Congratulations on your return to biking

An EX made a similar comment when I attempted a tough climb. He indicated no one made it up the hill on their first attempt, especially a woman ......I was waiting for him at the top as he huffed and puffed up it. Keep riding!

Great start! Just keep riding and improving. It never really gets easier, but you gradually go farther and faster.

Until one day you notice that you are not going as far and not as fast.

As Rudy would say, pedal on. This is fabulous

Welcome to the party.

My humble suggestion for your first season of riding is that you do everything you can to ride often and make it fun. If necessary, haul your bike to pleasant riding areas. Ride for a while and sit in the shade for a while. Do an informal group ride or two. If you are having problems with hills, walk up them.

Ride often. Make it fun. Forget about the rest.

(My humble suggestion for your husband would probably not be helpful or even physically possible. I hope he has either many redeeming characteristics or a huge life insurance policy. )

get revenge the easy way ,take the time to bake his favourite pie,make sure the smell is throughout the house when he gets home from wherever ,when he asks where's the pie ,smile sweetly at him and say"I ate a piece after my ride and gave the rest to the dog."

I'm assuming here that your husband does not ride at all? If so, it would be a HUGE milestone to get him to ride his first mile. Then maybe he'll catch the bug.

I, too, remember when 5 miles was a challenge. Like others have said, keep it fun. For me, part of the fun was finding like minded people to ride with.

Congrats. Like many have said, just keep riding and don't worry about speed or milestones. Enjoy the rides and everything else will come in good time.

I second weak link and MinnMan, whatever you do keep it fun. There will be days when it's harder than usual, don't worry just go to a lower gear or rest.
Bob

Great start!

Forget about numbers, and just stretch your ride a little every day.

pretty soon, you will be adding a mile a day/week - then 5 miles more next week.

Won't be long, and you will be over 20 miles a day, and looking for 40 or 50.

No kidding - it will come - just give it time, and a little dedication.

Next - you'll b e talking about building your speed ---- LOL

Such inspiration! Thank you everyone! I am going to ride after dinner hopefully before the rain! BTW my tailbone hurts

First congrats on the ride, enjoy it and the next and so on and so on. Keep riding and have fun, all the rest will come with time.

Please do not ask what saddle to buy.

No, no need to discuss saddle.

Today I rode almost 3 miles, 2 small spurts of walking, and a 1/2 fall - I caught myself! Yay!!!

Good for you. Forget speed and focus on distance and terrain challenges. Those of us who focus on speed usually do so because we need more stress in our lives .
Let this thread be all about you and your achievements!

Yes, we definitely want progress reports.

And pictures.

I like a quote I read on a Forum, as I recall it, "My 15 mph means as much to me as your 25 mph means to you." Personally, I'm more a mileage junkie than a speed one.

Good point about ignoring speed. However the original query was about how long it might take to ride 20+ miles. If the question had been about 20 miles exactly we could say the length would be 20 miles. However the + part means it will be at least 20 miles and that's the best answer we can give.

Now if the question meant how much time it will take, that's a different question. Ah, you can still be back in time for lunch if you start early enough!

We rarely stay on subject here.
The answer to the question is simple - "less time than it would take if you rode a few miles more".
So now that that is cleared up we can go on to other subjects.

Ride on Imagonnabike!

Another take on how long to ride 20 miles--- How long would it take before I can ride 20 miles?

So lets go offtrack again with the answers to that one.

But that 1st ride- however short- should have hurt. If it didn't then a longer ride should have been done.

So time for Imagonnabike to start getting clued up with Nutrition and recovery rides.

By that logic carried to its logical extreme every ride should hurt! Which would make Imagonnabike a serious biker indeed, not unlike so many others here.

Depends a lot on speed. Most folks can handle 20 miles in about 2 hours. Faster folks are closer to an hour. Really fast ones are under an hour.

Saying that it should have hurt----Muscles ache through exertion they haven't had before- Butt ache and that can come on very quickly- Shoulders not be used to working in that way- and plenty of other things. If it was sit on the saddle-get up to 5 mph and then coast- it was not a ride.

Understood. But you see, I was just thinking that if something was funny enough one could split one's sides laughing and that might hurt. Or simply ROFL and knock into something, which would also hurt. Lotta' way to hurt oneself in this world. Some are more fun than others.

[I was just trying to inject some humor with a slightly different bent. It's a fun thing to do. ]