The Plane Great Ride

I dreaded the very thought of hills. After the “hill” section of the “Pedal the Prairie” ride, I was not sure if I was ready for hills. Hills have always been my enemy and therefore I have never tried to get better at them and it’s been a vicious cycle. After a lot of encouragement from my better half, timidly, I signed up for the 47 miles distance for the Plane Great Ride. She kept insisting that I should stop being a sissy and sign up for the 67 but visions of riders zipping past me on an uphill while I struggled with granny gears kept haunting me.

The ride is hosted in the rolling hills and beautiful scenery through the Sam Houston National Forest and farms of Grimes and Montgomery counties. The 70 mile drive from my home helped me convince myself that I will be able to finish this ride even if I had to carry the bike on my shoulder for the last 10 miles.

The ride starts in the Montgomery High School campus and goes through the farms and ranches before hitting the pine forests of Sam Houston National Forest. The scenery is breathtaking and that makes the entire effort worthwhile and now I know why so many people sign up for the ride.

It is also a very well organized ride with more frequent rest stops that help you through some of the tougher climbs. I loved the stop that was actually inside a thicket of pine trees and you could literally smell the pine needles.

The other thing that I realized was “hills are not that bad”. At least they are not as bad as wind. Every time you make the effort of going up a hill, there is a downhill reward. However, the effort fighting the wind is just lost. In fact after finishing the 47 miles in well under 4 hours, I was in fact regretting not having signed up for the 67. Well, you ride and learn and I am a little wiser now.

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