Day 10 - Bozeman MT to Columbus MT, 105 miles, 2300' cumulative climbing

10 days. 1042 miles.  I’ve ridden much higher single-day mileage many times before, but never averaged over 100 for 10 days and counting.  Frankly I’m pretty amazed that more joints don’t ache and I still look forward to getting on the bike tomorrow morning.  As this trip was approaching I heard from a couple of veterans that Day 4 or 5 would be the “tipping point”, when I would slide into the daily routines, start to feel less exhausted each day, my legs would feel less sore, and my mental attitude would turn more positive.  Because the first few days were very tough on everyone; no matter how hard you train it’s hard to replicate this many miles and at least in Illinois this many mountain summits.  So midway through Day 4 I felt it happening!  Going up hills seemed not quite so hard.  My quadriceps ached, but not as much as the day before.  And I had the feeling that yes, I will continue to take on the coming days with confidence.

On the other hand, Day 8 started out rather poorly, and in spite of a good night’s rest, typical great PAC Tour breakfast, and a sunny morning I was having trouble keeping up with my group on even modest hill sections.  I began to get discouraged, and after visualizing some doomsday scenarios of being left behind to ruminate in misery, I remembered one of my training lessons:  every 3-4 days things are just not going to go well.  Period.  Get over it.  So I hung in there, and after lunch got a second wind and felt better physically and mentally.  As Yogi Berra famously said about baseball, “the game is 90% mental, and the other half is physical”.

So Day 10 was really not a difficult route.  We had an early morning climb out of Bozeman, with just moderate steepness, followed by a gentle downhill for 85 miles.  Perfect "easy" ride, considering we have two big climbing days to follow.  However, there's always something to deal with in the great outdoors.  Today it was HOT, maybe like the rest of the country was already experiencing.  High of 94 as we finished up the route.  The crew had extra ice on hand for our water bottles (Thank You!). And we had several stretches on I-90 again today, for the same reason as always, there were not suitable alternative roads for cycling without going far off our route.  The last 12 mile stretch of interstate was a hassle; the shoulder had just been resurfaced with an oil and chip treatment earlier in the day and we all got oily tar on our tires, which picked up gravel and debris, causing some flats and a lot of sticky problems in brake pads and other tight spaces around the wheels. All of the cyclists wound up riding in the new asphalt of the slow lane to avoid the gravel and debris and we were glad to exit the highway.  Lots of solvent was needed to clean the bike tonight.

Cliff displaying PAC Tour's ready to go attitude

Tonight Elizabeth Wicks and I had dinner together at Subway (limited dining options near our motel).  It turns out we have a number of common acquaintances and we had a great time getting to know each other better.  Hopefully there will be more chances for us to hang out together during the rest of this trip.