Sunday was the "Paper Man" bike ride sponsored by the Twin Cities Bike Club. 30 miles. I joined Kris, Bill and Michele. The weather when we started was upper 40s and moist, but not raining.

I did fairly well for the first half. My legs told me, "There's 10 miles" -- my normal bike ride to work. They totally knew when we'd hit 10 miles.

The ride from about 14 to 21 miles did me in, though. Lightly rolling hills, and by 21, the temperature had gone up to 52 but then dropped to 46. My legs were cold and starting to stiffen up and tremble.

Bill finished the 30 miles at an average pace of 19 MPH (wow!) and backtracked. He rode with Kris (well ahead of Michele and I) for a little bit, then came back to Michele and I.

Bill and Michele then baby-sat me for about 7 miles as I got slower and slower. I did a little walking to stretch the legs, and Bill pushed me up a couple of the long hills, which was really quite nice of him. With about 2-3 miles to go, I told them "Go ahead and finish. Once you're all packed up, come back this way and check on me. I think I can make it, but I'm just going to walk for a bit."

So they did, and I did, and I was about a quarter mile from the end when they got back to me.

I finished the 30 miles, walking about a mile of it all told. My legs were completely gone. I guess that means it was a good workout.

22 miles would have been a good distance yesterday. Even 25 I could have finished in something resembling fashionable. But 30 miles is the longest I've ridden (previous record was about 29), and I haven't ridden more than 7 since September.

Next scheduled ride is the Straw Man on Sunday. 48 miles, I believe. I won't go 48, but there will be cut offs to shorten the distance. The weather this week is totally crappy, but I'll hop on the exercise bike tonight for a very easy ride (maybe only 20 easy minutes to loosen up), then tomorrow I'll work it very hard to aim for exhausted legs by 30 minutes. Wednesday easy, Thursday hard, then Friday and Saturday easy.

Michele thinks I can complete the metric century (62 miles) at the Iron Man. We'll see. That's still my goal.