One of those days

Saturday Eric and I met up for a big road ride with a few long climbs planned.  Blue skies and warm temperatures had us excited for the challenges that lied ahead.  Not long into our ride Eric flatted, and then the 2nd tube went flat.  He decided to head to REI, which was maybe 4 miles away to replace the tire, tubes, and CO2.  Walking and carefully riding on the rim was going to put us way behind schedule for our adventure.  2 hours in, and we had maybe 16 miles.  It was shaping up to be one of those days where nothing goes right.  We even discussed getting lights to finish our 100 mile ride. 

We decided to change our plan from riding up High Grade (well named)  to Evergreen and down to Golden to just going up High Grade, a lap around Chatfield Reservoir, back up to REI, and home.   The climb up High Grade was really good and we put in a pretty fair effort considering we were not even at the halfway point of our ride.  The wind picked up out of the south as we were towards the southern part of our ride and it looked as if precipitation was moving in.  We picked the pace a bit and had a tailwind for the majority of our return home.  A quick stop at Walgreens for some Gatorade and Snickers fueled me through the final hour and helped us beat the rain.  I ended up with 106 miles and about 5,000 ft of climbing and felt great the whole day and even saw a couple friends along the way.  I guess it turned out to be one of those days.