Steel Legs

Jackrabbit Jim and I were chasing the lead group. I new the first part of the ride went straight up Orville for the first steep climb. We got on but Jim decided to drop back to Paul. The guys weren't going all out but it was kind of fast. We hit Orville and I got dropped. I chased for a while but it didn't work. That put me sixth out of 75 riders, so I just went at my own pace. This was a hard ride, no doubt about it. Almost all hills. I rode with a guy from Springfield who caught me. After about five miles I finally figured out he wasn't doing the century. He rode along to St. Albans where there was a rest stop. Years ago the road we we on was a dead end. Thinking this was still so, I rode backward on the route and added about six miles, more that erasing the ten minute lead I had on the main group. To make matters worse, I did two very hard climbs I didn't need to climb. It was a grueling up and down into Labadie, with some long climbs after. There was wasn't much choice, so I kept on going. About 50 miles in I caught up to the Jackrabbit, Lou, and Sean changing a flat. I waited for them, I needed the draft for a little break.

We finally got the little hoosier town of Washington. I worked there many years ago and was never so happy to leave a place in my life. If was raining a bit and we got some weird looks from the people driving around. I noticed I was having to work pretty hard to keep up, but I took my turns pulling. Sean the Iron Man had good legs and blasted out of town up a hill at 23 mph for about 4 or 5 miles. I took a few pulls, but Sean did most of the work. I looked back and our group was gone. We let up for a minute and the Jackrabbit caught us. He said he dropped back to help the others catch up, but it wasn't going to happen so he caught back on to me and Sean. The Rabbit scampered up the last hill into Labadie and we stopped for lunch.

There was still a lot of hard climbing ahead. Now it was on to the end.

During the section back into St. Albans was I realized I was out of gas. Guys started passing me. I teamed up with Lou and we limped in to St. Albans. On the climb up to Ossenfort, Lou dropped me. I was barely moving. Thankfully, he waited at the top of the hill and we worked our way the last big climb of the day, Doberman hill.

I hit the bottom of the hill and passed an old guy on a recumbent. About a third of the way up it felt like lightning bolts were going off in my legs and I started cramping. I stopped and the guy on the recumbent went by. There was no way I was going to walk the hill. I waited a couple of minutes and pedaled straight legged up the hill. The rest of the ride in was slow going and I cut off the last loop and headed staight for the bike shop where we started.

Sean was there putting his bike away and preparing to go for a run. I was completely spent. In a few minutes Lou and the Jackrabbit pulled in with Paul. They rode the loop that I skipped.

A couple day later I measured the extra riding I did and it made my ride about 104 miles total. It was tied fo the hardest ride of the year with Emminence to Chester, sick Marquette time trial, and Rabrai Century, the into the wind part.