Are the Stars Aligned Against Me?

I am starting to think that I have some sort of bad luck streak going on or this is some kind of warning. It is about a week and a half from D-Day (Ironman 100 mile bike ride) and try as hard as I can, every time I go to get on the bike to start training something comes up, breaks, changes, etc. I swore that I would bike to work at least twice this week.

It rained instead, finally the forecast showed Sunny weather Thursday morning. When I got home Wednesday night I was in a bit of a rush to do dinner, rake the yard, take care of the kids before bed, and head out to hockey; yet I still needed to squeeze in some time to adjust my rear derailer so that my bike would shift correctly. This of course being the problem that laid me up during my last attempt to bike in. I managed to get it adjusted and went for a quick test ride. It worked well, and I headed off to hockey. Of course being a bit of a later game, I didn't get home until 12:30 or so and after searching everywhere among the moving boxes trying hard to find all my bike gear I finally gave up around 1am. Being later than I had planned to stay up, I jumped in bed and grumbled as I changed the alarm clock from 5am to 5:30 (at least an extra 30 minutes would help). I promptly fell asleep and woke to light coming in through the window. Then it dawned on me (damn puns) that at 5:30 it shouldn't be light quite yet. Oh crap I thought, there goes another day of riding but when I looked at the clock it was only 6am which was my intended leave time. So I quickly jumped out of bed and grabbed everything I had and ran out of the house.

Finally I had beat whatever was against me, I was on the open road and realizing just how out of shape I had gotten since last fall when I quit riding. But that didn't matter I was doing it, I was getting in at least 40 miles this morning. The highlight of the ride came about 6 miles into the ride when I reached the top of the Baraboo Bluffs and was passing by the steep slope signs for the upcoming hill. I quickly pulled off and adjusted my ipod to something more appropriate and cranked it all the way up. Snapping back into the bike I quickly shifted into the lowest gear I could get into and peddled as hard as possible, it wasn't long until the cars where no longer flying by, I looked down at my gps and noticed it clocked me at around 47 miles per hour. Wow I was flying now and loving it. The hill down the bluffs lasts for about a mile and a half which happened to be just long enough for me to start thinking about what would be left of my body if I bit it at this speed.

I quickly turned my attention to other thoughts, and as I reached the bottom I was so pumped that I didn't realize how easily I was holding 20+ mph. Over the next 4 miles I was so excited to be out on the bike. It was then that I hit the low point of the ride. I was just on the border of Prairie du Sac when I rolled over some rocks and heard a loud snap sound. Then I felt the backend roughen up, and I quickly pulled over to notice that I did indeed blow out my back tire. Can I not win! Luckily I called my cousin who lives in Prairie du Sac up and found she had not left for work yet and begged a ride off her. So as I sit here at work typing this I am happy I at least got 15 miles in today but upset that it wasn't the planned 40 and now I need to go buy some more supplies. That is what I get for actually using my last tube and not buying extras :) Yes Dan you are going to kick my ass.