May 26 - Riding with MIT Cycling Team

Saturday the MIT cycling team and the Alumni Association arranged for me to do a ride. I need to give a special note of thanks to Kristen Naegle and Katha Washburn for setting up a great event. I hope the other riders had as good a time on the ride as I did. I rode on nearly deserted roads through Boston and over the Longfellow Bridge to Cambridge. I have been in that area east of the campus many times since I graduated in 1972 and it seems to change so fast that I never recognize anything. I found Ames St and was able to ride past East Campus where I lived for four years and then onto Memorial Drive. As I went by the Great Court I saw a group of Japanese tourists taking photographs and asked them to take some of me. When I told them what I had done they all wanted pictures with me. I then went to 77 Mass Ave and repeated the same process. There must have been three tour busses of Japanese tourists in front of MIT. I later learned that there are even tours that go through the Infinite Corridor and that it can be hard to get to classes on time if you find yourself behind one of these tours. MIT was never on anyone’s agenda as a tourist destination when I went there. I guess tech has become trendy, at least with the Japanese.

Kristen, president of the cycling club, and Katha, who works for the Alumni Association, arrived a few minutes later. We took some more pictures. Over the next 15 minutes about 15 riders arrived, mostly graduate students, as undergraduates had to be out of the dorms by today. We did a pleasant ride out to Lexington Green; it was billed as a social ride, which means you can talk as you ride. There were a number of nice roads with reasonable amounts of traffic. I was pleasantly surprised. They even found a hill. Let me say this about the hill, it might have been visible on the route profiles for the I days rode in Illinois where the terrain was as flat as a pancake, but on most other days I would not have taken any particular note of this hill. We returned by a different route and I was reminded of one of the many pleasures of cycling – you get to see places even in your own backyard that you would never have seen were it not for cycling.

I decided to ride back via the Esplanade. So I crossed the Harvard Bridge, paying appropriate homage to the number of Smoots I traveled, then I turned onto the Esplanade. I soon discovered that there was a large concert at the Hatch Shell and needless to say I had to walk the bike. I thought that everyone who hadn’t left Boston the night before must be on the Esplanade. When I finally got back to the Charter House where Karen and I are staying, I discovered that there were even more people at Quincy Market. Where do they all come from? Having ridden across rural areas of the US for 4 weeks I might not have seen this many people in total over that time. I will just have to adjust.

After a few days off the bike it is time to access the ride. Am I glad I did it? YES! Would I do it again? Yes. How do I feel? No aches or pains and while I will fly back to Berkeley, I feel like I could ride back if I had the time. It was a great adventure. I wish I had been able to ride every mile of the ride, but I didn’t. I described a method for grading my ride a few weeks ago. With the rain, my fatigue, and the bike mishap in Missouri, I figure I rode 89% of the total distance. Based on the assumption that an A grade requires 90% or better, I have to give myself a B+ for the ride. On the MIT 5.0 grading scale, I guess I get a 3.9, which as I try to recall is about what my GPA was at MIT. As time goes by some things seem to stay the same.

I will be staying on the East Coast for the next two weeks seeing friends and family in Boston, New Jersey and Philadelphia before attending my 35^th reunion. I plan to be back in Berkeley on June 10^th. I will see my friends in Berkeley then.

May 25 – We All Go Home

Friday morning I woke up and had nowhere to ride. I got up and saw about half the group board the vans and get taken to Logan Airport in Boston. Then I did a final laundry, so that I would not have to carry five days of dirty cycling clothes with me for the two weeks Karen and I plan to stay on the east coast. (I also didn’t want to hear her comments about having to wash the socks I wore on the beach yesterday.) I said goodbyes to the rest of the riders, those who had families at the wheel dipping and had other plans for getting home. It was a sad time as I am unlikely to see any of these riders again. That seems to be how it is so often in life today. People come together to work on a project and when it is finished they separate often never to interact with each other again. Certainly there are those among us who can keep those bonds of friendship despite the obstacles of time and distance we face in today’s world. However, it seems that this is getting harder today and it has never been easy for me.

As we rode across America we came upon a great number of small towns, each seemed to have a neatly kept graveyard, with monuments, both large and small, to the former residents of the town - the ancestors of the current residents. There was a stable sense of community. We also heard it in the roadside stores and restaurants we visited; people knew each other and talked about the things that were going on in their lives. We only heard snippets of conversation, but they were between people who shared a common history. It is something many of us who live in urban America never experience.

That day I saw two examples of community through the eyes of my wife, Karen. First we visited her aunt who is 95. She is mentally alert and in good health except for macular degeneration that has taken most of her vision. She lives in an assisted care facility but is far better off than most other patients. One of her two sons visits her regularly and Karen sees her whenever she is in Boston. However, she has become isolated as she has no one with whom she can recall shared experiences. The other example happened at dinner. Karen and I dined with one of Karen’s high school friends, Julie. They had been good friends but had had little contact since high school. Although their lives had gone in very different directions there was an immediate reconnection. They were able to recollect about their time together and had interest in what each other had done during the last 40 years. When they talked about Karen’s mother Julie recalled many positive experiences. I hope that after tonight’s conversations Karen will have a more balanced view of her mother.

The lesson for me is that I have very hard time fitting in to groups. I am far more likely to look in from the outside, than to be part of an inner core. On the bike trip I never rode consistently with any group of riders. I can say that this was because I never found riders who rode at a pace and with a style that I was comfortable with, but it is also true that I tended to be less than willing to alter my riding styles to fit with those of the other riders. It has been one of m major failings in life and in the end I can only hope that I will not become truly isolated and without any community of friends.

May 24 – The Atlantic Ocean

Today we made it across the country. We dipped our bikes into the Atlantic Ocean in Salisbury MA. Getting there from Keene NH was another problem. Our route today was in reality two separate days of cycling that had been added together. The morning ride of 70 miles was a very scenic and hilly route along country roads from Keene to Manchester, NH. The course would make a great one day ride. It has 3 sustained climbs of over 12% and many other climbs and downhills. The roads were rural and for the most part devoid of traffic. The views are great! The afternoon ride went through Manchester, yuck, and then on to the Atlantic via some relatively flat country roads. They were we encountered about 8 miles of recently tarred road. I am sure it improved our ride but my riding partner could only think and often comment about how bad it was for his bike to ride on roads like this. If on a 3500 mile journey you are complaining about the surface of a road 15 miles before the end you need a serious attitude adjustment.

While I struggled a bit with today’s ride, it really didn’t matter the fastest riders waited 5 miles from the finish for the slowest riders to get there, before we all went on to the Atlantic Ocean together. We dipped our front wheels into the Atlantic to end our ride. It was a joyous time many riders where me by family at beach. Karen met me and shared in my joy. It was wonderful. Kasper’s family (mother, wife and son) were there. I guess that in Holland the police are held in higher regard than they are in the US. We also poured the bottle of Pacific Ocean water into the Atlantic. While the air temperature was about 80 the ocean temperature was about 50. Twenty-eight riders who were old enough to know better got very wet and didn’t mind at all. After the celebration on the beach we put my bike in our rental car and drove to the motel. About half the riders rode the ten miles to the motel and somewhere along the way picked up a police escort. They arrived behind a police car with lights ablaze.

After most of the riders had packed their bikes so that they could be sent by UPS or be taken on the airplane, we had a final banquet. All but one of the riders, who had to leave early that evening, and lots of family were there. We toasted our success; we all got to say something about the ride, our feelings, our fellow riders and the leaders. The range of comments was dramatic. Many were simply thankful for the help and friendship they received from the leaders and their fellow riders. Some recalled memorable incidents during the ride. Others described the experience in reverential ways and thought of themselves as being blessed for completing the ride. I was thankful for the support of my wife as well as that of the fellow riders and staff. I thanked the staff for all the mechanical, emotional and physical support I received. I was pleased not to have had the most flats on the ride, I missed that honor by one. I also did not to have spent the most time in the van one rider had an Achilles tendon problem early in the ride and had to sag for five days while it healed. I was also pleased that after my bike was repaired in Quincy IL I rode every mile.

Many riders expressed a pride in their accomplishment. I have a great deal of trouble feeling that emotion. I look at it as if I did nothing special when compared to my fellow riders. I never felt a special sense of accomplishment when I became an Eagle Scout, graduated from MIT, climbed the highest mountain in Peru (22,000 ft), got a Ph.D., or completed Paris-Breast-Paris. In very case many others accomplished the same thing with me; I wasn’t any different than the other members of the group. I guess that I have never compared myself to the general population, only to the cohort of people doing the same things I am. It is an interesting character trait that I have only come to recognize in full lately. It keeps my ego in check but it limits my ability to feel joy and take pride in the accomplishments that I do achieve. On balance I like being that way but it certainly is something to think about.

May 23 - Through Vermont and on to New Hampshire

We were all concerned about today’s ride. It was 125 miles long and had some big hills. I tried to get an early start and for about 15 miles was the first rider on the road, something that I never had been before. There were some very nice rolling hills in New York State. We crossed the Hudson River 20 miles north of Albany. It is a smallish river at that point and it brought back a stream of memories. When I was 11, my Boy Scout troop did a canoe trip from the Southern end of Lake Champlain down a barge canal to the Hudson and then on the West Point. In ten days we covered 180 miles. There were 8 canoes with 4 scouts in each and only one adult leader on the water. Most of the canoes had a leader who was going to be a junior or senior in high school. They seemed like very old and responsible people to an 11 year old. I know times were different and that my parents must have really trusted the scoutmaster, Mr. Donnelly. Fortunately we had no problems, but I have often thought about what could have happened. I was reminded of this when we crossed over the Hudson at a place I must have canoed under 46 years ago.

My parents first lived together in Troy NY, where my father went to school. As we went through towns north of Troy I recalled hearing how my parents had been in these towns 60 years ago. I brought me another connection to my past. I wondered if they had seen the same vistas that I was seeing, or had it all changed so much in the last 60 years as to be unrecognizable today to a visitor form the past. I hope not.

As I approached the Vermont state line I started to hear a click in the bike with each petal stroke. I flagged down the mechanics van and Mike inspected my bike. He found several problems including a loose bottom bracket, but not the source of the clicks. Convinced that the bike was not going to fall apart and kill me I continued on. I never found the problem that caused the clicks but the day before Dave Thompson had a problems with a clicking noise. He spent 20 minutes trying to find the cause until he realized that it was due to a bottle of pills in his jersey pocket. I never found the cause of my clicks, but I made sure that they were not due to anything in my pockets.

After going through Bennington VT we had a long hard climb that eventually lead to a roaring downhill. I limited my speed to 40 mph, but several riders got up to 55 mph. One rider became so fearful of the downhill that he had to be sagged to the motel. It is really a shame because while with a little bit of practice a bicycle can be held at almost any speed on a downhill, it is much more difficult to convince the brain that it is safe to go down a hill. For me the downhills are the just reward I get for all the work I expended getting to the summit. There were several additional climbs and some other glorious downhills before we got to Brattlebourgh.

Once in Brattlebourgh the ride to our motel in Keene NH went became far worse. The roads were OK for cycling, but the constant presence and noise from an endless stream of cars and trucks made for a very unpleasant finish to the day’s ride. It was almost 5 PM before I got in, by far my latest finish. During the last 15 miles little clouds of doubt about completing tomorrow’s equally hard ride started to fill my head. I fear they will only be exiled from my conscious brain by tonight’s sleep, what they will due to my unconscious brain tonight I know not. The surprising thing about this is that I rode from Bennington to Keene 20 years ago as a latter part of a double century. I honestly don’t recall it being too hard but I am sure that there was less traffic that day than there was today. I don’t know if it was the increase in traffic or my increased age or 30 days on the road or a fading memory that has led me to feel so differently about this section of road.

May 22 – Syracuse to Amsterdam

Today Kasper woke up to learn that the US would not let his son come to America because he was on his mother's passport, even though she was also coming with him. Kasper had to write a letter of explanation, have a policeman? sign it (as an American official), and FAX it to the Netherlands. He is hopeful that this will allow is wife and son to travel tomorrow. Only one day delayed.

Today’s ride of 120 miles was along the Eire Canal, through a region of New York that was once a major reason why this is the Empire State. But increasingly the mill towns along the canal and Mohawk Valley have seen much better times and are now a sad reminder of America’s, no the world’s, tendency to use an area’s resources and when they are exhausted, or can no longer compete with another one, move on.

There were some interesting sights along the road. One was the worlds’ smallest church. It sits in the middle of a pond and has room for two people. However, you need to swim with the current growth not a pleasant choice, or take a boat to pray in the church. Another was a view of the fields to the south of the Mohawk Canal.

One of the things that we have seen as we came across the country is the progressive increase in the numbers on the Interstate roads we cross. We started in California crossing I5 and riding on I10. In New Mexico we rode on I40 and I25. Since New Mexico we have not ridden on any Interstates but as we continued to cross the country in a Northeasterly direction the numbers on the Interstates have increased we have now crossed to the North of I90. Tomorrow we will be East of I89 and eventually we will be East of I95. This has been one way that I have been using to measure my progress across the country. I have previously talked about how we get a very myopic view of the country and without the Interstate grid it would be hard if not impossible to know where in the country you were. Certainly, the landscape has changed as we moved across the country but without the Interstate grid it would be hard to place where you were in the larger context of the country.

All and all it has been a good day, a few close calls with potholes in the road, but I finished strong and am looking forward to attacking Vermont and New Hampshire.

Sorry for the delay but Internet access has been spotty and the rider/writer busy/tired.

May 21 – East to Syracuse

The ride from Batavia to Syracuse was 121 miles and for that distance a very easy ride. We started from Batavia after a breakfast at Bob Evans. They opened at 6 AM and all 28 riders were outside waiting to come in and eat. Fortunately the restaurant had been warned the night before. Standing outside in cycling clothes was a chilly experience as there was frost this morning. By 6:45 when I started it was a little warmer but not much. I rode most of the day with Ian, a rider who lives outside Boston. We both have the nice problem of only needing one plane ride to do this ride. Most riders flew to the start and then will fly from the end back home.

We set a comfortable pace on the gentle rollers that made up much of the route. We went through a number of small towns each of whom had seen better days and each with their own claim to fame. The most notable was LeRoy which claimed to be the place where Jell-O was invented. We passed through Geneva on Lake Seneca and had no problem understanding why the town was named Geneva, especially after having been to its namesake in Switzerland. Like Geneva the town of Seneca Falls has some remarkable Victorian architecture and would be worthy of a visit when I had more time to explore.

There were more chocolate chip cookies today and they were just as good today as they were yesterday.

For me the most interesting part of the day was riding on some of the roads around Syracuse. My mother lived in Syracuse for several years when she was growing up. I have no idea where the family lived, but some of the parks we went through must have been there in the 30’s when she lived there. I likely was going past places that she knew well. I will never know for sure, but there was a very strange sense of connection.

Ian and I finished the ride with AJ our lone rider from the UK. Many riders have had family or friends that lived near the route visit them during the ride. One who lives in Illinois seemed to be having a family congregation as we passed through the state. It got to the point where we would tell any slowly moving car that passed us that Rob Landis was just a little bit ahead. Many others will have friends at the end of the ride on Thursday. AJ’s wife had been in the US visiting friends in Pennsylvania for several weeks but has left of England and so she will not be at the end of the ride. It seemed like a shame to me, but I really don’t know their situation. Well today as we arrived at the motel four friends of AJ from PA were there to great him. He was totally surprised and overwhelmed. It was so nice that they came and that they surprised AJ.

May 20 – Old Bicycles and Cookies

Today got off to an inauspicious start. The weather channel could not provide any local weather. It was better to open the window and determine that it was raining and in the 40’s. Breakfast was a buffet; it was good with the exception of the pancakes that had to be cut with a knife, preferably a steak knife, even after syrup was liberally applied. The pancakes would have made good Frisbees.

Our ride today was only 84 miles, 87 with a necessary detour. It was divided into two nearly equal parts. The first 40 miles was from Dunkirk to Orchard Park where we toured the Pedal Power Museum. The world’s largest museum dedicated solely to bicycles and bicycle memorabilia. It has a remarkable collection of bicycles from the earliest bonebreakers and ordinary bikes (ones with one large front wheel) to bikes of the 50’s and 60’s. As owning a bicycle in the 1880’s was as expensive as owning a car is today, the degree to which bicycle motifs were used in everyday items is amazing. I have included a few pictures. I have heard a few riders commenting during the ride about whether anyone has ridden across the country on a fixed gear bicycle. I knew it had been done but didn’t know when. In the museum there was the first ordinary that was ridden across the country in 1884. It took about 100 days and in many places in the west there were no roads! I am glad that I waited for improved bikes and transcontinental roads before doing my ride.

The 40 mile morning ride to the museum was cold, temps in the 40’s, with wet roads and a little bit of drizzle. I got one flat from a small wire that though my tire needed to be steel belted. The 40 mile afternoon ride to Batavia NY was cold, temps in the upper 50’s, with wet roads, periods of rain and headwinds. I got two flats. Well, I got one from a piece of glass and a second one because the tube I used had a slow leak from a patch I put on before. I also made a wrong turn in the afternoon, in part because I was so frustrated with my second flat of the day. I am not sure which part of the ride I liked better but there was one ray of sunshine in the afternoon. Shane, our mechanic, was driving sag with his nine year old grand-daughter. When he fixed my second flat of the afternoon, his grand-daughter offered me a chocolate cookie from a palate of cookies her mother had made. I am no fool, so I thanked her and had the very good cookie. I was the last rider and about 10 miles from the end of the ride Shane waited at a turn to make sure that I made the right turn and that I had enough water. His grand-daughter offered me the last cookie from the plate. I told her I couldn’t take the last one but she insisted; then said that there were more. So I had a second cookie. When I finished the ride I told her that I only made it to the end because of her second cookie. She may be nine but I don’t think she was naive enough to believe that.

Our motel is a Days Inn, however the other half of the same building, just down the hall is a Motel 8. We have experienced motels that have changed their names between the time the organizers book the rooms and the time we arrive. But I have never seen one motel building with two different motels. I don’t know but we may have caught a motel in the act of changing its name. Unfortunately going back to Batavia NY to check out if one motel is being converted into another or if this is a stable situation is not high on must do my list, so we may never know.

May 19 – Ohio to New York

Today’s ride went from Niles, Ohio to Dunkirk, NY at distance of 134 miles. The route went North in eastern Ohio and then along Lake Eire through Pennsylvania to Dunkirk. It was the second time we went through a state in a day. Today was cold, upper 30’s with frost at 6 AM and never got above 65. But the winds were from the west and they literally blew us through PA and NY. I missed our hotel, the Ramada Inn has become a Clarion, this required me to bike back 2 blocks, it was the hardest cycling of the day. I rode alone for the last 110 miles, largely by choice as the route had a number of places where I felt it would be unsafe to ride in a paceline, lots of places where problems with the shoulder would appear too fast to be avoided when riding with others at 24 mph. Riding alone I managed 20 mph for much of the ride. I may have felt like I was superman but in reality if I had spread my wings I could have gone 15 mph without any pedaling. Dave Thompson and his riding partners took pity on me this morning and I rode with them for the first 25 miles. I let them go and continued on alone, but I must have been doing OK because I got to both SAG stops today before they had left. At the end there were only six riders who finished before me today. Like I have always said, “Give me a relatively flat road and a big tail wind and I can do pretty well”. That is what happened today.

We rode through a few Amish villages in OH today. We have seen Amish people in every state we have been in since Missouri. They are far more common than we city folks would think. Even if you don’t see the Amish, or their horse drawn carriages you can recognize their presence by the horse shit on the road. I recall a 60’s song by Tom Lear who bemoans the pollution being produced by cars but concludes that the pollution produced by horses would be worse. With what we now know about global warming I am not sure that he was right. However, what I do know is that as cyclists, at least those who wish to avoid flats and brush their tires with their gloved hands, do not like riding through horse shit. In addition both cyclists and Amish carriages tend to ride on the left hand side of the road so it is often hard to avoid the byproducts of equine locomotion.

We passed several wineries today. A few cyclists went in to taste. As it is my firm belief that wine tasting and cycling should not be mixed, I did not partake. Consequently I can not report back on the quality of the wine produced on the shores of Lake Eire. I can report that as of today the wines are just starting to show any signs of new growth. I wonder what this says about the length of the growing season and what this means to the wine that is produced. In general, Western New York and Pennsylvania seem to have the latest spring of any place we have visited on this trip. I guess that I shouldn’t be surprised, but I am.

On a lighter note about 15 riders went to a family restaurant before checking into our rooms. As we left a 30 something black woman can up to us and said that we had the nicest asses she had seen in along time. That is one way to make the day for a bunch of 40 and 50 year old men. We also had a small problem at breakfast. Our restaurant, a Perkins, was 0.8 miles into today’s route two of the slower riders turned the wrong way and went back on yesterday’s route for 7.0 miles before finding a Perkins restaurant for breakfast. They were surprised that no one else was there and they added 15 miles to already long day. One of them, Andy, has had a history of making wrong turns on this trip. I am not sure why he has gone wrong so often, he is a very smart guy from England, maybe it has something to do with his having to ride on the right side of the road.

May 18 – Why We Ride

Today we rode from Wooster Ohio to Niles Ohio, about 95 miles. We continued our trek across Ohio. What is most remarkable is that we have been able to avoid all major industrial areas of Ohio. My mental image of Ohio from this trip is at odds with any sense I may have had about Ohio being an industrial state. I may still think of Ohio as an industrial sate, but at least I know that there is a green swath through the state that is at least a mile wide. It is remarkable that we travel across the country by way of route sheets, detailed lists of turns to make and hazards we have to avoid in order to get to our next nights accommodations. On some days in the west route sheets might involve 4 or 5 turns and notations for 2 or 3 sag stops. For the last few days route sheets have listed more than 50 turns and hazards. While may see similar amounts of the country on the days with many turns, we seem to be focused on a much smaller area. We don’t get a big picture view. Our leader who has led tours on this route for ten years, can describe every turn on a route from memory and point out potential problems. However, he and the rest of the staff have very limited knowledge of things that are just off the route. Riding a bike gives you a far more intimate view of the land than you can get from a car, but at the end of the ride I will know a lot about a very narrow ribbon of land that stretches from California to Massachusetts. I will have experienced a part of Americana, but only a part, one that is heavily skewed toward rural America.

In the past few days we have ridden by many people who are out in their yards or doing errands in cars. We have waved to each other in passing, but I wonder what they would think if they knew where we started and where we intend to finish. I doubt that they could comprehend what we are attempting to do. They surely would have trouble with the issue of why we are doing the ride. In general, we do it because it is a challenge and because we are physically able to meet that challenge. It is a very limited challenge that for most of the older riders confirms our mental image that we are not yet ‘old’. But I doubt that any of use could climb Mt Everest or sale a boat across the Atlantic. What we are doing is not comparable to the 49’ers traveling to California in covered wagons or European settlers coming to the new world. At the end of our trek we will get on an airplane and go home to Wisconsin, Florida, California or Missouri. What we get out of this ride is the knowledge that almost all the people we meet could not do what we are doing. We get the knowledge that we are a few steps further from the grave than most Americans of a similar age. We get the knowledge that we have more time and financial resources than most of our fellow Americans. It is a confirmation that whatever failures we have suffered in life we have done better than most of our fellow Americans. That may not be politically correct but it is true and it is reassuring when everyone we meet believes we are all crazy.

May 17 – Rain, Cold, Wind, Hills, and Incorrect Route Sheets

As you might guess from the title, I have had better days of cycling. It rained last night in Ohio, nothing like we had in Kansas, but unfortunately the weather didn’t see fit to stop raining until 10 AM. That meant that the first three hours of our ride were in the rain and that for the rest of the day the roads were wet. We all cleaned our bikes when we got in. My rain parka and long sleeve wool jersey never came off today. That also goes for the cycling booties and leg warmers. The hotel shower cap that I had over my helmet to keep the rain out in the morning was used to keep the cold wind from whistling through the vents in my helmet in the afternoon. Baby it was cold outside, especially when you stopped. It was pleasant to smell the wood fires burning in the homes we passed. However it led to the question, why am I out here when it would be so nice to be inside? The wind did blow from a westerly direction today, something like NNW and our route was to the NE. Yes it could have been worse, but it was not good.

Central Ohio is the first part of the ride, aside from mountainous parts of the ride between Prescott and Flagstaff AZ where there were abundant trees. We have either been riding through arid desert regions or grassland. Now the presence of trees means that the land was not fit for farming so the trees were not cleared, that in turn means that the land is too wet or too hilly to farm. In Ohio the land is hilly. While a few of today’s roads followed geographical features, valleys or natural passes through the hills, most seem to have the same unidirectional focus of the roads in Kansas and Illinois. They go north-south or east-west no matter what. As a consequence there are some pretty spectacular short steep climbs and descents in Ohio. We may have done all of them today, it certainly felt like that at times. The roads would have been fun to ride if it were a sunny day and you were doing a 50 mile loop, but they were not what I wanted for the final 50 miles of a cold, damp century.

Lastly, there was the route sheet. Usually they are great everything is just as described and the distances are accurate to the nearest tenth of a mile. Today’s route sheet was that way until the final 10 miles then while the roads went in the same direction that the route sheet indicated many seemed to have different names. Then there was the bridge that was out with no indicated alternative route. The leaders have up to now always indicated alternate routing when necessary, but not today. Finally after struggling though a final section were there was little correspondence between the street names on the route sheet and the street signs. We were directed onto a freeway and then one exit later off, but told to turn in the wrong direction to get to our motel. After going the indicted half mile down hill on a road with some pretty bad traffic, I asked if someone if they knew where our motel was. Yes, it was a mile away on the opposite side of the freeway. Needless to say it was not the best end for a hard day’s ride.

On a positive note I was contacted by the MIT cycling team about the possibility of having them accompany me to an ‘official’ finish at 77 Mass Ave. It may not happen for one reason or another but I am flattered by the offer and to know that they are interested in what I am doing.

I promised to calculate how I am doing on this ride. Well on the ride from my home in Berkeley to the start of my ride I didn’t ride 185 of 495 miles, mostly because of rain and some because of my fall. So far on the America By Bicycle ride I have not ridden 367 miles. These were for a variety of reasons that include exhaustion, weather related issues and my broken crank arm that kept me off the bike for almost two days. Up to today the length of my route has been 3147 miles 495 miles to the start and 2652 from the start to Wooster Ohio. I have ridden 85% of the total miles. Based on the grading system I described yesterday, I would get a B or a GPA of 3.5 at MIT.

May 16 – Wind and Clouds and Rain

Last night a front moved through Indiana and Ohio. Temperatures dropped into the 60’s and the roads were wet in the morning. Conditions changed dramatically. We had some good winds today but we also had threatening skies and more than a few drops of rain. I got left behind at the start and was by myself for the entire day. This was not too bad, but it meant that I arrived at the hotel about one and a half hours after the first people to finish today’s ride. Today we rode on some of the nicest rural roads we have been on so far. It has been amazing how once we left Kansas we have been able to find roads that go through hamlets where as in the West roads only went to towns, large or small, and we had to ride through the towns. In one respect this reflects the larger number roads in the East and the fact that there are good roads to all the smaller farms. The West may have the most spectacular scenery but I really think that there are nicer roads to ride in the East.

Let’s take stock of how I am doing. I have been loosing weight, primarily because I can’t eat enough to replace the calories I burn each day. This will not be a great problem once I reach the end of the ride. Some of the pains I had in my shoulders before the ride and in the early days are much better. I have been trying very hard to improve my riding posture and I think it is working. At the start of the ride I had a lot of numbness in the fingers of my left hand, there is still some in the tips of the fingers, but it is much better since I increased the padding on my handlebars by taping a sponge onto the bars. I fell on the first day as I was cycling to the start of the ride. My knee is fine and the only reminders of the fall are a few holes in my knicker-riding shorts. When I fell last week I lost some skin from my left elbow, it is healing and causing me no pain. I have been taping my left ankle and it has helped quite a bit. Lastly, I have a sore butt. It is not so bad that I can’t ride but it can be a reminder that I have ridden over 2000 miles since I started. All in all I am doing OK for an older guy and even most of the younger riders will, when confronted, admit that they have about the same number and type of problems that I have admitted to.

I am also trying to determine how to evaluate my performance. I think the best way is to grade my ride as if I were a student at MIT. (Fortunately, I am not.) I will calculate what fraction of the total miles in my trip I have ridden. At MIT As are worth 5 points, Bs 4 points, and so on. If I ride 100% of the distance I should receive a grade of 5.0, for 90% I should get a 4.0 and so on. I am working on math and will let you know where I stand tomorrow.

May 15 – Titanium, McMansions and the East

The first order of business today was a tour of the Roark bicycle factory. Roark makes custom titanium bicycle frames. They are really nice bikes. Several riders wanted to know if I was interested in a new bicycle. I think they are suggesting to me that my bike might be a little old and that if my bike were lighter I could ride faster. That may be true but I like my old bike. Several people have commented that I should at least have indexed shift levers in the brake levers, all modern bikes have these, but I like my downtube shifters. Sure I would like a new bike, but do I need one? Probably not. I can dream of riding like Lance, if only I had a better bike. However if I got a better bike and still couldn’t ride like Lance, I would have to find another reason for my lack of speed. I think I will keep my old bike and my fantasy.

Today’s ride was from Lebanon IN to Richmond IN a ride of 105 miles. We skirted the northern suburbs of Indianapolis on a route that is becoming less attractive each year. Because of our tour we didn’t start riding until 9 AM. That would have been no problem if the winds had been a little better; 6 hours on the bike and half an hour for two stops, in by 3:30. Unfortunately, it was not to be. I rode alone all day today, mostly by choice. All the riders I normally ride with had left before I started and the roads were so nice to start out that liked being on my own. The roads were quiet, a mixture of farm land and exurbs, kind of like Danville and Dublin were 20 years ago. As the ride progressed the area became more like that area today with McMansions and new developments being created out of what was farmland. There was a resemblance to areas around Radnor PA and the outer suburbs of Boston. I am sure that everyone knows of an area like these. They can be OK for riding but as the number of houses increase, the shopping malls come and then the sprawl. It is starting in Indiana, I saw more cement trucks today than I have seen on the whole trip so far. In a few years the route will have to be routed further from Indianapolis.

The next section of the ride was through rural farmland. It was pleasant but most of it had a vicious wind that could most charitably be called a crosswind, but seemed tome to be into my face. It truly beat me up, so that the last 35 miles along US 40 were nowhere near as pleasant as they might have been. US 40 runs parallel ton I70 through a number of small towns that soon will be completely forgotten but in the 40’s and 50’s had a major highway running through Main Street. Richmond where we ended today’s ride is a big city and the traffic on US 40 increased as we got closer to Richmond. However 40 miles from Richmond US 40 is a 4-lane highway with wide shoulders and NO traffic. Several times I rode for over a minute without being passed by a car going in either direction. This was in the middle of the afternoon. If it wasn’t for the two flats I got US 40 would have been a very memorable road. In summary, it took me 7 hours on the bike to cover 105 miles and with stops and flats it was after 5 PM before I got to the Holiday Inn.

Richmond marks our entry into the East. It is the first town where I get the sense that the natural resources in the environment have been used and that regeneration will be close to impossible. There are lots of places in East that are like Richmond and there are some in the West. Richmond CA comes to mind. Our ride has avoided major cities where ever possible, primarily because they are usually not bicycle friendly. We have also seen lots of rural towns that will be only ghosts of there former selves in 10 years and will be all but gone in 20. However, I haven’t gotten the impression that when they disappear the land will be an environmental disaster zone. We can rail against the practice of slash and burn farming in the tropics, but in reality we have been doing the same thing in America, only at a slower rate. America is a great country, with natural resources that can support our present population and more, but we must realize that this seemingly limitless natural bounty can be exhausted if care is not taken. We just seem to be building a new world for those who can afford it and leaving those who can't behind. Is that really the American way?

May 14 – We will take what ever we can get

"You can’t always get what you want, but if you try sometimes you can get what you need." A wind from the west was what we wanted, what we got was 20 mph from the south. About 20 miles of our 120 were due north, so for those legs the wind was great. For the rest of the ride a crosswind was better than a headwind. All told I rode 120 miles today in the same time it took me to do 77 miles yesterday. I would call that an improvement, but we still haven’t seen a true westerly wind. Indiana is less flat than Illinois. There seem to be more towns than in Illinois, but that might be due to the fact that we are getting near Indianapolis. The farmers in both Illinois and Indiana have planted their corn; it is about 6 inches high and blowing in the wind. In Kansas it seemed like they hadn’t started to plant and with all the rains that they had while we were there it may be a while before they can plant any crops.

We lost another hour today as Indiana has for the first time this year gone on daylight savings time. The result is that at 8 PM there will be at least another hour of sunlight and at 5:15 when we wake up it will be dark. There are also a lot of irate Indianian farmers who don't like getting up in the dark. I have been told that someone wrote to NPR claiming that the reason for all the bad weather this spring was that by going on daylight savings time earlier there was more time for the sun the heat the country and that this added heat caused the bad weather. I am not sure that I believe this theory, but I haven’t heard any other explanations.

When you ride a bicycle you get to see a lot of things that you don’t see from a car. One thing is highway litter. I have talked about shredded truck tires on the Interstates before. In states with high values for the return of cans and bottles there are far fewer containers along the roads and you often see scavengers picking up cans and bottles while riding a bicycle. There is always more debris on small bridges and overpasses than along the highway. Traffic tends to blow litter off the shoulder and into the grass on the side of the road where it can’t be seen or puncture you bicycle tire. On bridges there is usually a barrier that prevents the debris from getting off the road so it accumulated.

Road surfaces can vary greatly. Some states seem to like cement highways others prefer asphalt. As another rider said “We have been building highways for almost 100 years and apparently we still can’t figure out what the best way is.” The texture of the surface can also vary greatly even on good roads with out cracks or potholes there can be big differences in the smoothness of the surface. Sometimes the difference in road smoothness can cause a 4 or even 5 mph difference in cycling speed without any increase in perceived effort. Another thing you see while cycling are numbers written along the highway surface. These are surveyors’ measurements and depending on the state are painted on the shoulders of finished roads at 100 or 500 foot intervals. They can be fun to count onto roads where it seems that you will never reach your destination. In Illinois they do not paint the marks onto the road they stamp them into the fresh concrete or asphalt. This leaves a permanent record as opposed to pained numbers that eventually fade into oblivion.

Tomorrow morning we are going to take a tour of the Rorke bicycle factory. They only make custom titanium frames. Several riders have suggested that I might want to consider a new bicycle since my current one is 24 years old and made with an old fashioned technology, steel. After hearing the costs I do not think I will be tempted, but you never know.

May 13 – A Mother of a Day

Today was going to be easy, 77 miles of flat farmland in south-central Illinois. It is also Mother’s Day. For one or both of these reasons we started riding at 9 AM. Everyone was awake by 5:30 and had eaten by 7 at the latest so we sat around and waited until 9 when we could but our luggage in the van and depart. 77 miles for us should be a cakewalk, without any wind no more than 4 hours on the bike would be needed, with a good tailwind we could do the ride in 3 hours, hence the late start. However, today we had a 15 mph wind from the east and all but about 5 miles of short zigs and zags were due east of Illinois’ grid like secondary road system. I took me just over 6 hours to finish the ride and for all but 10 miles I was working in a paceline. It was as hard as any century I have ever done. Since there were no hills we were in the saddle all day. For the first time on the ride my butt hurts. It is not a rash or boils, no it is just sore. I don’t know but maybe I have lost all the cushioning fat from my derrière. I will have to look into that possibility. I do not believe that I have lost that much weight on the trip, but it has been redistributed within my body.

We had a tee-shirt swap tonight. It worked like this, everyone donated a tee-shirt and got a number from the ‘hat’. Then the first person selected a tee-shirt. However that shirt wasn’t necessarily his, as any tee-shirt could be taken from someone else until it had been selected three times, then it was out of the game and whoever had it had it for good. One rider donated a cycling jersey, it changed hands very quickly but by the time the fourth person selected it had had tree owners and was out of the game. I was about the tenth to select and chose a shirt that had already had two owners; I got something I liked and didn’t have to worry about someone taking it. I donated a GPC Century tee-shirt from 1992, it has a tandem with a cyclist and bear as the stoker on the front and a bear with the remains of a bicycle and no cyclist on the back. Andy a rider from England took the shirt early on and no one else seemed interested until the next to last person selected Andy’s shirt. He was crestfallen. The look on his face was priceless, so much so that after the swap was over the other rider gave the GPC tee-shirt back to Andy. Our club century will now be known in England. All in all it was a fun event.

I must report that the crank arm Karen sent me and that we installed on my bike last night worked without any problems today. I have shifted between the three chain rings in the parking lot so that also seems to work, but for the entire ride today I was in my middle chainring, the one I used yesterday. I really haven’t tested shifting between the front chainrings under actual road conditions. So I can only say that I hope the problems of my broken crank in Missouri are behind us.

As I prepare for bed I and hoping the Weather.com will be right and that tomorrow’s winds will have a westerly component we ride due east again from Tuscola IL (south of Champaign) to Lebanon IN 121 miles. Another day with headwinds would be a killer.

May 12 – On the Road Again

I started today’s ride from Quincy IL to Springfield IL (108 miles) with some concern about the new chain rings. Since I couldn’t use the large chain ring my maximum gear was limited, but without any real down-hills I didn’t think that this would be to big a problem. When we started I noticed another problem, my computer was not working. I quickly discovered that I had lost the magnet from my rear wheel. As breakfast was at a restaurant 14 miles into the ride, I was able to get a new one from the mechanics van at the breakfast stop. This allowed me to determine where I was on the ride, but only after I converted mileage from the bike computer to that on the route sheet. It was difficult at times, but I probably avoided going brain dead during a number of long flat miles into a headwind.

Breakfast was at a very nice place called ‘Mike’s Place’ - no known relationship to our leader Mike Munk is known to exist. The restaurant served great food but was overwhelmed by the presence of 30 cyclists; service was very slow. Once we got back on the road I was able to stay with a paceline until a mile before the next rest stop, 40 miles into the ride. By keeping my time off the bike short I joined another paceline but could only stay with them for 15 miles. I then rode into lunch, 70 miles into the ride, alone. Lunch was in a gas station parking lot, a common location for rest stops as they will usually let us use the bathrooms and we can buy some types of food in their stores. Soda and ice cream are big favorites. Again I started with a paceline but had to drop off after 10 miles. I continued on alone until I was about 15 miles from the end when I latched onto another line that was passing me. They pulled me to the motel.

There I got my room key and found a FedEx box from Karen, my replacement crank arm arrived. I also found that several riders we being met by families in Springfield. One by his son and daughter in law who came from Wisconsin with a cooler of beer and cheese, another from Indiana who was met by his wife and four kids ages 8 to 16. It was nice to see a few of the rider’s families.

After one false start we were able to install the original TA chain rings and right crankarm with the left, Campy, crankarm that Karen sent me. It is an odd setup, but the bike has components from at least 3 different manufacturers. It is not the recommended way to set up a bike, but it seems to be working. I told the mechanic, Shane, that the crankarm would be old, but when he saw that it had a Suntour pedal with toe clips and a leather strap he for the first time realized what I meant by old. For non-cyclists that style of pedal hasn’t been used for over 20 years. But it is an old bike and an even older rider.

May 11 – Exile

Today I rode in the van. My bike could not be fixed last night. I have a picture of my poor bike with one broken crank arm. In reality it is a relatively minor thing on the bike but like many things proper functioning requires that all systems work properly. This interdependence is so pervasive that we tend to ignore it, but it is essential for the proper functioning of cars, computers, our government, society, and even the environment. We risk causing significant problems when we alter components within any of these systems.

However the major emotion starting out today was disappointment. I have ridden in the van before. Previously it has always been because something on the road had caused me to reach a limit beyond which I couldn’t or shouldn’t go. Today was different the choice had been taken out of my hands and there was simply no way for me to ride. I felt estranged from the rest of the riders. At breakfast the hotel staff questioned where I was part of the group as I did not wear riding clothes today. In the town of Baynard, population 192, a reporter asked us what we were doing and proceeded to interview people about our ride. She also wanted a picture. I felt excluded from the group. We crossed the Mississippi River on a small ferry today, the Paul B, I took a lot of pictures of the cyclists on the ferry but by choice I did not get into any of them.

On the positive side I did get to take several pictures of the roads in Missouri. I think this one gives a good impression of the terrain in this state. It is anything but flat. I also got to help many of the riders as many ran out of water between two support stops. Lastly, I got to see some of the problems that cyclists create for motorists. Many things that we as cyclists do all the time for our own safety, cause problems for motorists and the resulting friction between the auto and cycle communities. When there are no shoulders to ride on, riding into the lane provides a measure of safety by forcing cars to make a commitment and cross the center line before passing. That is very good when there are long sightlines and little traffic. Then autos have little trouble passing cyclists. However on hilly roads, where cyclists go up hills more slowly and need more of the road to avoid minor road hazards, this can cause bigger problems for autos who must slow down and wait for the cyclist to reach the top of the hill before passing. On down hills cyclists are going faster and need even more of the road in order to ride safely. Here autos can also have problems passing cyclists although the sight lines are generally better.

OK enough of the auto-cyclist carping. What’s happening with the bike? Will I ever get out of the van? The simple answer is yes. I will be able to ride tomorrow. I went to a bike shop in Quincy IL, Madison and Davis Bicycle Center. The original owner, Madison, still works in the shop he has owned for 60 years. The younger owner, Davis, has worked there since 1964 when he we 13. With over a hundred years of experience they were able to find a way to get me back on the road. I got a cheep triple crank set that has 175 mm long crank arms as opposed to my usual set up with 180 mm long crank arms. There is a very large difference! The other problem is that the large ring can’t be used because the front derailleur can’t reach that far, so my largest gear tomorrow will be a 42/12 or 95 inches. For tomorrow’s relatively flat roads it will do just fine. The other issue I discovered as I left the shop is that my saddle had to be raised 5 mm. It is also surprising how big a difference that makes. This should work until tomorrow when I will get a 180 mm left crank arm that Karen is sending FedEx overnight to Springfield IL. We will put that and the original chain ring on the bike and I should be as good as new.

Lastly, for puzzle fans the answer to the puzzle for Wednesday. In simple terms the modular difference between the first two numbers is used to generate the third and fourth digits. The first member of the series is 0000, the 25 th is 2468, the 50 th is 4949 the 75 th is 7418 and the 99 th is 9876. In base 10 modular arithmetic 8 plus 5 is 3 as the ten’s digit in 13 is dropped. For instance for 4949 the difference between 4 and 9 is 5 so 9 plus 5 is 14, or 4 and 4 plus 5 is 9. For 7418 the difference between 7 and 14 is 7 so 4 plus 7 is 11 or 1 and 1 plus 7 is 8. I hope everyone who is interested can 1) see how my series was generated, 2) how boring it can be to ride through some parts of this country and 3) what lengths I can go to, to amuse myself.

May 10 - Bad Breaks and Bottom Brackets

Today was going to be a signature day in my ride, 145 miles across Missouri from St Josephs to Kirksville. The route was hilly with large rollers all the way. Someone said that if they flattened all the hills in Missouri it would be our biggest state. I’m not convinced but after today’s ride I understand what they mean. Last year the route was 8 miles longer. I wonder if plate tectonics has pushed Missouri together and made the hills higher than last year. If this is true it would be a very serious problem. Why at this rate in 400 years the Atlantic and Pacific coasts would be joined together and it would be no big deal to bike across the country. I have a route profile and a picture of the road to show any doubters what I mean about the route.

While the flooding has made some small streams raging rivers and has flooded some road and many fields and houses it has also made for a very vibrant spring. There are flowers on the fruit trees and lush, albeit, wet pastures. There was a beautiful fog hanging over some of the lower fields this morning as we rode on some lovely little county roads. While state and federal highways have numbers, county roads in Missouri have letters today we rode on roads W, O, V, Z and UU. I guess if they have more than 26 roads they start giving them double letters designations. Highways in Missouri could be more bicycle friendly; they could have wider shoulders. This would also please the motorists who sometimes have to slow down while a cyclist climbs a long hill at 8 miles an hour, or worse blindly pass the cyclists without being able to see oncoming traffic. The one area with a good shoulder was an area with a large Mennonite population. There, there were wide shoulders for the horse drawn buggies. However the state put a large rumble strip down the center of the shoulder. It doesn’t bother the Mennonites as their buggies easily straddle the rumble strip, but it was not bicycle friendly.

Unfortunately, today’s big event was a fall taken by yours truly. I am fine with only a few small scrapes on my left side. Really I am OK. At the time I was riding with Karen a ride leader and Pam a registered nurse from Missouri. Once we determined that I was OK, Pam was calling a local friend to see if there was a local bike shop. I would have gotten up and finished the ride, were it not for the problem with my bike. You see my fall occurred because I snapped a crank arm while powering up a hill. After my fall I had half a crank arm attached to my left shoe. You think walking with cycling cleats is hard, try walking with a pedal and half a crank arm on your shoe. In Berkeley the solution would be to go to the nearest bicycle shop and buy a new crank set. Riding on rural roads in Missouri is very pleasant until you need to find a bicycle shop. The ride leaders had the names of two cycle shops in Kirksville but they turned out to specialize in motorcycles. There were also a lot more John Deere dealers out here than in Berkeley. I also suspect that the Mennonites might have been able to make me a crank arm out of steel, But I didn’t pursue this option.

When we got to Kirksville the tour’s mechanic thought he might be able to fix me up with another crank set from an unused bike. Unfortunately there was a small problem with differences between Italian and English bottom brackets. Mine was Italian and the other was English. For all non-techie cyclists don’t worry about this difference; I don’t understand the difference either. We are now hoping to get something that will work from a bike shop in Quincy IL, our destination tomorrow night. However, we are not out of the woods yet. Bottom bracket technology is I am finding not all that standardized and it has evolved greatly in the last 24 years since my bicycle was built. A small bike store in a small town like Quincy may have on their back shelves exactly what I need and it may have been there for 20 years just waiting for me to come by. (I was not able to compatible components at the bigger mail order bike on-line bike stores.) As a last resort Karen is sending me a left crank arm from an old crank set that I have at home. I may finish the ride with a TA chain ring and right crank arm and a Shimano left crank arm. We shall see.

May 9 - On to an New State and Better Weather

We left Topeka today and rode to Atchison to cross the Missouri River into ‘The Show Me State’. We then rode on to St Josephs, the start of the Pony Express. Today was a GREAT day. There are no two ways about it. It started with a very cute do not disturb sign that I saw on my way to breakfast. We are not conserving energy. There was a rainbow over Topeka as I started my ride and it only got better. What made today’s ride so good? There was no rain. The roads were for all but a few miles very nice to ride on. For most of the day I rode in a 6 or 7 man paceline, where almost all of the riders knew what they were supposed to do. There was the small problem that I missed the turn for lunch, but when I discovered that I had missed the lunch stop, a mile down the road, I decided to push on and was one of the first to get to the hotel. Lastly, the ride was only 85 miles long.

It also occurred to me that the Santa Fe railroad, now the Burlington Northern Santa Fe, or BNSF, was once the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad. I have traveled through all three of those towns. Until today I never realized that there was a town called Atchison.

I hope we have left the bad weather of Kansas behind us, but more importantly that the weather leaves Kansas as they, and much of the mid-west, need a break. When we crossed into Missouri we got a good view of the Missouri River that has come over its banks in Atchison. Tomorrow’s route has been altered because the original road is under 2 feet of water in at least on place. We know that the first 30 miles of the new route are water free and hope that the next 115 miles are also passable. Yes, we will be riding 145 miles tomorrow, our longest day of the ride. The route is said to be hilly with steep rollers for the entire distance. For my GPC friends I suspect that it will be like riding Hwy 1 from Point Reyes to Fort Bragg without the view, rolling hills and headwinds have been promised. We have also been warned about Missouri drivers.

As I have been riding alone quite a bit recently, I have been paying close attention to the odometer on my cycle computer. The following are six consecutive numbers in a series of 100 four digit numbers; 2727, 2840, 2963, 3074, 3197, 3210. Leading 0’s are permitted. I don’t want you to give me all the numbers in my series, just the 1st, 25th, 50th, 75th and 99th numbers. Maybe one of my classmates will be interested enough to provide an answer. I will reveal my answer in my post for May 11.