Daily Summary

The Ride

It was a hard one today! I did almost 7,000 feet of climbing. I got up at 5:15 so we could eat and get on the road before 7:00. The ride was 90 miles. It had some very challenging hills, some nice roads, some rough roads, some nice trails, and some horrible trails. A very mixed day! The temperature was nice and no rain, which helped.

By mile 40, we had climbed over 5,000 feet already. That is a really hard ratio. You can see two of the climb profiles. We started with an almost 8 mile climb averaging 5.5% grade. As you can see in the picture, it wasn’t a consistent slope, so there were plenty of sections well over 5.5% and even into the upper teens. I downed a Red Bull a couple miles from the climb start to get an energy boost.

The second climb profile shows a 1.4 mile climb averaging over 11% grade that topped out at over 18%. That one was crazy! It is hard to even find roads that steep. We hit 15%+ grades on 4 or 5 different hills today. Needless to say, the downhill portion after all the climbing was welcome!

The final 20 miles was supposed to be on a rail trail. However, it was the most rustic and least maintained trail of the tour. It was so bad in points that I was worried about messing up my bike and we were barely able to go 7 mph because it was so rough and bumpy. We ended up taking some roads ad hoc instead of the trail after a few miles.

My leg held up fine today, which made me really happy. I could not have done those hills 7 weeks ago when the injury was more fresh. I was also surprised that the route that I expected to just be brutal didn’t feel that bad. I can tell that my conditioning is way up from the start of the tour. At one point, I was riding along and getting some water and thinking I was on a flat-ish stretch. I looked down and saw I was in the 5% – 6% range. Usually I would be feeling that more. So, after 90 miles with huge doses of climbing, I feel fine as opposed to destroyed.

The Sights

I caught a picture of a river crossing near the start by Williams College. I didn’t pass the college itself and didn’t get a picture. I did get a picture of a random Minion figure I saw along the road, however.

There is a picture of the skyline that looks foggy. That’s actually smoke from some forest fires out west and in Canada. The smoke was noticeable. I’m not sure it was too healthy for us to breath this in all day, but what can you do? There is also a picture of the sun through the smoke. It was thick enough to mostly block it out.

We spent a chunk of time on dirt roads with some gravel. They were actually very smooth and almost pavement-like. I didn’t mind them at all. There is one picture of that. The last picture is of part of the very rustic trail. This part wasn’t bad. The bad parts were so bad that I was afraid to take my hand off the handlebar to take a picture. You’ll have to use your imagination.

We hit 3 states today. After starting in Massachusetts, we went into Vermont for an hour or two. Vermont did not have a welcome sign on the rural road we were on, so I just grabbed a picture of some Vermont road signs to show we were there. You have to zoom in on the picture to see them. We finished in New Hampshire. I got the welcome sign on the bridge for that one.

And Then There Were 4 …

Today, one of the remaining 5 had a bad wipeout coming down one of the dirt road hills. Apparently, he went off the edge of one of the dirt roads and over the embankment down to a river. The guide behind did not see him because he was so far off the road.

He managed to get himself up and finish riding to town, but he was beat up pretty bad. His bike shorts were ripped up and he was limping when he made it to us. He was taken to an urgent care to get checked. His one leg was swelling massively and so they sent him to the ER for more testing. As of dinner, he’s in the hospital and we don’t know if there is anything major wrong with his leg.

It will be a bummer if he can’t finish the last 2 days after coming so far. At dinner, we all discussed how none of us are going to take any risks or do any extra miles of any kind. We just want to finish the last 2 days with 4 of us still left and not be the one to take it down to 3. This tour group has been an outlier in terms of attrition for sure.