Chris’ Journey

I put almost everything I had left after 2 weeks of riding into today. We started around 9 where we left off yesterday in 29 degree weather. The “we” included my cousin Andrew, Dustin, and myself on bikes and Aislinn and Mattie Pancoast ( Andrew’s girlfriend) in the car. It was nice to have Andrew back riding with me again. He is a force on the flats. Unfortunately he was not feeling very good this morning but he was still a huge help.

After a few miles of riding we encountered the beginning of a long day of climbing. We were all going different paces up the climbs so we regrouped every few miles. Despite the hills I had a good pace of about 16.4 mph after 20 miles or so. The bad news was that my legs were sore and tired. The worst news was that I flatted again and of course forgot my saddle bag with all my extra supplies in the car. Aislinn and Mattie brought all my stuff and we got the flat changed pretty quickly and were back on our way. At this point we were a little bit behind schedule so we had some catching up to do.

For the next 15-20 miles before lunch we were essentially going up hill the entire time. It hurt. We were quite spread out by the time we got to the top so we regrouped and headed down to lunch. And when I say down, I mean down from 1,700 feet to 200 feet very quickly. I reached my max speed for the trip at 48.2 mph on that down hill. It was fun.

After lunch we rode about a mile to the NY/CT border to get our photos for the 2nd to last time. At this point Andrew and Dustin jumped in the car for the next 25 miles or so. They were lucky to miss the biggest climb for the day which was a struggle. It was at that point that I questioned whether I would actually be able to finish the day. But I think the only reason I was hurting so bad was that I was putting everything I had after 2 weeks of riding into the day. It hurt but it was fun.

Dustin and Andrew started again at the top of the big climb and rode almost all the way to the finish. But instead they decided to get lost and climb up some random hill before getting picked up in the car by Aislinn and Mattie. I actually ended up in the right place after 89 miles and about 5600 feet of climbing. I had put everything I had left into the day as I planned. I ended up with a 17.7 mph average, my second highest of the trip I think. And it was one of the tougher days of the trip. In the top 5 for sure. Andrew and Dustin did an awesome job of getting over the hills despite the fact that they never ended. Without them I would’ve died today.

Tomorrow is the final day. I am relieved, tired, sore, and slightly saddened. It has been an awesome trip and an amazing experience but I am certainly ready for a break. Tomorrow I will hopefully have a decent group of 5-10 guys riding with me to bring me to the finish. They’ll be the ones that get me to the end tomorrow. Which will be at 2 PM at the First Congregational church in Holliston around 2 PM tomorrow afternoon. I am very excited for 2:01.

I will continue to write a blog tomorrow and over the next few days, mainly with a summary of the trip, and some observations of different states, and random stuff like that. I’ll change up the style. In fact, Aislinn has promised she will be writing a blog some time in the next few days. So make sure you hear her side of the trip.

We don’t have many pictures from today but I will post them tomorrow. I’m tired. I need to go to bed. Early morning tomorrow. Thanks to my sister’s friend Alyson Cannone, we are out of a hotel for our final night. The Cannone’s were kind enough to give us a place to stay and an awesome dinner. So tonight should be a good night sleep before one final push to the finish. I look forward to finishing.

Thanks for reading.
Stephen

This entry was posted on Saturday, March 21st, 2009 at 9:06 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.