I am toast. Today was the Tour Nortel, and I thought it was going to be a breeze, I really did! I tweaked my lower back yesterday, not sure how, and was very sore last night, coupled with a horrible headache. Woke this morning and had problems getting my shoes on, my back was still a mess. Greaaaaat. Still had funky head too. Couldn't even think of breakfast, so grabbed a handful of cheerios, forced it down, and we went.

The weather called for rain, and rain it did... right until the start. Then it stopped! Thank you weather gods! I have only done one bike event that wasn't a race, and the same bottleneck happened. Within a few minutes, Steve was out of sight - he's so funny, when we talked about the ride his plan was to ride with my colleague and I - that lasted all of maybe 5 minutes. I think he spotted a pretty Cervelo and it was game on. That's cool, Ginette and I peddled away feeling great. We turned the corner and a little kid says "there's the killer hill". Oh look at that! Ok, I can take it. So early in the ride it killed my quads. This is going to be fun ;). By the turn for the 12k ride I was thinking maybe I should take it! But I don't give up that easily. And the little kid did say "the killer hill", so it's got to be the worst one.

The kid's a liar.

Every corner we turned there seemed to be another hill. I think there were 5 total. I think. The last one was a monster (at least by Ottawa's standards). At the top of the last monster, my chain didn't want to get back on the middle ring, and I hit the wall. So I stopped, got off, and had a long drink. My heart rate was at 150 and I was dizzy. Lovely. Oh, and there was an earthworm squished onto my seat. How the heck did that get there! And ewwwwwww!! I cleaned off my seat, and talked to another man stopped at the top, and asked him to check my back and hair please, for earthworms. He looked me over and said "I don't see anything". And then he hightailed it out of there! LOL So did I.

At the 20k rest stop there was an angel with oranges. I bellied up to the buffet and had 4 slices. Delish! 5 minutes later, I had wings. I was also cursing myself for not having a snack in my seat bag. Carried around energy bars for YEARS, and tossed them out last week without replacing them. Such a dough head.

On the way back we had the wind behind us for part of it, and I was averaging 30km/hr +. Finally. I did have to walk the hill because my granny ring wasn't behaving, and frankly, I wanted to save my legs. Then I zoomed to the finish.

Steve biked back 3km to meet me, and I was feeling great at that point. My colleague, Ginette finished ahead of me as well, she had the legs and didn't stop on the hill - atta girl!

I feel tired, didn't stretch after the ride (oops) so my legs feel heavy, headache is still there, but my back ache has worked out. I am thrilled with my ride, because it was really tough. There are no hills in the south end. We need to get to the Gats ASAP and start hill training again!

Tonight KT and I are going to see Colin Mochrie and Brad Sherwood (of Who's Line is it Anyway fame). Should be a blast. I'm so excited!

Well, I was supposed to work today, worked all day yesterday, and late every day last week, but I'm just not focussed. So going to eat something and watch a movie. And probably fall asleep before the credits ;)