Portland Century

Well, tomorrow's the big day, the Portland Century ride. One hundred miles of extreme climbing, or at least that's what they keep telling me by e-mail. I've received two e-mails from the organizers this week alerting me to the extreme climbing riders will face tomorrow. Of course, when I signed up for this mother-scratcher they made no mention of extreme climbing. In fact, they made this sound more like cozy picnic in the park than a trip up Alpe D'Huez.

To make things worse, I'm riding with a very pretty girl. I met her at the 11 Bridges Ride a couple of weekends ago. We've corresponded by e-mail, but I'm not sure she's interested yet. She surely won't be if she sees my body start to betray me by the mid-point. She doesn't seem like the kind of girl who might be attracted to guys who cry openly and beg for mercy on bike rides. Shame, because that's exactly how I roll.

So think of me tomorrow as I ride off in the dark at 5:45 a.m. toward the starting line. I'll post a few updates through twitter tomorrow, assuming I can still move my thumbs to type.