Yesterday, while Patrick was filling his tyres with some of the Kansas tail wind, the wiry guy, aka Mike Munk, was trying to load a few rocks into Patrick’s Camelbak to slow him down. He was not very successful.
Patrick is still struggling to convert English to American. Accordingly, despite telling the hotel desk clerk at least five times he would like a wakeup call at 5:50am, they called at 5:15am. Close I guess.
Opening the curtains just prior to 6am, it was another clear sky and the wind was again in action.
Breakfast was in the hotel and was average American hotel fare except they wanted to charge extra for orange juice.
We loaded our luggage and were on the road at 6:48am with a temperature of 23°C. Initially we had a large group of riders but this soon split up as the road began to roll up and down. The opening miles saw us benefit from the wind and we were cruising at a good average pace. As such, we reached the 1st sag at 30.5 miles in under 90 minutes.
At around this point, we also completed 50% of the kilometres on this ride across America. After today, there are just 15 riding days and approximately 2,622km to go before we reach the Atlantic Ocean on May 26th.
Riding on, we crossed the Missouri River at 56 miles over a bridge with interesting metal grate gaps in places. This took us into the state of Missouri where we stopped for a photo by the welcome sign.
The road rolled up and down, with some short, steep climbs of around 14% gradient, and also curved with variations in scenery which made for more interesting riding than the flat lands of Kansas. The SSW wind also generally helped us along most of the way with us sitting on 30mph (48km/h) in some stretches.
Lunch was at 68 miles in the tiny community of DeKalb at a park next to the community centre.
Leaving lunch, we were on the Missouri country roads which made the route directions sounds like a secret code e.g. R/L CR H @ A (Yield) (T) which actually means turn right then left on Country Road H (highly original names are used in this state!) as it meets road A at a give way sign at a T intersection. Some of the roads were in very poor condition with gravel stretches, pot holes large enough to eat the bike and loose gravel commonly encountered.
We also had two encounters with dogs. The first one involved a small dog running out of a gate when were cruising around a corner at around 30mph. By the time we saw it, it was too late to do anything but hope it did not get run over. Fortunately, we were going too fast and left it behind unharmed. No other riders saw it so it must have tired itself out in one short sprint! Further down the road, two large farm type dogs came pounding down the road like they owned it and wanted to play chicken with us. A few appropriate yells at the dogs saw them chicken out first and move off the road.
As we were riding the route for the first time, there was no 3rd sag despite there being about 55 miles to ride after lunch. With the temperature hitting 36°C and with high humidity, hydration was again an issue. One support van was supposed to drive up and give us water but we were too far in front. Accordingly, we stopped at a farm house and were treated to cold, fresh well water to drink and refill our bottles. The lady was also keen to give us instructions to town and also to another farm house that would give us cookies and milk. We declined and carried on.
The luggage van arrived at the hotel just prior to us so we quickly unloaded this, showered and changed before heading out for a large peach-passion fruit smoothie at the shop across the road.
Route maps were given out for tomorrow at 5pm which show more of the same as today for 121 miles to Kirksville. There is also the possibility of thunderstorms en route and another cyclo-cross stage across a bridge under repair which could make life interesting. Breakfast is at 6am with luggage load at 7am. Winds are expected to be largely across our path with some tail wind stretches.
For dinner, we experienced some real Americana at a typical truck stop across the road from the hotel. This came complete with smoking truckers, disinterested waiting staff and large plates of food. No need for pie today.
Numbers for the day:
Departure time: 6:48am Distance: 124.7 miles (200.6km)
Riding time: 6hrs 36m
Average speed: 18.9mph (30.4km/h)
Maximum speed: 35.7mph (57.4km/h)
Vertical climbing: 6,545ft (1,995m)
Temperature range: 23-36°C
Arrival time: 2:16pm
Weekly (Monday – Sunday mileage) to date: 234 miles (377km)
Total kilometres ridden to date / approximate kilometres to go: 2,940km / 2,622km
Rolling last seven days total kilometres ridden including today: 1,191km
No comments:
Post a Comment