Jun 22, 2018. Ride #200

Today I led my 200th Breeze ride. It wasn’t a long journey - 3 years isn’t long at all these days. But with rides nearly every week since I began leading, I guess it wouldn’t take long to get to this milestone. 

The ride itself wasn’t that long either. I had originally posted it in the hopes to bring back together some of my old regulars who rode through thick and thin (well warm and cold) throughout that first year. 

But when my 200th tied in, it made the perfect way to mark this milestone. And every rider tonight has some real significance to my journey, let me introduce some of them. 

So on tonight’s ride was Anne, who had encouraged me to put up my first ride, and  seeing through her promise of signing up if I did, joined Olwen on that first ever ride. 

Olwen was my assistant tonight. She was on my first, my 100th and many many rides between. I was on her first ride too when she became a leader a couple of years later. 

Emma (with Anne), was one of the first of my riders that I convinced to train up enabling us to have bigger groups and go further afield. 

Su, well she has been on more rides than I care to think. She was one of the merry band that kept me going through my first winter, even though she hates the cold and says every year that she won’t do that again. 

Pandy and Jo - sisters who regularly met up in the Friday ride and chatted family stuff as we rode to our fave local. Claire, who joined us whenever her workload - and run training -  allowed. 

Kate and Lisa who only joined Breeze last year. Lisa had come back to cycling a short while before, Kate had not long restarted cycling herself. Both had wanted to challenge themselves to ride longer and faster, which is exactly what they did when they joined the progressive training rides over the summer and then completed a 100km rose at the beginning of September. Donna, who was such a huge part of that 100km ride, arrived after we did. She had delayed her holiday to join us and detoured her journey back to spend more time with the group. 

And finally there were three ladies new to our rides - their company reminding us just what Breeze is all about - fun, friendship and cake (with a bit of cycling thrown in.  

We rode to the Luzbourugh a slightly more challenging route than I would have liked. We had coffee, shared cheesy chips and caught up on each other’s life away from cycling. It was a lovely cycle. 

Thanks ladies for being a part of the 200th ride and all those ones in between. 

Sharon.