5 hours of sleep. Wake at 430, breakfast at 530, wheels down at 6. It’s cold. Ungodly cold for Texans. We aren’t familiar with the cold but we love riding bikes more than the cold can keep us off it. Spirit is questionable, but high enough. Dan is especially pumped because I had a spare eTap derailleur to swap onto his bike; his had bricked towards the end of day 1. He was in luck, we had already gotten our shirts from Paul, so there was only one thing to do: finish the second day. The only silver lining for this ride was that there would be no rain, however, temps would be quite low. This was a matter of riding as efficiently as possible and keeping the body warm. Eastward we go. Within a mile, we had two minor mechanicals. Luckily that rate didn’t persist onwards. Getting out of Kerrville and into Comfort, my engine was having trouble kicking into a comfortable pace. It finally turned on somewhere 40 ish miles in. This time around, we’re headed in every single direction, including west at one point. Everything is smooth sailing until mile 116, where one rider wisely called quits. Mile 140 rolls by, and I think, “Hey there’s only 100k left, yay”. 150 comes, the shoulders begin to ache. Also around 150, Greg’s derailleurs brick so he single speeds it to 160 where he swaps bikes. 160, the wrists are getting sore. At every single water break we get, I have to apply Lantiseptic. It’s honestly the only thing that got me through the second half of day two, otherwise I definitely would have developed ride ending saddle sores. It’s cold around mile 170. I’m counting it down every 5 miles at this point. 180 crosses, and I think, “10% left….that’s it, what’s 10%”. Paul designed the ride so that we would still have an evil amount of climbing towards the end. I remember at 20 miles left, we still had to climb a little over 1k feet. But you know what they say, what doesn’t kill you…makes you gain quads. 190 is here and so it the tailwind. Dan has been at the front for such a long time and he is a machine. We fly with the wind on our backs; this is the end game. 8 miles left, 4 miles left, 3...2…1…and then somehow, someway, we roll into the finish line with relief splashed across our bodies.
It was quite the journey, and definitely the most difficult thing I’ve had to do thus far. I commend Paul and April Dodd, for organizing and supporting. Todd for cooking Friday night meal. All the other riders for coming through and keeping morale high. This may have been possible solo, but at a very, very costly price. It’s better to suffer together, and as Paul says, “You now have many reference points of what it means to keep going when things are hard. To keep going when it's cold, when it's wet, when it's dark. Pushing thru those I-feel-like shit moments and finding that over the next hill you feel great again. You now know what it is like when the only way out is thru. Just keep pedaling and you will get over the hill, thru the darkness, and to the finish.”
Thanks for reading any of this if you made it this far. Until the next crazy adventure. 500k in one go…?