Craig's 1st 50

Today was an early day - I got up at 4:40 AM to go for a ride at 5:30 AM since I had a 7:30 AM meeting with the Bishop. While getting ready, I got to catch some of stage 20. The entire stage, 100+ miles of nothing but up. Granted, there was some descending but very little. The stage profile offered a bit of inspiration as Rob asked me, "So where we going today?" All I could think about was "up!". So we headed up to Bald Peak - 52 minutes later we were at the top. I felt the climb as I was paying for riding up Bell Road yesterday after work. I had never been up Bell Road from the 99. It was 2 miles of up, averaging probably 10% - pain, more pain, and well, pain. I got up the climb but paid for it this morning on the way to Bald Peak. I was able to stay with Rob but it was painful.

After the meeting with the Bishop, Craig and I got ready and headed out to ride his 50 miler to complete the cycling merit badge for him. We rolled out North Valley Road to Gaston, Cornelius, Forrest Grove to the Hagg Lake store. Craig was doing an excellent ride as we averaged 15 MPH. We got some lunch at the store and rested for a couple minutes, and then headed back to Newberg. Craig did his part pulling and keeping up. I thought he would start to ease up about mile 35. It never happened. On the rollers on North Valley as we were coming back in, he was pulling hard on the up. In fact, pulling so hard that I had to work to keep up with him. On one of them, I had to get out of the saddle and give it the gas or I would have been dropped. I could hear Phil Liggett in my head screaming, "And there goes Beecher! Beecher has cracked! He couldn't take the acceleration of Craigus and so he's off the back." I wasn't having any of that so I quickly jumped back on his wheel, wondering if he noticed that he was putting me into the red zone. No excuses but I was feeling Bell Road and Bald Peak. Just like a predator that smells weakness, Craigus was kicking it in. The mini-Pain Train was taking it's maiden voyage and I was it's first passenger! Wow! Doing this was not only rewarding but fun and made a dad proud. We hit 50 miles at 3 hours 20 minutes. I wonder how I did my first 50 that Christmas Day back in 2004. I rode out Bandera Road and suffered that day. I remember the suffering, just not the time. Anyway, Craig did well. I hope this has sparked his interest in cycling and we can continue to ride together. Well see. For now, Congrats to Craig for riding his first half century.

All told for the week, over 130 miles. I have my eye on the Tour de Tucson in November and making sure I can get in the miles. The intensity of the training has been ratched back a few notches as I try to get in some good base miles again.