Post-Promenade Party w/ Princesses and Princes

After our wildly successful Princess Promenade ride, we all got together to pat each other on the back. We went out to the new classy bar in West Sacramento (that's a joke, in case you haven't actually been to West Sac), had some drinks, some dinner (the veggie curry was surprisingly good), and got some presents.
Plus, the rose-giver from the ride showed up with his dad, who is Ann's husband and Vanessa's father-in-law (got that?) and it was fun to see them again.

(Don't you love how we all go with the decor of the bar?)

The girls gave me a massage and a gift certificate to the best frozen yogurt place ever and a lovely card. And Ann and Vanessa made all of us very sweet photo albums with photos from the last few months. It's such a thoughtful gift.




Here's Christine and Jana (left to right).

As I said that night, I asked Jana to help me out with the Jill Team because she's also a relatively new cyclist and has lots of great insight and because I wanted to keep her on her bike this summer. We were glad to have her there.

Christine was gunning for 'most improved cyclist' -- she bought her road bike not very long before starting with this group and was doing fantastically -- but she opted for 'most dramatic finish' when she sprung from her bike only 1/2 way through training, slammed herself onto the asphalt, scraped up her legs, arms, and who knows what else, and fractured her humerus. Christine, if you didn't want to ride with us anymore, you could have just said so.


Ann and Vanessa (left to right):

Vanessa joined up first and said she didn't have a bike, but her mother-in-law has a second bike and they're about the same size, so she's going to ride that. Vanessa is probably not much younger than her bike, it turns out. She started off strong and fast, leaving the rest of us in the dust most of the time. I'd like to give her 'goofiest' or 'able to get out the most words per hour than any other rider, because she's a total goof ball and all over the place and she talks. A lot. Sometimes I have to put her on pause so I can get two minutes of instructions out. And when I can't hear her talking behind me, I have to check to make sure she didn't drop off the line.
Those are just reasons to like her, though. Vanessa gets 'most fashionable' (the 'outfits' obviously) and 'most willing.' Vanessa was willing to go any speed, any time. Usually she lead the pack, but she was also willing to slow it down and have an endurance, rather than speed day. One day it was just me, Jana, and Vanessa, and we road out for about 10 miles, and then turned around to come back. On the way back, I set the pace at about 17.5-19.5 mph. Vanessa kept up with no complaints. In fact, she stopped talking altogether.

Ann told Vanessa she could use her bike and somehow Vanessa turned that into getting Ann to sign up to ride with us as well (we're happy it did). The first time I rode with Ann (which was her second Jill ride, and our 4th meeting or so), she asked if I thought she should quit the team. I don't think she knew that she was talking to someone who doesn't think anyone should ever quit cycling, unless they have to pee or something. Ann was concerned that she was going to hold people back and they wouldn't get to ride how they wanted. I told her not to quit and see how it goes. The next ride, we were coming back on the infamous River Road and I came up beside Ann, set a 15mph pace and told her to hold it until the end of the road (about a mile and a half). I dropped behind her and watched my speedometer. 15mph. 14.5mph. 15mph. 16 mph. 17mph. 84 rpm (whoops, I pushed the wrong button). 18mph! And she held 18 for the remainder of that road and most of the next.
Long story short: Ann is the 'most willing to defeat the Voices' and also my favorite closet-speed-racer.

Jen and Heather:
Jen started off riding a hybrid bike and, though she was keeping up just fine, she was working harder than most of us. Jen surprised us all when, about 1/3-1/2 way through our training, she went to Bicycles Plus to get a new jersey (not to be outdone by V's pink outfits) and showed up to ride the next day with a new jersey and fancy new road bike. After that, she was off. Nothing holding her back. Jen's progress on the bike was matched only by her progress in eliminating the unnecessary 'I'm sorry's' from her every day mode of being.
Jen gets the award for being most likely to fall off her bike for no apparent reason and still not get hurt (much). But, she also gets the 'most encouraging rider' prize because there was never a time that Jen was not telling folks how well they were doing or encouraging them to see what a fantastic accomplishment they'd had, or to let the others know that even though she makes it look easy, she's right there with them. It was fun to have such a sincere cheerleader.

Have you ever seen such a smiley bunch? You'd think it was November 5th, or something.