The home stretch, May 24-31: 80 miles; 2nd "hill ride"

We had our largest TnT group yet for the 80 mile final group ride on May 24. Weather was "iffy": drizzle & cold to start, some rain along the way. The ride was gorgeous, and everyone finished. The big moment was Lucy & the fox & Jim Kimball: Jim swerved & slowed to avoid the fox. Lucy who was a new rider at the start of training, but learned quickly the advantages of drafting, was momentarily distracted by the same fox, and crossed wheels with Jim. The second rider always loses contact like this, and she crashed. Some serious scrapes, a head banging (with helmet on, of course) and a scary experience. But she decided to continue.
The group was called a "White" group, as in Red, White & Blue, in order of average speed. I usually have ridden Red, but I was the only one this day, so I rode White. My discovery: White riders have become Pink, at least, as I rarely felt we were slow, and everyone kept up well.
After her crash, Lucy got some rush of adreneline or something. As we hit the long hill of the ride (about 4 miles?), I got out front a bit, then Lucy blew by me like I was in the wrong gear, and stayed ahead for the entire hill! Quite a feat for a "newbie", as my hill climbing in MUCH better than when I started training for Tahoe.
It was getting late, and I had commitments, so I took off at about mile 60, with Lucy sticking with me for the first 10 miles. At our last pit-stop, she waited for the others to catch up (only a matter of 10 minutes) and I took it in at reasonable speed & major effort. My new shorts were wonderful (Pearl Izumi Splice Ultrasensor -- expensive, but so much easier on my rear over a long ride. This ride proved to everyone that they could finish AMBBR (Tahoe), and was just another of many well-planned training events that Henry & the other coaches set up for us.

Tuesday, I did another Shelton Hill Ride, this one with a different & faster group of four, and eventually some pretty substantial rain. We cut it short at 16 miles, but got in probably 2000 feet of climbing.
Took my bike for a thorough tune-up on Wednesday, ended up with a new bottom bracket, but that was not a surprise: my Cannondale CAAD5 was built in 2000, and this was the first replacement.
Friday at 7:30, again in the rain, we loaded bikes onto a truck in Meriden for transport to Tahoe. No bike for a full week! So Sunday, I ran ten moderately hilly miles, just to put a little strain on my cardio-vascular system.
This is written on June first, with just six days to the ride! I'll write when I return.