Last week was a pretty normal training week for me.  Monday night I met up with Kris for the Beans and Barley team ride.  Same ride as the week before about 26.5 miles in around an hours and a half.  It was only the two of us though, so the pace was a little slower and we didn’t do any drafting.  Hopefully this week we’ll have a few more people.

Wednesday I had the day off and decided to go for a ride around 3pm.  I drove up Puetz to the Oak Leaf Trail between 51st St and 68th St.  I wanted to try and get to Greenfield Park and back since I was feeling good.  When I got to Greenfield withing about a 1/4 mile, I saw two pairs of deer right on the side of the road.  I was a little freaked out because a car was passing me on the left and they just lingered behind me for a while, then I realized they were checking out the deer about 10 ft away from me.  Just up the road that same thing happened where the deer were just hanging out eating on the brush line.  Pretty sweet to see as always. :)  Once I got around Hwy 100 and National the skies started looking pretty dark, so I turned around to race the rain back to my place.  When I was heading back through Whitnal Park I ended up riding along side another cyclist who was rounding the curve as I was passing through.  Back a little further, he was bumped by a guy in a van that was yelling at him for not being on the curb.  Adam, the guy on the bike, was going 28 mph in a 25 mph zone.  On top of the fact that cyclists, by Wisconsin law, are considered a vehicle and are suppose to be towards the right side of the road “as deemed a reasonable distance” when you’re going over the speed limit, I think you should have just as much right of way to the road as a car.  Apparently the COEXIST bumper sticker that the car had was just for show. ;)  But I had a riding partner the rest of the way since Adam lived near me and come to find out we both work for Rockwell.  Small world!  Towards the end of the ride, the rain started to fall, but was light enough that it didn’t affect me.  A pretty solid 30 mile ride, although next time I hit this rout it should be 10-20 miles longer as long as the weather cooperates!

Please visit the LIVESTRONG site in the next couple of days and sign the petition to fight against cancer.  The petition is already more than 100,000 people strong and has a goal to get 10,000 more before the Global Cancer Summit ends on Wednesday.  It only takes a minute and will do a world of change!  Check out the LIVESTRONG Blog for more info.

 Want to read more?  Check out my blog at ridingforareason.wordpress.com