The Black and Blue Relay is Saturday, and Team Little Guy is stoked! Over the past several weeks, the eight members of TLG who will form two teams have put in thousands of training miles on their bikes to get ready for the relay.

I guess we’re ready – or as ready as we’re gonna be at this point.

In my case, I’ve been putting in some heavy miles on the bike, including a 30 miler this past Sunday near Asheville. I started at the Folk Art Center off the Blue Ridge Parkway and rode 14 miles up to the entrance to Craggy Gardens on my road bike.

That route is a pretty good testing ground – a 2,000 foot elevation gain over the 14 miles. I made it to the top without stopping at a 9.7 mph average clip, and blazed down the hill on the return trip at about 23 mph. (Ain’t gravity a lovely thing when it’s working in your favor?)

In April, I did this same route on my mountain bike … went a lot slower … and stopped twice on the uphill leg. This week’s ride was a good confidence boost in the days leading up to the main event!

I’ll be riding stages three and seven on Saturday. Three is a real bear at a little over 29 miles and a total elevation gain of more than 2,200 feet.

If I can survive this leg without my heart, lungs or calves exploding, I have the good fortune of coasting in stage seven … it’s an 18 mile stage with a big downhill portion and a total uphill move of less than 650 feet.  

Lucky for me, I’ve got some great guys who will be bailing me out along the way. Ed Agnoli is riding stages one and five, John Radebaugh (pictured above in our team jersey) picks up stages two and six, and Rob Semar of Members Credit Union — our “mountain goat” has the most difficult stages – four and eight.

We hope to log an average of 14 mph for the race course and finish before dark. But even if we don’t, it’ll be great to spend the day with some great people, have fun on the bike and share info about the Foundation, credit unions and the Little Guy with other riders.