Best Laid Plans

If there’s a plan, my husband probably didn’t make it. Although that’s not completely fair since he has made a cute little training plan to cram in some last minute miles before we take on the ride across girona next weekend.

Last year we were grossly unprepared and I refuse to put myself in that position again. Allow me to tell you a story.

The first day of the Ride across Girona in 2024, we rode around 220km of the 389km route. I argued that we should stop in the town before the hotel and eat something, because there wouldn’t be anything near where we were going to stay. My lovely husband argued that we would find something, because bless his heart, he never seems to worry about anything… Guess who was right?

We ate the little bit of snacks we had with us and went to bed. The next morning we were treated to a french breakfast of a little bit of bread and and some fruit. Hardly enough to fuel the 13kilometer climb in the pyrenees that would start our day. Again, my lovely husband said there was breakfast just on the otherside. We were in France, but once we crossed over into Spain breakfast would be waiting for us like a beacon of light.

We crawled our way to the top, and down the otherside. We passed through a small village where we could see people enjoying a lovely meal on a restaurant patio, but my lovely husband had a very specific stopping point in mind that he ASSURED me wasn’t too much further…. friends... that was a whole ass lie.

I rode several hours before being fed, and a year later, I’m still mad about it! One thing about me? I will remember being hangrot (hungry, angry, and hot), and do everything in my power to prevent it from happening again.

So this year, I’ve made a plan. A meticulous outline with kilometer markers for places we can stop and get food and water if needed. Also a plan for late hotel arrivals, and snack re-ups before early morning starts. I might be unfit, and maybe out of my depth with the difficulty of this ride, but one thing I will not be, is hungry. I REFUSE.

We start in Banyoles, and make our way over to the coast, down and back up to El Far, then up into France over some very intimidating mountains, although nothing can possibly be as challenging as Col de Madeleine in the Alps that i’ve just done twice as part of my Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift adventure. After that we encounter a few lumps before descending back to the end of a familiar loop back to Banyoles.

The whole route is 686km with over 11,000 meters of climbing. We’ll do 300-ish km the first day and 200-ish the rest of the two days. We’re on a set situation because i’ve booked hotels since sleeping in a bed is a thing we both agree we’d prefer. If you ever see Ayesha in a bivy, she’s being held against her will. Call rescue services and send help immediately.

Day 2 is the most climbing, but we have the most time to do it. Day 3 is a time crunch, as we have to be done before 2pm, but it’s a LOT of descending and we plan to start super early, so it should be more than doable. Especially if we keep eating.

Anyway, wish us luck. I’ll be sure to share the tracker on my instagram stories and do little updates throughout when i can. Little words of encouragement and reminders to eat are VERY welcome!

I have so much more I can chat about, but i’ll save it for later. Thanks for reading! I appreciate you! And thanks for everyone who sent me e-mails/ messages/ etc after my blogpost last week, I love hearing from you and will do my best to always respond! Keep em coming.

Bonus:

I was a guest on a few podcasts, check em out if you’d like!

Random images from the past week:

Audio version of this blogpost: