Ready or not, it's almost time!

Well, Thursday is the day! Ready or not, here we come. The training is done and it's time to depend on Him fully now. I want to thank Lisa for not bailing me out of this and allowing me the time and expense to do it. It has been a growing experience and I'm glad to say that I'm addicted to biking.

Training has went well overall. I look back from where I started out this spring and am amazed at what God has done with my body and my attitude. I went for my first 20 mile ride (without hills) and thought I was going to die. Now 20 miles is a cool down the day after a long ride. I used to tell myself that I wasn't an athlete and this was crazy. Now I believe I can do this and have a positive attitude more often. I'm down over 25 pounds from February. There's over 800 miles on my bike and after this week it will be almost 1200. My goal for next year is 3000 during the riding season!

Thank you to everyone that has donated to Pray America. While short of the $5000, we have raised almost $2000 for the widows and orphans of Guatemala. That money will go toward either the feeding programs or widow housing as I've left it up to them to decide how to disperse it. I will give a final total after the ride as donations are still coming in. I want to thank the donor that donated the complete widow house and, by doing so, committed me to doing a Century ride. Make sure you get your bike ready because the part I forgot to mention is that the donor has to ride it also! :)

I'm not a big scripture-quoting person, but Philippians 4:13 is what keeps running through my head these days: I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. I know that this verse pertains to much more than just what I want to apply it to. Sometimes I just want to apply it to this ride and say that I can handle everything else on my own. He's asking me to let Him lead the way but too many times I've said no... I'm working on this in my prayer life but it has been a struggle. Your prayers are coveted for this ride and my faith. If you have any favorite verses that might apply, I'd appreciate hearing them. Just put them in the comments section.

As far as my rides have gone, it's actually been a pretty good couple of weeks. We went camping at Wilderness State Park by Mackinaw the weekend of the 16th. I did a 50 miler on Friday and a 75 on Sunday all by myself. This is kind of cool as I wasn't even drafting anyone! The 50 miler was tough as I went a route that looked like a "good" biking route on the map but in reality it was filled with hills with a headwind on the way home. Now I remember why this is ski country! I should have known I made a mistake when the two people biking behind me kept going straight when I turned south. Turns out that the route they went was where I'd be on Sunday.

The 75 mile ride was really neat as I found the DALMAC markings on the previous ride and figured out the route we'd be finishing up on. I rode the last 30 miles of it and it is just gorgeous, and flat! I saw multiple deer and turkeys, and even saw a black bear run across the road about 100 yards ahead of me. My nephew Max doesn't believe me as he's always telling me bear hunting stories about the hunts he and his dad have done, but I pinky swore on it! I couldn't get a picture of it as it was really thick where he went in but I could hear him thrashing through the woods.

I did follow the route backwards as I drove home from camping. It got quite a bit hillier after I got past where I turned around. I foresee walking some portions of them or possibly taking a break mid-hill as there are some long ones. But I'm looking at the positive side, as most of those hills have a big downhill on the other side where I get to rest!

This past weekend was a "winding down" weekend as the marathoners call it. Thank goodness as I was not feeling it on Saturday! Thirty miles of medium hills and it felt like I was riding through water instead of air. Maybe it was just the humidity or the fact that I didn't sleep much the night before, but it was not a lot of fun. Sunday's 20 miler was much better as we did our Grand Valley route. I can tell I'm 40 now as the mind is going. We talked about the time we were leaving the day before and I showed up 15 minutes late and missed the group. I finally caught up with them and Bill rode with me so I could get my 20 miles in.

As I mentioned before, the training is done. No more biking before Thursday. Just need to finish packing and some minor tuning of the bike. Surprisingly, I'm not nervous right now. Thursday morning may be different, but I'm just going to enjoy it. I think it's going to be a lot like the time I spend hunting: plenty of time to reflect on the past, pray about the present, and wonder about the future. Maybe that's why I like biking so much. Even though I'm usually biking with a group, it's a lot of time alone with my thoughts.