Oh, rally?

Last Sunday I took part in the Ramapo Rally, a biking event in Mahwah, New Jersey (Mahwah, just wants to make you cackle evilly, right? Me too). The rally consisted of marked rides from 12 miles all the way to 123 miles (for the truly hardcore) starting and ending at Campgaw Mountain County Reservation. I've never done an organized bike rally before, but as the Russian has been hounding me (rightfully so) to get out and ride, I thought it would be a good chance to do a ride in a well-organized (read: food stops) safe (read: people to make sure I don't get lost) situation.

I did the 52 mile ride and overall I had a really good time, though I think there were some things I could have lived without.

The good:

• 52 miles is the longest ride I have ever done. And my sensitive parts were still okay after all that.
• I got to ride with my new bike friends (the lovely ladies of the Tenafly Bicycle Workshop Team). 
• It was a beautiful day with mild temperatures and lots of cloud coverage. 
• The food stops had a great selection of snacks and treats (though for some reason I didn't eat as much as I normally would in such a situation) 

The bad:

• My friend Sam had some issues with her bike and decided to drop to the 25 mile ride. Though she was a great sport and had a great attitude about everything the whole time. 
• We had to cross a highway twice and ride on major roads (with off ramps!) twice 
• I forgot to close my bike bag before putting it on the car on the way home. Amazingly, only one thing came out (I think).

The ugly:

• There are apparently some people who don't understand the concept of riding single file on a road where there are cars. The roads were not closed and this guy was doing this while biking slowly up what amounted to a mole hill. Why, no I didn't want to yell at him...
• I had yet another low speed fall!  
• Someone got badly injured near the end of the course. I didn't see what happened, but he was being taken away in an ambulance.

While it seems like the number of bad things outweighed the good, the overall magnitude of the good parts really made it a fun event. See, I'm smiling!(Okay, that was before it started, but I was smiling at the end too).

Also, The rally gave me some (just a tiny amount) confidence in at least getting the 56 mile half-iron bike ride done without serious problems (minus any low speed falls). This is a bit of a pick-me-up from the blows my confidence has been taking with my hip injury. Don't even get me started...