lot has happened in that time. For perspective: we have almost been in Calgary as long as Tammy and I were in Prince George. Here’s a photo that the realtor took of us when we got the keys to our house five years ago.
For fun and giggles, we re-created the photo this afternoon.
Glad you enjoyed your ride, the weather seemed ok. Hard to think you have been there for 5 years, the kids have definitely grown, or you and tammy have shrunk a lot.
Enjoyed your fun and giggles photo, Simon😍