I wasn't sure if I'd do the 41 or the 64 mile route before starting, but somewhere around 25 miles in we hit the fork and I decided to follow Karen on the 64 mile route. I did well for the first ~40 miles, but sometime around mile 43-44 I ran out of steam something fierce. I don't know why it happened, it could have been the humidity that sapped me earlier than expected. I did a solid job of taking in food at rest stops and on the road so I don't think that was the problem, and though I could have drank more fluids I wasn't really dehydrated either. I think I just hit my limit for the day.

I dropped down from 17-18mph to 14-15mph and rarely came out of the smaller chainring(I have a double, not a triple) for the last 20 miles. I hit some really low points in the next 10 miles and at one point got so fed up with myself that I started cussing like a sailor with a bad case of Tourette's. Karen had been pretty patient with me(sometimes I think she should be sainted) so I pushed ahead of her to save her from having to deal with my mental state. For the next 4-5 miles I was unyielding in my foul language(75% of which was directed at the hills, 20% at myself, and 5% at this jackass on a nice road bike who wasn't wearing a helmet on the aforementioned highway) and I pushed through until I started feeling cramps coming on. Thankfully - and this was the best moment of the ride - at the 50 mile rest stop they had a group of chiropractors & physical therapists who had shaded spots where they helped work out some of my cramping. Karen showed up a couple minutes later and got worked on a little as well, but I needed some serious work on the quads & hamstrings. The girl that worked on me was an angel for getting my legs back to a serviceable place.

Side note: For probably the first time ever, I was referred to as 'flexible' by a physical therapist. I guess the stretching has paid off, because most times they're amazed at how tight all my muscles & tendons are.

Anyway, we headed out and eventually got back to the stadium where it all started. I was pretty much a bag of goo for the rest of the day.

Not sure. There wasn't anything obviously wrong with my preparation and I've done rides that long before without running out of gas so early, so I'm not sure what the problem was. Maybe it just wasn't my day.

Ate hot dogs and tried not to pass out driving Karen home.


The lack of a 2-stroke engine probably kept me from really flying.


Some rest areas were better stocked than others. None of them were poorly stocked mind you, but the 20 mile stop was the only one with fresh watermelon & bottles of pickle juice. The 50 mile stop was the only one I noticed with any sort of medical station. Plus, the 50 mile stop was icing down paper towels so they were handing out cold towels that you could cool off with(this was the 2nd best thing about that stop behind the PTers). For the first year, this event wasn't bad. If they make a few adjustments it could be one of the better rides in the area.