Day after my birthday

Today: 95 miles, average speed: 12 mph.

Today was the most challenging day so far, and I wasn't too impressed with myself. The day started off early. At 5:40 the alarm buzzed, I dragged my body unwillingly out of the bed I was sharing with Michelle and pulled on my spandex, sweaty jersey and cycling shoes. Michelle and I were staying with an elderly woman just down the street from the amazing church that hosted us in Avon Lake, Ohio. We arrived at the church by 6:00, in time for a lavish breakfast. Dan, one of our leaders, assured me that my wheel was fine, despite its wobble (courtesy of the VERY potholed street we rode into Cleveland).

We set off a few minutes later, and the 95-mile day began. About 11 hours later we arrived. Uck. The directions were pretty simple; basically we got on route 6 and never got off. The shoulder varied from a couple of feet to a few inches, and the quality of the pavement varied with the counties we passed through. There was a certain consistency to most of the terrain. Corn fields. Corn fields. More corn fields. A soybean fiel. More corn fields. It was all quite beautiful, but by mile 55 or so I was not feeling so good and I wasn't appreciating the scenery very much.
Earlier on we had a delicious lunch (at mile 40) and were regaled by some great van-top dancing on the part of Dan. At mile 45, we stopped at the Carousel Museum of Sandusky, Ohio. It was a blast- we saw carousel rabbits and boars and ostrichs, each more wonderfully carved than the last.

At that 55- mile mark, I started to think about the next time that I could convince my companions to take a snack break. We stopped at a light, and I was feeling a bit light-headed. My fellow riders noticed I was looking flushed, and kindly suggested that we stop at a gas station. One of the other riders, Joy, pulled in behind us and was happy to take a break to. She was having a rough day, dealing with a bad head cold.

We spent the next hour or so at the gas station. I ate and drank all of the salty/sweet foods I could- chocolate milk, awesome orange/cream slushie, chex mix, banana, twizzlers. I knew I wasn't dehydrated and I wasn't hungry. So it was probably the salts I was missing. A few minutes after downing the food, I started to feel more alert and more like myself. The other riders were great, and two stayed with me until I was ready to go. We took the rest of the ride slow, pushing against a decent head wind and made the last 30 miles in. It wasn't fun for a lot of it, I didn't feel strong, and I was not impressed with my performance. We were the last to arrive, around 6:30pm. My legs didn't feel that bad, but I was beat.

Luckily, the church greeted us warmly and we got showers right away. We had a fun discussion with Pastor Steve and the generous members of his congregation who cooked for us. Plan for tomorrow: drink gatorade.

Photos: Me under a tarp on our first rainy day. It was cold and wet, and it was hard to see with the water pouring into my eyes. And the wonderful women on the way to Boonville, NY who donated donuts to all of us.