Day: August 24, 2011

Day 4

Posted on August 24, 2011 Updated on August 24, 2011

Day 4

Trying to write while this is fresh in my head by need to get to sleep!

Alarm went off at 7:30am and for the first time all week I pretty much slept thru the night.

Lill PB&j, OJ, and coffee to start the day and we were off at 9am with a good size group!

We rolled thru the foggy roads and started to up the tempo 21-22mph was the norm as we headed south via the PCH I took what felt like a lot of pulls trying to keep the pace quick but not fast as we had a long day! Highway signs are foresees of the future for us a long way till home and a descent ride to our 1^st sag stop in SLO.

Like the humming of a mechanical humming bird we buzzed down the road all taking pulls I even dipped off to take a leak at one point and then just chased back on. Eventually we hit Pismo and the sun!

Lunch was a social event on this day so we hit up a local café for some pancakes and coffee not my usual mid ride meal but when in Rome

After lunch we rolled out in a big group ~13 heads I sat on the front for a bit and slowly rolled up the pace, rolled up and then I realized it was me and Daniel (I keep doing that don’t mean to being a dumb MTBer I just feel like when at the front you should be working so I do work…) Daniel comes around me and lays the wood to me on a small climb out of town there was a split second I thought my pancakes were going to make a repeat showing but it ended well. After the climb I took over the pace and drilled it. But after a while we were feeling anti social and sat up to regroup. From here it was rural farm roads and narrow ones at that! Bad cross winds! Me and Daniel both took tough pulls in the wind (well it was tough for meJ ) at one point we were totally echeloned across the road….

We turned to a tail wind and Daniel hit the gas, I jumped on and we were going 30+ on flat roads. On one pull I started to really feel like I was running out of gas, he came around me and eventually I lost his wheel. I fought like hell to stay in contact but it wasn’t to be…. Then I looked down and realized I had a flat…. No wonder!

Fixed that and got caught by the 3^rd group on the road. We rolled together for a bit then I had the hair brained idea that I could catch the 2^nd group on the road…. I put my head down (at mile 70 now) and went! I thought I might be making up grounded till I made the turn onto Harris grade and got a time check of 10mins… climb was too short to make up that much time… But I kept the hammer down anyway why not.

I felt surprisingly good for hitting the biggest climb of the day at mile 86… What a view from the top!

We regrouped at the top and made our way into town… As we pulled into the hotel I saw 98.5 miles on the clock so me and Tom decided we wanted to see 100 so we rolled down to santa rosa road and back to end at 101