September - What a great month!

Wow can't believe I totally missed writing anything on here in September. Well, it was a pretty busy month. Ended up taking 2 weeks off of biking after my injury and during that time I ended up moving into my own basement apartment!! Very exciting. Been here for over a month now and I absolutely love it. Love that it's my little space.

Managed to get 2 more rides in with the freewheel group before we sadly had to close up shop due to the sun setting ealier and earlier. Can't believe the summer is over already...sigh...

My name officially was placed on the Sea to Sea website and now if you go there, there is even a link to my own profile/donation page. Things sure are coming along!! Dave R. even has even put together a forum for the cyclist who are partaking in the Sea to Sea. Can't wait to really get to know eachother. Definantly can tell there are alot of different types of personalities and characters coming on this tour. Hopefully we can all learn a little something from each other.

Started rock climbing again. Just casually though this winter. I had stopped last Feb. due to training for the Paris to Ancaster Bike Race and because I was finding I was getting fustrated alot due to the fact that I wasn't coming enough so I wasn't advancing in my skills and usually felt like I was going backwards on my skills. I really do enjoy rock climbing though so this year I've promised myself to just have fun with it and just take it as it comes.

Once I got back on my bike part way through September I had to step it up a notch as I had one more race to go, St. Catharine's Liberty Squeezer 30km Mtn Bike Race. My friend Derek (who just started biking this summer) also decided he was going to try the race out, which I was super excited about. We went out for a really good ride to warm up in the Dundas Valley a couple of weekends before. I couldn't believe that here he had just started riding this summer and already he was nearly kicking my butt in riding...of course that was in the first half of the ride. Then his cardio ran out and I smoked him....well kind of...lol. It's sad and I hate to admit it, but no matter how much us girls train and gain muscle and strenght, boys are just naturally stronger. Man that sucks!

The few days before the race (which was on Sept. 30) I wasn't able to get any pre-riding in but for good reason. My gradeschool best friend who moved to Calgary before Gr.3 and I haven't seen (we figure) in about 11 years was coming down for my friend (her cousin) Melanie's Wedding. I was so excited to get to see her again after sooo long. I was a little nervous though too, would we connect? Would we have enough to talk about? Well let me tell ya, I picked her up after work on the friday and we didnt' get to bed till 2am cause we couldn't stop talking or giggling. Felt awesome. It's sad how as you grow up you don't seem to laugh that "laugh till your sides and your cheeks ache laugh" like you did when you were younger. Why is that I wonder. Is it just the opportunity isn't there as much? Or you just don't seem to get as deep with those around you? Hmm, who knows. But it sure is great when you get too! The wedding was great and the weather was perfect for an end of September wedding. Melanie looked absolutely georgeous. The reception was tons of fun too. Funny thing is I was joking about the food and what was being served as well for those of you who ride a wee bit more serious know what you eat the night before a race is fairly important and can make quite a bit of difference in how you feel while riding. Mel told me to sign up for the Veggie dish as it was going to be pasta. I said perfect, I need my carbs...and I am sure I can sneak a piece of chicen somewhere. Well, let me tell you...everyone at my table was drooling over my meal and wishing they had the veggie dish as well :) Plus sneaking a piece of chicken was no problem as the food was passed around each table :) All right! lol. I was soooo stuffed. The only thing that was too bad was I didn't end up using my 2 free drink tickets as I just didn't want anything bringing me down (that and for some reason later on in the evening I wasn't feeling so hot :P), but still danced the night away. It was sooo hard to leave and go home cause we were having so much fun. But I finally found myself in bed about 12:45am.

We had another perfect weather day for the race. The track was beautiful. So dry, but not too dry that there was alot of dust. Definantly the best year out of the 3 that I have been apart of this race. I ended up in the 2nd wave this year (there were 1100 people out this year and they send the groups out in segments, 7 min apart). The last 2 times I had been in the 4th wave so all of a sudden I had a little less time to get ready...yikes! and would you believe my friend Derek who has never done a race, also ended up in my wave!! Crazy. Poor guy was a wee bit nervous at first, but let me tell ya, he biked a good one. In fact for the first 5km or so he was ahead of me!! Till he nicked a tree and then I passed him and left him to eat my dust ;) (Love ya Derek if you are reading this, hehe) My friends Mari and Dave were also in the 2nd wave as they were riding single speed bikes. Mari is smoking fast and has strength like no other...which became obvious when it was later realized she was the only female single speed rider!! First place for her :) Dave passed me a couple of km's into the ride and I was waiting for Mari to do the same, but it didn't happen for quite some time...well actually it didn't happen at all b/c at one point all of a sudden I heard her say "Hey Steph" behind me and I was like, I'm half way through this now there is no way I am letting her get by me now :) lol. She was an added push which I credited her for later, lol. She is such a motivator.

I wasn't sure how well I was doing at times but I was feeling so great so I started thinking, hmmm maybe I have a chance at podium again. I'm going to push it hard...no pain no gain. At one point I ended up hearing the people who were handing out banana's at the half way point yell out, "Hey it's a girl rider." I took that for not many others had come by yet, so I was feeling really good at this point. I definantly was feeling this ride as I never got off for any of the tricky spots this year and even made it up a few sharp super rocky spots that the boys weren't even doing :) There was a camera man at the top of that one saying "That's right you show them how it's done." What can I say, makes me smile :) Near the end with only a few km's left 2 girls ended up getting by me. I was like, noooo. What if they are in my category. I just got bumped. I have to catch them. So I went hard after them and twice I nearly went over my handlebars. The end part is very dug out with a bit of puddles and one that I went through in order to get by the one girl ended up being wayyyy deeper than I thought it would be. My bike clipped the side wrong and swung out sideways. I was like oh man I'm done, but somehow I managed to stay on 'er and kept on going, of course I had put a bit of distance again between me and those 2 riders.

Near the end I caught the one girl on the last bit and there is this last hill right before the finish and I was in such a hard gear as I had been pushing to get by her and I hadn't geared down fast enough but it was too late for that hill but with the adrenaline (and the crowd is there as well as my parents screaming and cheering :) ) the pain disappears and I went. Then I saw the other chick and thought I could catch her...would have too had there been about 1/4 of a km extra to go. Ah well in the end I ended up finding out that neither were in my category after all, lol. Ah well gave me a good time!

But the best part is...I did end up getting podium!! I finished 2nd in the Female 20-29 age category!! and I was only 3min behind first place. I came in at 1 hour 35 min. I had shaved another 20 min off my time from the previous year. There ended up being 27 females in my group and in total I was 19th out of 156 women (of all categories) and 362 out of 996 men and females (of all categories). Feeling sooo good!

I was soo proud of my friend Derek too. His first race and he came in only 7 min after me at a time of 1hour 43 min. You rock Derek! My friend Mari came in only 2 min after me for a time of 1 hour 37 min! She is fast! and remember that's on a single speed!!

There's another reason though I love this race. It's also St. Catharine's Wine and Grape festival!! So afterwards (as a cyclists you get a few free tokens) you get to go for yummy food and wine, mmmmm. So good :) After the food we waited around to get my medal and for prizes after. No big wins though :( but did manage to snag a bike pump thanks to Derek's long arms :)

Well sad to say, I have about hung up my mtn bike for the year (unless a few friends want to make a day of it on a weekend) and it's back to road riding on the weekend and spinning classes or the trainer during the week night. Can't wait for the first Freewheel Cycle group ride of the season already set for April 7th :) Yep I'm weird :) But I love my biking!