Eureka to about 30 miles east of Ely, NV. My stats for today (from my bike computer): 107 miles, average speed 15.6 (a new average speed record), time on the bike: 7:05 hours, high speed 41.7mph.

Wow, today could be considered the Day of Days for this week. Starting in Eureka, you start climbing immediately out the door from the hotel (so much for a warm-up). While on that climb, we ran into 2 guys, Will and John from San Francisco biking across the U.S. to Virginia. They rode with us for about 45 miles today. It was cool to help them out and ride with some different people. They were very appreciate (because we caravaned their stuff in our cars). From Eureka, it was almost 80 miles to Ely and had 4 major climbs. On the 3rd climb, Little Antelope Summit, I took off about a half mile ahead of Larry to catch some KOM points, as no one has been able to summit before him on any of the climbs. It was risky since I didn’t know how far the summit was, but did finish first. But, ONLY because I had the half mile head start. Every other climb today I tried to get him, but to no avail. He’s an extremely strong climber.

Now, the weather. Everyone keeps telling us that this weather is not usually like this, but can someone tell me why we have to have it while we’re out riding?! We got rained on (no, downpoured on for about an hour heading into Ely) twice today. We had lunch at McDonald’s in Ely and if any of you know how much of a germ freak I am, once we got to the McD’s, I start taking off all of my wet clothes in the store; putting jackets, helmet, wet shoes on the floor and then ordered something to eat. I then went to change in the toilet stall to get into a new pair of dry clothes. Desperate times call for desperate measures is all I have to say anymore about this week.

Heading into the last climb, it started to rain like the mother of all rainstorms to finish off a relaxing day of high mileage riding. I quickly put on all the remainder of all the winter bike clothes I brought and by the summit, where it was raining harder, I was cold, wet (is an understatement) and shivering. It was raining so hard that the water couldn’t run off the road and was puddling. As we descended, I started to shiver and shake so by the time I finally got down off the mountain I stopped 5 miles short due to shivering too much to continue. So, I will start off early to get in those lost miles today. As I finished, I changed right there on the highway, to get of my wet soaking clothes. Again, desperate times call for desperate measures. At that point, I didn’t care who or what was looking!

Insights from today. While riding one of the summits (can’t even remember which one), Mike was next to me saying how he was sick and tired of all these climbs and how his butt hurt and then said, “But you know, I could have just been diagnosed with colon cancer, so maybe this isn’t so bad”. True that. Excellent point.
2. Perserverence. This morning, I felt terrible and wasn’t sure if I could even get on my bike seat, but did and ended up actually feeling strong today, riding-wise, than I have felt all week.
3. The team. Jeff, Larry, Mike and Taylor. What can you say, they all rode so well and we all rode well today. Everyone helps where they can and help where help is needed. Mike finished so strong today at the end, truly an inspiration.
4. Team support. Judy and Jim. Without their help, there is NO way we could do this. Period. Judy was there right before the rainstorm (you could see the line in the road where the rain started) and drove back to give us more warm clothes before that last climb rainstorm. Simply awesome.
5. Perspective. The 2 guys we rode with today, Will and John, from San Fran, were riding with all their gear on panniers, carriers, etc. and we are thinking that it’s tough for us? We can stop whenever we want. Isn’t that how life can be, that we think our life is tough until you meet someone whose lives is tougher? Same thing.

I have rambled on enough. I miss my family but they know what this is for and am thankful for that.