Attention getter

Stop me if you've heard this before: I'm still amazed sometimes by the sheer volume of email that flows into my inbox at the shop. It's inside chatter about items of note, heads-up-type warnings of potential issues and, often, questions about situations and how to resolve them.

It's like I'm ... managing it all. Hmm.

On Monday, I got a confirmation that I'd be attending Trek World, the yearly Trek dealers' show in Wisconsin. Cool. I've been looking forward to it. But on the bottom of an email from Jay, there's this:

"PS: You will also be riding a 100-mile gran fondo on the 8th. Stay tuned for details."

Personally, I love it that a 100-mile gran fondo is the "PS." It's like, "oh, by the way, bring some riding gear, we're going to take a spin at some point during the trip. It'll be about 100 miles or so — no big deal."

It's been a while since I've ridden 100 miles. In fact, I've only done it once — in 2006 ... on my Bianchi. Also in 2006: the RAGBRAI century day that ended at 98.something miles. Eh, close enough. RAGBRAI 2008, when I left from my house, picked up Munson, rode to Missouri Valley and then did the route: 99 and change.

Ultimately, 100 is just a number. The near-misses would have easily topped 100 had I seen any reason to carry on. I'd arrived at my destination. Close enough.

But a gran fondo is a bit of a race. Not a super-serious, present-your-license race, but riders are timed and results are kept. And this grand fondo has a course profile that looks like this:

Seems a little lumpy, no? I'm a pretty solid climber, but this could leave a mark. The good thing, though, is that I've felt pretty good on the bike for a couple of weeks now. The weakness in my hips is pretty much gone, though the bright pink skin gives away the secret of recent road rash.

So now it's all about fitness. I did some seated climbing on Monday while watching a storm skirt Omaha to the north, then three hours of Zone 3-Zone 4 work yesterday. Tonight is Wednesday Worlds, which should detonate me entirely.

Seriously, it's going to be ugly.