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No worries about gas prices when running on human power!
For several years I've been hoping to go for an epic bike ride from my house in Lowell to my parents' house in Ann Arbor, a distance of roughly 120 miles. With my recovering hamstring preventing me from planning any running races, I thought that maybe this year I could squeeze in an all-day bike ride.
However, "real life" gets in the way as it often does and I wasn't able to put in enough training to prepare. Sure I could've pulled it off, but I figure that to do something like riding my bike across an entire state ought to be done right. For example, a decent road bike would help compared to my 6-year-old "comfort bike".
Yeah, that's what my Giant Cypress DX is called and it's since been "tricked out" with a new seat (twice), bar-end hand grips, new pedals and second-hand pedal clips, bottle rack, speedometer, rear rack, and a cheap bike computer. It has served me well over the years on the roads, mountain bike trails, and even in adventure races. But it's not a fast bike.
A few years ago I bought a 25-year-old Peugot road bike for $65 just to see what a road bike feels like. Despite being an old 10-speed I easily averaged a full 1 mph faster on my standard routes. That bike is now in need of repair so the Cypress is all I have, meaning that a 120-mile ride would take 10-12 hours including food stops whereas a nice road bike could shave a few hours off of that time.
Ready to ride despite the rain.
Instead I planned a ride that traveled 55 miles, starting near Lansing and finishing at my parents' house. Last Sunday Amanda dropped me off near Webbersville at the I-96 exit in a heavy, steady rain! I was standing in a two-inch deep puddle as I unloaded my bike from the car and got ready to go. Due to the weather I had to keep all of my gear in a dry-bag bungeed to the rack on my bike and I wore a rain jacket to stay warm. You can see what the weather was like in Amanda's video:
The first 15 miles of my ride were solo as I pedaled my way to Stockbridge where I would meet Dad. It took me about an hour despite a strong WNW crosswind on my southbound road and the steady rain blurring up my sunglasses. Believe it or not I found the glasses to be of help because they kept splashes and road grit out of my eyes, but also being polarized it really cut down the glare from the wet road.
No frogs here, yet...
Worse than the wind and the rain were the frogs - dead ones. The shoulder of the road was littered with hundreds of dead frogs! I don't know why so many were trying to cross and getting hit and why they ended up on the shoulder but I was constantly weaving my tires among the slimy amphibian bodies, not wanting to get a taste of frog leg sushi kicked up into my mouth!
Finally I made it to Stockbridge and rendez-voused with my parents. Dad's raincoat was rather heavy - it's meant for field work, not cycling - so Mom offered him the $1 "emergency poncho" that she keeps in her car. He was quite pleased although the poncho went down to his knees and he just about fell over trying to hop on his bike when the plastic caught on his seat! Mom had to trim off a foot or so of plastic and after the obligatory photo, we were on our way.
Dad and I are "waterproofed" prior to hitting the Lakelands Trail
Our route took advantage of the Lakelands Trail, a linear state park created as a Rails to Trails project. The first several miles of the trail were packed dirt that was rather rough in some areas due to horse traffic. We'd had several days of rain here in Michigan and the ground was wet but not soft. The bumpiness was pretty rough on me as Dad kept looking back wondering why I was lagging behind. I think his fresh legs had a bit more pep that mine after having ridden for an hour just to meet him!
Soon after starting down the trail the rain stopped and since the temperature was already 70 degrees even in the rain, we were plenty comfortable. It was actually splendid weather for a ride with overcast skies, a now NW breeze and warm air temps.
When my water bottle ran dry we stopped in Pinckney at a gas station to refill and we also chomped on some food: a Power Bar for Dad and some Clif Bloks for me. When planning the ride we talked about stopping here for food but we both were feeling very good and decided to just continue to our "dessert stop", a Dairy Queen in Hamburg.
For quite a while I was telling stories about the interesting politics I've been getting involved with in Lowell, only to be occasionally interrupted when Dad would point out one of "his" many projects in the area - a water tower, a subdivision, a boardwalk, and more - he's a land development civil engineer with lots of handiwork in Livingston County.
Suddenly Dad said "Oops!" It turns out he completely missed the turn for Dairy Queen! We'd been distracted by the conversation and since I've never been on the trail before, I was relying on his navigation. We only went about half a mile out of our way so it wasn't too bad, and when Dairy Queen is the destination you don't lose any motivation to get there.
At the DQ Dad got a large chocolate shake and I ordered a Blizzard with M&Ms, but asked if they could use chocolate ice cream instead of vanilla. The guy at the counter suggested their "Chocolate Extreme" flavor - chocolate ice cream with hot fudge syrup, fudge brownie chunks, and pieces of hard chocolate mixed in. Awesome! Yes, I love chocolate, but I also learned that even I have limits - a large Blizzard more than filled me up, but it was worth it.
Sitting at the outdoor table at DQ my dad whipped out his Blackberry and showed off some coolness, like how he can pull up a weather radar image. Days before our ride he had mentioned this and I teased him, saying "How would that help us on the ride? Are we going to see imminent rain and decide to pedal faster?"
We'd been riding precipitation-free for hours but looking at his Blackberry the radar image showed that a ton of rain was right upon us despite the bright but overcast skies. Wouldn't you know it... five minutes later as we pulled out of the DQ parking lot some big, fat drops of water started to fall! We could only laugh at the irony and besides, we'd been soaking wet since Stockbridge.
Soon we were at the end of Lakelands Trail and heading south on back roads near US-23 on our way home. The skies never did manage to open up - occasionally it would sprinkle a bit but then stop. Since the rain was coming from the NW and we were riding south I think we were keeping ahead of the weather.
Recharged with chocolate I was feeling pretty good but Dad was starting to tire out and we took a couple of extended water breaks on the side of the road to rest the legs. With about five miles to go our quads began to cramp up - both of us at the same time! Yet fortunately a couple miles later our legs relented and allowed us to finish our ride in comfort.
All smiles after dozens of miles.
But not in style - the first thing Mom said when we pulled into the driveway was "Wow, you're muddy!" Actually I didn't think it was that bad, but Mom insisted on a "rear-end view" photo nonetheless. Dad explained how only a two mile stretch of Warren Road was to blame - the rest of the entire route was paved or puddle-less dirt.
If Mom thinks this is "muddy", wait until we go mountain biking!
Dad and I also discovered that one or both of our bike computers isn't calibrated correctly - mine had logged a couple more miles than Dad's over the same course! I used MapMyRun to determine that my Webberville-to-Stockbridge solo ride was 15.2 "mapped" miles compared to 15.4 "computed" miles so it seems mine is a bit off. However, it's hard to say for sure about the rest of the ride since our double-back for missing Hamburg can only be guessed for distance.
All told my computer showed 55.3 miles, so assuming that it's off by 0.2 every 15.4, my total distance would be 54.6 - not a major error. I'll just call it 55 miles and be content.
Soon after getting home the "Blackberry rain" arrived and it began to pour cats and dogs. Two of the dogs were mine - Haven and Beacon arrived with Amanda and her parents, as did Ryan and Megan. We all (except the dogs) went to dinner at Red Robin where it rained even harder and the restaurant even lost power for a couple seconds before the backup kicked in! Perhaps it was a good day to not be riding 120 miles after all!
Overall the ride was a total blast and surprisingly "easy" if 50+ miles can ever be deemed easy. The route was pancake flat except for a few short hills between Hamburg and Ann Arbor and traffic on the non-trail roads was never a problem. My legs were sore for the next couple days but I never felt bonky or worn out. I'm already thinking about doing this again! But not this weekend. :)
Saturday I went for an easy-paced long run for which I had zero plans except to bring the camera and stay out for 1.5 hours or so. The entire time I was never more than 2 miles from home, but I wound up covering 8.5 miles during the run and I snapped several photos along the way.
The morning air was cool and the river was somewhat warm, causing some beautiful steam fog on the surface. One spectacular effect of this was that the gentle morning breeze coupled with the rising warm vapor off the river created some mini tornadoes! This was the second time I've ever seen them; the first time was last summer during a kayak outing on Lake Malone in Kentucky.
Part of my run took me through the fairgrounds, where I got some photos of the horse arena and the dirt track where Amanda and I do our speedwork. In the background of the wide-angle photo you can see the grain silos of King Milling, among which I ran after going through the fairgrounds.
My little expedition also ran past my old elementary school and playground!
I swear my life has a soundtrack... there's always a song in my head for everything I do. In fact, every morning I wake up with a seemingly random song broadcasting on my brainwaves! Early on in today's bike ride I thought to myself "How nice that there's no traffic on these country roads" and in an instant John Denver's song was playing in my head the rest of the way.
This is why I never feel compelled to iPod-ize my workouts - don't get me wrong, I love jamming to tunes on the run once in a while - but even without an iPod there's usually a song in my head anyway. It reminds me of Andy Dufresne in Shawshank Redemption when he tells Red about enduring solitary by remembering the music he had played over the loudspeakers to get him thrown in there: "That's the beauty of music. They can't take that away from you."
After a speed workout on Friday and a moderate 6-miler on Saturday, I was going to take it easy today with a 1-2 hour bike ride. As part of enforcing my plan I pressurized my tires to just 60 psi instead of the usual 75 psi I use for flying along pavement - that way if I tried to go fast, I'd get frustrated by the mushy tires sapping energy. I also brought the camera along to remind me to stop and shoot the roses.
Or lambs, as it turned out! I was cruising along one of those melodious country roads when I spotted these woolen kids grazing. The wet brakes on my bike squealed to a halt and every single lamb pricked its ears in my direction - how cute! Unfortunately by the time I got my camera out of its double-ziploc bag waterproofing they'd all resumed breakfast, but it was still a cool scene.
Finally I stopped to check the time and to my surprise 1.5 hours had gone by! I was feeling so good that it seemed like I'd been on the road for just half an hour. I had told Amanda that I'd be gone 1-2 hours and now I'm looking at 3 hours if I turned around right then. I called her up and we made some plans - I would continue on for a 3-hour-ish ride into town and she'd come pick me up and we'd go out to lunch.
Back on my bike, five minutes later Amanda calls me back. "Aren't you getting rained on?" Sorry honey, it's just cloudy. Turns out she was in Meijer and the metal roof was echoing a downpour throughout the store. Well guess what? Two minutes after hanging up, the sky opened up and I got soaked. Amanda cursed me! ;)
My only directional plan had been to ride south for a while, then return home. With no pre-defined ending point now, I simply wandered south and west for a while until I realized that I had no clue where I was! To make matters worse, there were signs of alien activity... Crop circles! Actually it looks like the work of a willy willy spawned by yesterday's violent storm front that downed several tree limbs. See the cloud bank at the top of that photo? A minute after snapping the shot I got rained on again, just as I got the camera back into its protective baggie.
Now I had to find my way to town so whenever I hit an intersection I rode either north or west, depending on how ridable the road looked. I hopped onto a nice westbound road but a mile later it turned south with no intersections for a few more miles. Ack! Finally I got on a westerly course and found myself staring at quite a hill. Luckily it wasn't too bad at my slow pace; in fact, this was typical of about a dozen large hills that I climbed - and descended - during the ride. According to MapMyRide my route involved almost 2000 feet of climbing - not bad for Michigan!
Going down those hills was fun and fast, but the raindrops really sting at high speed! Yeah, those raindrops - the last hour of my ride was in a steady rain. I was completely soaked, but it was 67 degrees and I felt great - perfect riding conditions if you ask me! I finally came to a road name that I recognized and called Amanda to look up my location on Google Maps. She told me that it was six miles to a familiar intersection, and from there I was "really close" to the airport. She emphasized that it wasn't far at all, so I figured I'd meet her at the airport viewing area and assumed it was 8-9 miles away.
10 miles later I was wondering what the heck Amanda had told me! Turns out that Amanda had thought I was at the familiar intersection, which was six miles from the airport. So instead of 8-9 miles I actually needed 12 miles to reach the rendezvous point. Less than a mile from the finish the road was blocked by geese! Two families with adolescent goslings (about half the size of their parents; the fuzz was shedding from their necks) were thinking about making a crossing. They ran back to the shoulder as I used the oncoming lane to get around them. I slowed down to watch them when suddenly one of the parents hissed loudly and started running at me! I accelerated and got outta there! :)
At long last I met up with Amanda and changed into some dry clothes before getting refueled at Pizza Hut. My planned 1-2 hour ride became a 3-hour affair (including phone call and photo stops) where I covered 35 miles! All told I averaged about 13 mph if I subtract out the stopping. Surprisingly I still feel great! Apparently last week's 50-miler with my dad has recalibrated my cycling endurance. Nevertheless, I'll go easy on my legs when I run tomorrow.
Alas, I was not a Detroit Tigers ballplayer this weekend, even if it would've meant sitting on the bench as we got swept by the division rivals. Instead I rode a different type of pine, rolling along the White Pine Trail on my bicycle with Amanda and my parents.
My dad and I have long been planning to do a 50-mile ride on this trail, and Saturday was finally the day. Initially I was hoping to ride the entire 92-mile trail to achieve one of my "wouldn't it be cool?" goals for 2007; however, complications involving car repairs altered my plans and I opted for the logistically simpler plan of just riding 50. Not that riding 50 miles is ever simple...
In fact it was only 49 miles, but my dad and I aren't ones to nitpick. :) Mom and Dad drove to our house, loaded up my bike, and the three of us drove to the trailhead in Big Rapids where Dad and I began our journey. Since it had rained all morning we brought along our raincoats but seeing clear skies in the north, we chanced leaving them in the car. I was well stocked with 4 liters of water (planning to give my bottle to Dad, since he brought just one) and tons of munchies.
Three of those liters were in my Salomon Raid Race 200 (bought two years ago for my first adventure race) that I converted into a hydration pack. In contrast my dad went old school, wearing a vintage REI knapsack with felt-lined leather shoulder straps, a wedding gift from 1974! Aside from the handy waist-belt pouches, my pack didn't seem any superior to his - both were lightweight, comfortable, breathable, and durable. Impressive!
The first mile was easy pedaling - all paved. That soon gave way to a dirt two-track for the next, oh, 30+ miles that had been softened by the morning's rain. While some sections were harder-packed than others, the soft dirt just sucked the kinetic energy right out of our tires, much the way EMAS slows down aircraft that overrun a runway. Both of our rides were hybrid bikes with relatively narrow tires that the soft ground swallowed up. We kept wishing for some good old 2" mountain bike tires and I finally tried to emulate those fat knobbies by lowering my tire pressure from 70 to 45 psi. It helped quite a bit, but we'd already ridden 20 miles at the higher pressure so the benefit was minimal.
The weather held up for us terrifically. Temps hovered in the 60s while the sky remained overcast yet without rain - very comfortable! Every 45 minutes or so we'd stop and have a snack. By the end of our ride we'd consumed four energy bars, one bag of dried fruit trail mix, and half a bag of Combos - I later calculated our pit stops to have totaled about 1000 calories for each of us! I swear we burned it all, too.
We were amazed at how far down the trail we could see in some places. The trail is a former train track - straight and flat - and at times we could see two miles ahead of us! It was weird to see a road intersection way in the distance, ride for five minutes and look up to feel as though we didn't get any closer! 33 miles along the trail we spot this pink thing in the distance - minutes passed before we were able to confirm our guess that it was Amanda, who had ridden up to meet us from Grand Rapids. She had to pedal 16 miles to reach us!
Now our group was 50% larger as the three of us slogged through some loose gravel on the two-track. All of this soft terrain was wearing on Amanda's legs and she had one goal in mind: pavement! Half an hour later we finally hit Russell Road, which marks the point where the rest of the trail south is paved. Ahhh! Our average speed jumped a few MPH as cruised along the blacktop. Another 30 minutes and we reached the town of Rockford, our temporary finish line.
In Rockford we met my mom, who had ridden the four miles up from Grand Rapids to meet us all for lunch. We found a pizza restaurant situated in a 100-year-old house that was cramped, but the food was served quickly and it really hit the spot. That pizza joint has the world's smallest bathroom - imagine fitting a toilet, sink, and towel dispenser in a space the size of an outhouse!
Loaded up on food, we walked around the Rockford dam for 15 minutes to digest a bit before hopping back on our bikes for the 4-mile ride to our awaiting parked cars. A mile into the ride it began to rain and quite honestly I welcomed it - after 4 hours of cranking the pedals and getting sprayed with sand and pebbles, the rain felt refreshing! At the very end Dad and I sprinted ahead to see how high of a max speed we could hit on his bicycle computer - he reached 24 mph while I was still gaining on him. It felt fast but then again, Olympic sprinters can run that speed!
We got so carried away we almost missed the parking lot! Dad and I racked up 49 miles, which was his longest ride since a 100-miler in his youth on Belle Isle. This matched my longest - last June I rode the same section of trail but in reverse, going solo from Grand Rapids to Big Rapids. Amanda notched an impressive 32 miles, topping her longest lifetime ride of 28 miles that she did last year, also on this trail. Mom finished at 8 miles, which isn't bad considering that her longest ride in ages was 9 miles a couple months ago. Who wants to go again? :)
"April showers bring May flowers" so the saying goes, but I don't think those flowers had snow in mind! Isn't this crazy? But it makes for fun running. Here's the view out our front window this evening:
Several weeks ago my wife and I took one of our foster dogs, Bella, to the local vet to get her health certificate updated. The vet who checked out Bella was Dr. Bruce Langlois, owner of the Lowell Animal Hospital. He proclaimed Bella to be perfectly healthy, and then we chatted a bit about running.
See if you can follow this chain... Back in March I went for a run with Dean Karnazes, who was in town for a book signing thanks to a guy named Don Kern, the director of the Grand Rapids Marathon. One day I was reading Don's blog and was surprised to find an entry about Bruce! So I asked Bruce about Don during our visit with Bella, leading to Bruce inviting me to join him and some running buddies on their weekly Saturday morning run. Finally on July 19, I took him up on the offer.
There's a group of runners who show up to Townsend Park at 8:00am every Saturday to go for a run. However, Bruce and a friend of his named Dave like to get started early at 6:00am! So I dragged myself out of bed ready for a hard run because these two guys like to go FAST. At least, fast relative to me. They were planning on 8-minute miles for 13 miles! I wasn't sure I could do that but I figured I'd be close and might as well try.
Well, I can't run quite that fast. After about 4 miles I dropped a few yards behind them on a long hill, and each hill after that put them farther ahead. Luckily they were planning a stop around halfway at Bruce's lake cabin to grab a drink of water, so I caught up to them there. Five minutes later we were off again, and after a mile I just couldn't hang with them. They went on ahead and I eventually stumbled back to Townsend Park, but not that far behind them - I ran 8:30 miles! A good run for me.
Last Saturday I was back at Townsend Park, but this time at 7:00am. I ran for half an hour on the trails, then rested up and waited for the 8:00am crowd to show up since they run at a slower pace than Bruce and Dave. A little after 7:30am those two came striding into the parking lot, having finished their 13-miler at a 7:30 pace! As it turned out, however, only two guys showed up for the 8:00am group run - Andy and John. I was looking to run 12 miles, but Andy and John were planning on less. We started off together but after 3 miles Andy turned around (to run 6) and then after 4 miles John turned back (to finish with 8) while I pressed on alone.
The next few miles were miserable, not because of my fitness because I felt fine, but because of the hordes of deer files! I was getting swarmed and even bitten a few times. Then to make matters worse I started to run out of water! Even though it was early in the morning the temperature was already into the 80's with a forecast high in the mid 90's. I turned toward the main two-lane highway for two reasons: 1) I figured there would be fewer deer flies than on the tree-shrouded dirt roads, and 2) I needed to find somewhere to refill my empty water bottle.
As it happens, my aunt and uncle live along that main road but when I ran by they weren't home. No problem, though, because just another mile down the road is a convenience store where I was able to refill my water bottle. However, I had already dehydrated and was forced to walk soon after leaving the store. I walked about a mile and then started feeling better and managed to run the remaining 2 miles back to the park. Boy was it HOT that day! I drank three bottles of water over 15 total miles of running, which is twice what I normally drink.
Now I've gotta run - literally. I still need to go running this evening. Today was the hottest of the year, reaching 98 degrees a few hours ago and it's still in the lower 90's right now (7:30pm) so it'll be an interesting run. I'm planning to take one of my dogs with me, so I'll be carrying two water bottles - one for me, one for Haven, plus a little water bowl for her to drink from. Gotta keep her hydrated, too!
One of the highlights of Lowell is the Kent County Fairgrounds. The main event each year is the Kent County Youth Fair, but this beautiful site at the corner of the Flat River and Grand River has numerous other uses. There are annual events such as the Bluegrass Festival, Pow Wow, and even a hovercraft club convened on the grounds. The fairgrounds also host facilities for the high school crew team, youth football and t-ball, and your basic camping, boating and fishing. I often visit the fairgrounds, but usually not for the above reasons - instead, you'll find me running on the dirt track around the football field.
Whenever a major event is in town, the fairgrounds are packed with people. However, during the week the place is quite empty and if I feel like doing some speed training, the track is a great escape. It's not a spiffy, rubber-surfaced track like at most high schools; rather, it's just a 1/4-mile ring of hard-packed dirt with weeds growing on the front stretch. Best of all, it's just a mile from my house!
All day at work I was in quite the antsy running mood - I felt like burning some energy. It didn't help that the world's premeir adventure race, the Primal Quest, is going on right now. I kept checking the leaderboard and tried to imagine what it would feel like to experience such an epic physical and mental challenge. Alas, I was spectating from the vantage point of my drab beige cubicle, so I was more than ready to run when I got home.
It was a good point in my training routine for some speed work. Haven absolutely LOVES to go running with me, so I laced up my shoes and leashed up my dog and out the door we went. Our one-mile warm up jog took us through historic downtown Lowell. Haven is obedient enough now that I was able to let her off leash, especially having the entire track to ourselves. I started off by running one fast lap and Haven simply kept pace just a foot behind my left heel. Next lap was a slow recovery jog so Haven took the liberty to explore our surroundings a bit. But each time I ran a fast lap, she stuck to my heel all the way around the loop.
After a few laps Haven started getting hot and tried to linger in any shade she could find. One time she ignored my whistled command to "come" just long enough to grab a drink from the nearby river! So we rested five minutes in the shade, then began doing wind sprints (well, as much of a "sprint" as I could muster) at which point Amanda arrived with Beacon. While Beacon does enjoy running, he's not nearly in love with it as Haven. Beacon's thing is frisbee fetch.
Amanda waited with Beacon on leash while I finished my last couple sprints and another fast lap around the track with Haven. Haven and I then gulped down some much needed water before putting the leash on Haven and setting Beacon free. Yes, we brought his frisbee and we played fetch with him until he was desperate for water, too. Now that everyone was exhausted, we ordered a $5 pizza to pick up for dinner on the way home. Both dogs have been sleeping ever since!
Sunday morning Amanda and I hauled our bikes over to the White Pine Trail, a 92-mile linear State Park running from Grand Rapids to Cadillac and passing through over a dozen towns in between. Today's objective: ride from Grand Rapids to Big Rapids via the White Pine Trail.
We set up at a parking lot in Belmont on the north end of Grand Rapids. From there we rode 14 miles to Cedar Springs, the first 11+ of which is paved (see trail details using this map). One of the nice things about this trail is that it was a Rails to Trails project - a former railroad track converted into a public-use trail - which means that the entire route is very flat.
At the Russell Road access point the trail becomes an unpaved two-track that continues until just before Big Rapids. We continued on to Cedar Springs where we stopped for a few minutes to eat some snacks before parting ways. Amanda turned around to return to Belmont while I pressed on towards Big Rapids. By the time Amanda got back to our car she had ridden 28 miles - her previous longest ride was over a year ago at "just" 12 miles!
Surprisingly this trail doesn't have a wilderness feel - as a former train track it parallels a major two-lane road. Despite this, there are nice views across some farmland and a few sleepy, rural small towns to pass through. These 30+ unpaved miles are quiet enough (I didn't see a soul on the trail!) to allow the local wildlife to feel at home exploring the trail. During my journey I saw countless rabbits, robins, goldfinches, and even a couple woodchucks. Near a pond I had to dodge two painted turtles goin' slow and steady across the trail. At one point I startled a sandhill crane, who decided to fly away from me straight down the trail - I put the hammer down and tried to give chase but wings beat tires every time. I also encountered a doe with two very small fawns, and later another deer watched me pedal onward from less than 20 feet away.
Sharing the trail with so many animals wasn't the only excitement of the trip. Halfway through the four-hour ride it began to rain; 30 minutes later the wind picked up menacingly and it began to pour. What a blast! It was such a rush to be flying along the trail against the driving rain, out there on my own with many miles to go. Three times I enjoyed a ten-minute downpour - the rest of the way it was a steady rain. Needless to say I was soaked by the time I finished.
I was feeling strong the entire day. I set my watch to beep every 15 minutes to remind me to drink water, and every half hour I made sure to eat some form of calories. Given the soft trail surface I couldn't ride very fast (I wound up averaging 11 mph) but I kept the tempo up best I could. At one point I even let some air out of my tires to give me better traction on the sand and loose gravel, which helped significantly. The trail has mile posts and once I realized that I had just three miles to go, I picked up the pace. Soon I was greeted with a "Welcome to Big Rapids" sign and the trail became smooth pavement - a welcome sight indeed! I flew the last couple of my 49+ miles and arrived at the access point where Amanda would pick me up, except...
Where's Amanda? She had plenty of time to get there so I found a roof overhang (it was still raining steadily) and called her on my cell phone. She had stopped for french fries but then couldn't find the access point; the intersecting road M-20 made a few confusing turns as it passed through Big Rapids but eventually she found me. Did I mention that I was soaked? And covered with dirt, bits of leaves, and whatever other trail debris my tires kicked onto my legs, back, and even my head! Wisely we had brought along a change of clothes so while Amanda gassed up the car I used the restroom to wash up best I could and put on some dry threads. We treated ourselves to Jimmy Johns sub sandwiches and then headed home. What a ride!