First Team Cynergy Ride

So this ride that I finished yesterday is now my longest ride ever. 53 miles. It's really not a lot, but if you've never done it before, it seems like a lot. So I felt a little nervous about it before starting. And when I was told that halfway through the ride there is a stretch called "3-mile hill", I got even more nervous. But I was told that there are other routes if I wanted to take it easy. My nerves weren't helped any when I talked to one other "new" rider who's longest ride to date was 70-ish miles. I was thinking to myself, "Oh shit, I've only done 38 miles before this. I hope I'll be ok." Well after riding 20ish miles, I find out that this "new" rider, Marcus, has actually done half triathlons and has even ran a super marathon, running 60 miles. So he wasn't completely a "new" rider. Just new to ALC.

So here I am standing in front of Cynergy Cycles in Santa Monica. One of the official ALC training rides start from this location and they call themselves Team Cynergy. Though I am standing there without my bike, I really did ride. I figured that I've had plenty of pictures w/ the bike and it wasn't necessary for me to go grab it just for the picture. If one looks closely, they will notice that this outfit looks very similar to the "First Ride 2011" outfit but it looks slightly different. Well it's actually the same outfit, but since it was cold outside, Darin lent me his vest and these things that went over my arms. Not sure what they're called, but it's like leg warmers, but for your arms, and seemed to be made w/ the same stuff that they make the jerseys with. Darin was sick, so he wasn't able to join me for the ride. One should also look closely to see that I am now wearing the 3rd sock that my sister gave me. From this distance, it's hard to really tell, so just take my word for it.

The ride was actually really beautiful since most of it was along the coast going from Santa Monica, through Venice, Marina Del Rey, El Segundo, Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, and up to Palos Verdes. And then we went kind of reversed our route and ended back up where we started from. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to take too many pictures. Below is a shot of the some of the people on the ride in Marina Del Rey during one of our breaks.

I really enjoyed riding with a group of people riding the ALC. Everyone was friendly and had cute anecdotes about ALC ride and training for the ride. And having others to talk to helped make the training more manageable. Plus, riding along the beaches presented a lot of distractions in the eye-candy department. So I am probably going to join this group again. Not only because of the eye candy (ok, perhaps mostly because of the eye candy), but also because the other riders. And next time, I'll make sure Darin goes too.

And to end my post, I present to you the food that I ate to help replenish my body after the ride:

Oops! Looks like I was a bit too hungry and scarfed down my meal before taking a picture. Trust me, it was delicious and hit all the right spots.