107.3 miles later...

So obviously I made it, otherwise you wouldn't be reading this.  I was up a little later than I should have been Friday, and I had a little trouble sleeping the night before mostly because I was a little anxious I think.  The plan was to leave my house at 6:50AM to meet Julie (my old roommate from back in the intern days) a few miles from my house, so I set my alarm for 5:45 (ugh!).  I swear, my alarm gets more use on the weekend than any other time.  From there we meandered our way south past Loveland, fighting the urge to stop at the outlet mall for some shopping.  In one area that we rode through I saw, no lie, a turkey walking down the street.  I'm not sure if that's the norm around there, but it was certainly strange.

It seemed like no time at all before we hit the 1st aid station.  Having aid stations along the way was really nice because it allowed me carry only 2 water bottles instead of the 4 that I would have needed otherwise.  The food was questionable for my tastes, so I just stuck with my tried and true Gu.  This wasn't the type of ride where I wanted to experiment with eating borderline junk food for energy.  Walking around the aid station I managed to get some mud in my cleats and could get them to clip in.  After a few minutes of fussing, and some help from the sag wagon, I got them to work and we were on our way to the first major climb of the day up to Carter Lake.  It wasn't a super steep climb, but it was a nice long slow burn with a couple switchbacks.

From there we went up to Horsetooth via Masonville.  It's a road I'm pretty familiar with, which was probably a bad thing.  Once we got past Masonville and started heading up to Horsetooth Mountain Park I decided to chase down some people that I saw in front of me.  Probably not a good idea 40 miles into a 100 mile day, but it was fun.  I think I understand my dog's chase instinct now.

Things got a little hairy after Horsetooth.  There was a motorist at the corner of 38E and Centennial who flagged me down for directions.  This guy asked me how to get to 287, and clearly deserved a dope slap.  To get to there he was, he pretty much HAD to come from 287 in the first place.  I really should have told this guy to get a map (and a clue).  While this mind boggling exchange was going on, Julie rode by without me noticing.  Since I hadn't seen her, I decided to wait in case she had flatted.  To make a long, frustrating story short, I eventually found out she was ahead of me, and met up with her on the other side of Centennial at the next aid station.

All the major climbing was done at this point so now it was just a matter of surviving on the flats.  We caught a little bit of rain on this stretch, but not enough to be trouble.  As we turned south and started heading (thankfully) back towards civilization a headwind picked up.  It was really nice to have a riding partner at this point because we were able to take turns at the front taking the wind while the other person drafted.  I was sooo ready for that last aid station in Wellington, and I finally caved and ate some snack food.  It was relatively healthy trail mix type stuff.  What I REALLY wanted was some pizza from the restaurant that was right there.  It smelled soooo good.  Instead we forged onwards for the last 20 miles.  It was kind of a drag being back in town with a bunch of cars again.

We got stopped at a light just before the finish line at the bike shop which game me a chance to rest up for my "sprint finish".  I just had to make sure my legs were good and trashed.  :)  Due to the fact that I started my century from my house (and not the bike shop), my ride ended up clocking in at 107.3 miles.  But I guess the extra 7 miles made for a nice warmup/cooldown.

When I bought my bike this year, I decided that I'd like to ride a century someday.  I didn't really think that I'd be doing it my first year out.  The next goal: Mt. Evans.