What a spectacular ride! I felt great all the way through. My knee didn't bother me until well after 100 miles, so I'm on the right track with that. My only real regret is that this is the 20th of these rides and I've never been on one until now. I'll not miss one again.

RideType: Road
Distance: 127.95
RideTime: 7:41:12
AvgSpeed: 16.84
MaxSpeed: 36.6
Intermediate split: Sagamore Bridge @ 60.93 mi: 17.15 mph
Intermediate split: Cape Cod Rail Trail @ 100mi:  16.85 mph

Total miles for the weekend including the next morning's ride from Truro back to P-town: 134.44

The route

241 people registered, 182 started. You were not allowed to start before 6:00am. First male finisher was at 1:31pm, first female finisher was 1:36pm. I started at 6:15 and finished about 3:30pm. Last finisher was my friend Mark who rolled in at 7:00pm. I don't know how many dropped, but there were a few. Most of those who dropped stopped at the lunch stop in Sandwich (which was just about the ½ way point). Women slightly outnumbered men. Most were gay or lesbian, but not all including one notable babe from Portland, ME who rode an MTB the whole way (Rider #1852). Riders came from ME, NH, VT, MA, CT, RI, NY, PA, OH, NJ, DC, and from ON and PQ in Canada.

One of the guys who stayed with me the night before was forced to stop because his car broke down. He had a friend who volunteering at the lunch stop and the car broke down there. He was forced to turn around at the 3d stop to return to the car at the 2d stop. He ended up riding 100+ miles, but not all in the right direction. I felt sorry for him especially because he was supposed to be back to work in New Jersey today, but won't be able to until at least tomorrow, assuming they can get the car fixed.

The guys from Cleveland I billeted the night before were creepy and weird. They knew each other but I'd hesitate to call them friends since they were sniping at each other all night. Actually, one wasn't so bad unless he was in the presence of the other. He was a non-stop whinger. I lived in Ohio for 18 years and, as far as I'm concerned, it's a stagnant backwater best flown over or driven around. But I never spent any time in Cleveland and since it's such a large city, I sort of thought it was, you know, a bit more cosmopolitan than the rest of the place. Perhaps I was wrong. Still, he was nice enough to bring me my requested ransom of some Vernor's ginger ale which can only be obtained in the immediate area surrounding Detroit. Best soda EVAR. I'm drinking some right now. MMmmm.

The other guy from Cleveland was... hmmm... I'm struggling for words. Creepy comes to mind. He looks almost exactly like "Dr. Smith" from Lost in Space (the old TV show, not Gary Oldman) and acted a lot like him. All my guests said they'd be here some between 5:00 and 6:00. He showed up at 2:30. WTF am I supposed to do with someone for three hours? I'm still working and I haven't even showered yet. So I did all I could, I just sat him in a chair and said make yourself at home, I have some things I have to finish. Ugh. I got to hear this long, drawn out tale of his day and how he's been so constipated lately, so yesterday he ate a lot of bran and orange juice that this morning he had such a large bowl movement that he plugged up the toilet and almost missed the ferry. Now, I have never met this person in my life, and have spoken to him on the phone only once. Just. Eww. I bet his house smells of old lady.

Clevelander #2 came at about 5:00 and was much more normal. But Dr. Smith started into his intestinal story again and #2 (so to speak) said 'no one wants to hear that' but it didn't stop him. But that started the sniping which didn't let up for the rest of the weekend.

New Jersey man showed up just as we were leaving for the pot luck dinner. He'd hit a lot of traffic in CT and was late. He came just as we were leaving the house. He was a very nice, personable, reserved person from somewhere near Morris(?) Township. His car is full of political bumper stickers and he's a NJ delegate to the Democratic convention. He didn't say much, but then, it was a bit difficult to get a word in with the other two going at it.

For the pot luck, I made falafel with cucumber-yoghurt sauce and it was gone in minutes.

That night, I put the Ahians in the living room and NJ guy in my office. I couldn't bear to stick him in the room with the other two.

New morning, we were up at five and ready and out the door at about 5:45. The start of the ride is only about two blocks from here. While I ran into all three of them occasionally for the rest of the weekend, that's pretty much the last I saw of them.

It was a great day for cycling: completely overcast and a bit on the cool side. It had rained pretty hard early in the morning, I guess, and the roads were very wet, so that wasn't great, but otherwise it was perfect. The sun didn't come all the way out until the last 20 miles. The last 40 miles got pretty steamy, though.

The ride started at 6:00

Milling about at the start

The first rest stop was in Exeter where everyone really needed to get rid of their morning coffee.

Queue for the used coffee depository

The only real mishap was that some time between when the route was marked and Saturday, one of the roads disappeared. Some sort of construction something or other in Exeter (right after the stop) completely obliterated the road. I was headed toward the dead end when I saw about 50 cyclists coming back up the road saying you couldn't get through down there. That was so, so lucky because if I'd hit that on my own I'd have had no idea how to get around it. But someone in the group knew where they were going so it was all good. The added benefit to that was that it was a pretty fast group, so we got a good pace line going and I pretty much was in that group for the rest of the day. One of the group was "Silver Surfer" who had the Best Ass® of the ride. Bar none. (Bob Abooey, surrender your Award®)

Silver Surfer

Roughly the halfway point is the Sagamore Bridge across the Cape Cod Canal. It's impressive to look at, but a bear to cross. You have to walk your bikes because there's only one tiny sidewalk on one side and it's strewn with crap. At that point I had an average of 17.15 mph which is very good for me.

Lunch was, appropriately, in Sandwich where you had your choice of PB, PB & J, Fluffernutter, or Fluff & Jelly sandwiches.

Lunch

Just after Sandwich, there were four boys about, oh, 9 or 10 or something, standing out by the end of their driveway clapping and everybody went by. They were saying "how many more are behind you?" so I said about 150. I think they spent the rest of the afternoon cheering. I heard that they were even running along side a bunch of them, just as they do in the races in Yerp. It was pretty funny.

After lunch was the Cape Cod Rail Trail. It's not as nice as the Minuteman Trail I usually ride, but it was okay. Lots of root ruts, but no cars, so that's good.

Cape Cod Rail Trail

There was a stop at the end of the trail featuring some wonderful fresh fruit and a bewildered beagle. And another "T-dance" stop in Truro featuring brownies from Haley House.

Then....the final town and the last few miles

P-town

The ride ended at the bas-relief where there was tonnes of food and lots of people. I was about 40th to finish at about 3:30.

Finish at the bas-relief

The straight mountain biker from Portland, ME rolled in a bit later to the welcoming arms of his gf. I don't know, it seems a long way to go on a bike like that. Still, he was quite fit[tm].

Quite fit mountain biker from Portland

I go to P-town about once every three years, so I don't really know the layout of the place very well w/r/t hotels and guest houses and things. So when I made my hotel reservation, the place shunted me off to North Truro. While it was a nice place, it was about in the next town over. I really didn't feel like getting my backpack, turning around, and riding back out of town to try to find a hotel when I wasn't exactly sure where it was. Luckily, someone offered to drive me. (Bless you, Lew!). I got back to the hotel, took a shower, then a bath, then another shower and caught a cab back into town to meet Lew for dinner. We were both so tired it was a wonder we didn't both drown in our plates of pasta. On the way to dinner, I ran into my friend Mark who had just finished about 20 minutes earlier, poor guy. Almost 13 hours of riding. Yipes.

I had planned to go out that night, but I just couldn't do it. I got a cab back to the hotel and was in bed by 9:30.

Sunday's tale is shorter, and as you're probably not even interested in this, you're probably not interested in that either. But we'll see about tomorrow.

But what a day. I felt good then, I feel good now. I think I'm ready for my ride in July.