Good day today, a bit fast, but tons of fun.
I'm riding with a great group of veteran DALMAC riders who have a lot of individual talent which makes for an amazing show of force on the road. We have four main tandems and four main single riders, which includes me. Of course with this large of a group of tandems, other stronger single riders who are not with our group tend to gravitate to the back of the group to try and get some break from the head wind. Other riders who can't catch up to the group tend to have humorous reactions as we pass them at high speeds. It must be pretty amazing from the standpoint of a spectator or someone who has not seen this many bikes going this fast at one place at one time before to see this group of 15 riders going down the road. I know I feel the same way when I see a group of elite racers riding by me… makes you feel like you're standing still!
There was a great southern wind today that gave us a lot of speed as we headed north, but made for tough pulls for the tandems when we headed west, which was the predominant direction for today's route. A side wind can be as tough if not tougher than a headwind for tandems because of their long wheel base and greater weight. It's basically equivalent to a sail on a sailboat - they tend to catch all the wind. Equally, when there's a side wind, higher speeds can be attainable, but you're still fighting the side wind, and that wears your upper body down after long periods. During the last 20 miles the wind seemed to kick up even more from the south, which made the last haul to the first campsite in Howard City that much tougher.
A funny story about today's ride started at around 35 miles when we came up to a stop sign. Traditionally, when this size of a group heads towards a stop sign, a single rider rides faster to check for traffic. It's not anything that's articulated as "Oh, you want to be the traffic watcher", it's just something a single rider notices and does for the group. I was feeling pretty good at this point and decided to be the traffic watcher for this stop sign. So as I pulled ahead of the pace line, I heared cheers and yells of "Yea, Clint!" as I went through the intersection waving the crew on, a few of them mentioned as the pace-line passed by that it looked like I had dropped my glasses out of my back pocket. So as the group proceeded on, I went back to find my lost item. It turned out to be a simple helmet visor, which I probably would have not left the group to find had I known. As I turned to catch back up with the group I realized I was pretty far away and had to push it pretty hard to catch up. After about 45 seconds of pushing it hard at 25+ miles per hour, I noticed that one of the single riders was waiting for me to help me catch back up to the group, which I appreciated since I was never very good at sustained periods of power. Big thanks to Joe for helping me out on that day.
I'll share one more story. At about 70 miles, we met up with an Ann Arbor cycling group, and together with our group did one of the hardest pushes of that day's ride. The toughest part for me was that there was never a point where I could try to recover my heart rate to the point where I was comfortable in the pace line. It was just one huge hammer fest for me. I'm sure most of the other group members, both Ann Arbor and ours, thought it was a bit easier, but for me it was a pretty tough pace to keep up with. I was quietly kind of glad when our group turned into a filling station to take our middle afternoon break and the Ann Arbor group proceeded on without us.
With the push to get back into the group early in the ride and the pace of the Ann Arbor group combined with ours, I'd have to say that this was one of my toughest centuries I've done. I'm hoping that the start of the hilly terrain tomorrow will slow this group down a bit. But then again, I doubt it. Maybe by tomorrow morning I'll feel a little fresher.
Day 1 - Day 2 - Day 3 - Day 4 - The Day After