I'm riding my bicycle where?: Eat - Sleep - Drive - Ride

Monday, October 15, 2012

Eat - Sleep - Drive - Ride - Repeat

Yes, that is pretty much the schedule...and so far, there has been lots of eat, drive, and ride...but not much sleep. Time is a premium with all that is going on and each team must ensure we do our share of the ride each day. It means that we have to track and find transition locations, it means we have to drive about 500 km's every day to leap frog the other 4 relay teams. It also means we need to eat often and lots to ensure we have the fuel to do all the riding.

A few more awesome things to tell you about. The first is the great support from the IronDames who came out to our launch and provided each rider with a Buff for use on the ride. The IronDames are awesome. Thank you!

http://irondames.ca/irondames-turnout-to-support-wellsprings-peloton-challenge-oakville-on-to-austin-texas-october-12-to-19th-2012

Our envelope from our Warrior Donna today...contained band aids! Luckily we haven't needed them yet....but now we have them just in case!

The forecast before our 6am to noon ride did not look too good...there was a call for rain, thunderstorms, and even tornado warnings right when we were riding. We got up at 4am to pack up and begin hunting down our transition point about 50kms away. To our surprise...it was 15 degrees and dry!

The ride itself was most challenging...many, many hills....long slow climbs of which we generally don't see back at home. There were also significant winds for the second half. Regardless...long slow climbs also meant long fast downhills and the scenery in Ohio was fantastic:

So far...I'm not aware of any bike issues on the ride...so I had the pleasure of being the first to get a flat tire. I think my team feels that it may have been strategically planned, as it was right before the biggest and most challenging hill climb of the day. While they climbed...I was changing my flat in the follow vehicle...pretty good timing I must say!

In my last blog post, we had the bird hitting the van. Well...it continues. This time while enroute...the magnetic Wellspring sign on the front of the van decided to lift and crash into the roof rack and bikes. It all happened so fast...we didn't even see anything except hear a loud bang on the roof. Everyone nearly had a heart attack as we looked back expecting to see one or more bikes flying down the highway. Luckily...it sounded much worse than it was. Only the sign was damaged. There was an idea to cut up this limited edition, one of a kind, magnet, into pieces and sell them as a fundraiser for Wellspring! Hmmmmm....