Day 1 - A little over 3 hours in the saddle. I did some "cruise intervals" during the second hour of the ride. I ended up on some good roads that had lots of nice rolling hills. One thing that the map doesn't show is all of the wind! Inland, there was a pretty strong wind from the North, and then, as I got closer to the lake, the wind seemed like it was more from the West. Definitely some tough going in spots where I was out in farmland and had no protection. This ended up being my toughest ride.
Day 2 - Almost 4 hours in the saddle, although not by design. Much less windy than the day before and I took it a bit easier. The directions I was following, from MapMyRide, had some errors. They showed me going over some dirt roads and some places where there were no roads! I muddled my way through, but I did end up on some very sandy dirt roads. The sand was deep enough in places that I had to get off and walk. A narrow road tire at 80psi just sinks too deep in the sand to ride it! I saw lots of pumpkin fields while I was out there, which was kind of interesting. It was mostly a good ride, but I didn't particularly enjoy riding back down to Pentwater along the lake. The road was just too narrow and rough and there was a little too much traffic.
Day 3 - About 2.5 hours in the saddle, and Dad rode with me. This ended up being the hilliest ride I did; we also put in a 50 minute "tempo" effort in the middle. There was a tour in the area the weekend before, and there were a couple signs painted on the road. My favorite was "Climb Time" just before a tough little climbing section... hey, when you're tired, the little things are funny. The tempo effort was pretty good for me; I probably need to do that type of training on the road more. Dad did a good job hanging with me too!
In general, it was a good week of riding. The roads were good (and hilly), and most people around there seem to be used to people on bikes. I only had one incident where someone passed me too close, and then Dad and I had another when someone (who presumably misjudged our speed) pulled out in front of us and we had to brake hard. I was pretty tired by the end of the trip though. We also went to bed late most nights and the kids were up early, so that was kind of a tough combination. Still, I think I will appreciate that little training block when cyclocross season heats up.
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