Flat and Fast!!

We cruise across S.Dakota on Highway 44 heading mostly East. The terrain is low rolling hills with a continuous brisk wind. Colours are green to yellow with brown hills/rocks. Lots of cattle and horses. We each did 50 miles with Ken first, me next and rounding up the relay was Mark. Of course, Mark's average was 20.4; however, I was thrilled @ 18.4 mph average.

Still feeling tired and not at the top of my performance, however, this ride was a great "get back into the routine" ride. Had a wonderful "Day Off" yesterday, then dinner out for my aunt. Came home and watched Jeff Dunham's Christmas DVD. All of us laughed throughout it!! It was even more fun for me as Ken had never experienced him before. My favorite character, Peanut, Ken immediately said, "That's you, Cindy!!! That is just so you!!". Except, I don't mix Nyquil and Red Bull like he does.

Generally roads today were pretty darn well maintained. There certainly is a HUGE difference between asphalt types, that vehicles overall, don't notice. The "sparkly" asphalt should be outlawed. It looks like someone sprinkled ground glass over the full street. Makes one balancing on really skinny tires quite apprehensive and fearful due to its appearance of being broken glass. Then there are the roads that have been patched by filling in the transverse cracks with tar. These "bump" oh, about every 10-20 feet. In a car it is merely annoying. On a bike it feels like someone is hitting you and Thee bike with a baseball bat. It jars your whole body. Then every part of you starts hurting. Then you tense up, which only hurts more. Then continue on this nonsense another 5-10 miles, factor in heat/fatigue/minimal dehydration and one becomes a little bit irritable and much less than pleasantly pretty.

One can now calculate into this asphalt equation the "Rumble Strips". These vary by a MASSIVE difference, primarily state by state. The Wise States place them near the white shoulder stripe. That allows a reasonable size on the distant side for a cyclist to ride on. Remember, however, when vehicles drive the rubbish on the road is picked up by the tires and thrown laterally - onto this area. So it can still be really trashy to try and ride on.
Then you get the states where "the cook wasn't consulted for the design of the kitchen". These states (sadly, WA state is included here) place the Rumble Strip exactly in the middle of the shoulder. With this position, a cyclist really can't ride to the far side of them as there is just too much garbage, road slant, and end-of-asphalt-start-of-dirt to safely ride there. However, the only other choice is to narrowly balance between the Rumble Strip and the shoulder's white stripe. Very small territory to navigate.
Finally, is the Rumble Strip that is only in pieces. A, perhaps, 5 foot in length strip that is not continuous. Strips repeat, oh, say every 20 feet. So you end up cycling in a weave fashion in-and-out of them, trying to stay as far as possible to the right.
None of you who read this will ever ride a Freeway/Highway again and look at it the same way.

The very few vehicles we encountered were really courteous so it was a GREAT DAY!!

Tomorrow we'll continue on this Highway until ... decision has not yet been made. The guys are still hammering out the final route (depends on the wind direction) and the stop point (call me soft....I want a motel). We are tentatively shooting at a longer day - each of us riding about 70 miles. My vote is then to have 2 of us riding at the same time. The first rider will start. A few hours later the van now drops the third rider off. Van then tags back and forth, at least once if not twice, between those two riders to sag them. Then the first rider completes his distance, gets out, and the driver (who is rider two) starts riding. Van then sags between Rider #3&2, again, hopefully twice. Then rider 3 is done. Finally, rider 2 is done. Sounds good on paper.
The risk is getting the riders too far apart to be able to sag in a reasonable time.
The last time we did this was on a Freeway. I ended up with a flat and found it easier to walk into town than just wait. The guys (especially my Handsome Husband) really don't want me out too far to get to in a reasonable time in case I need anything. In this vast land of minimal vehicles and people, that could be a concern.
The other concern (Ron...WHERE are you with the weather report?!?!????) the high tomorrow is predicted @ 93 degrees F. So "fresh water upon command" just ain't gonna happen.

Thanks again to all of you, and your family members for joining in, for posting comments. They all make us smile :) !!!