Needing those longer rides and hours in the saddle to get ready for the Covered Bridge Classic three weeks from today. Average speed was high (for me) for the first 2.5 hours and then fell off a cliff, so to speak the last dozen miles or so as the legs tired and the climbs did not relent. Also did not help going on the Hoyles Mill Trail (it used to be a gravel road), which is not fast even with a slight downhill and then paved side-of-the-road trails back to the Soccerplex. It was a little more humid today, that is, more like summer than the previous several days, but as long as you kept moving it wasn't terrible. And it wasn't particularly hot, either. Stopped roughly every hour -- a bench just before Edwards Ferry, a bench in downtown Poolesville and then a mere 2 miles from the end, when the right foot was on fire. Could find no good reason to just suffer so sat on the grass and got the shoe off and put the fire out. Pretty good ride when all was said and done. A little contact point pain but not serious; the legs were pretty glad to be done. We'll need to keep doing this as the CBC gets nearer.