So tonight's required workout was a 10 minute warmup, 40 minutes at 130-160 heart rate, and 10 minutes cool down.   Not real stressful since my last 200k was at 143 average.  So I decided to try and do the whole 40 minutes in the big ring.  Alexis went out with me and we warmed up together until a group of 4 roadies zoomed by and I had to play fox and rabbits.  Hung on their tails for a couple miles until 1 of the roadies was dropped and I tried to bridge him back up but he was blown or not very strong.  At the wide spot on the trail I called "on yer left" and was gone.  The leader sucked wheel for a few hundred yards at 23, 24, 25.  At 26 he fell behind and at 28 he was a spot on the rearview.  I hit 29 and just kept going from there.  I was fresh legged - who knows how long those other guys had ridden?
 
Nothing else interesting other than the setting sun on the trinity, the flying and nesting cranes, and the human squirrel.  I called out "on your left" and he ran left.  Then right.  Then froze in the middle of the path.  I had to stop to keep from impaling the poor man.  No big deal.  I have learned to expect it on the trail and don't let it bug me like some rider's I've seen.
 
16.48 miles
138 bpm average, 169 max
17.7 average including warm up and cool down - training average more like 21
300 whopping feet of climbing  

Fast is relative.  There's always people faster than you.  Watching Jim Kern at Sebring doing 486 miles in the span of time I did 304 was just awe-inspiring.  I can hold my own with Steve on the flats, but he just walks away from me on any uphill grade.  Bud beats the snot out of me on any city limit sign sprint.  
 
 Its all in what you train for.  I am actually slower now than I was a couple years ago and am trying to get that back.  I have the benefit of being able to train a lot.  That's both good and bad, as sometimes the scenery is wasted on me.
 
Of course, it doesn't hurt to have an 18-pound bike (before I put 20 pounds of junk and 210 pound of crap on it!)  
 
Good idea about the joggers!