Seems to me, that a lot of folks worry needlessly about "am I doing this right". The answer to this question seems to me to be "are you enjoying the ride?" then you are doing it right for you. OK just a bit of a rant. Sorry to the OP, it really is a legit question. I find that I lost all my desire to cycle after I started competing for a few years. I totally burned out. Took me years and years to get back to being able to ride for the pure pleasure of the open road. I had to retrain myself to understand that every ride was not a training event, and that just going for a noodle about the countryside was indeed OK. Now I find that I am slowly being drawn into long distance cycling, and have to fight the idea that under 50 miles is not a "real" or worthwhile ride.