A Day of RAGBRAI

The two bright yellow dudes are myself and my best friend Travis.

I don't know how he did it, but my best friend of more then 35 years talked me into riding a day of RAGBRAI with him. And not just any day... but the longest day. 70 miles. With hills. And terrible porta-potties that no one should have been subjected to (vile things).

So how did this happen you ask? As with all things... the best of intentions were at hand.

RAGRAI stands for the "Registers Great Bike Ride Across Iowa". It's an week long annual event that goes back 40 years this year. Thousands of bicycle riders come from all over (not just the states) to ride it. Click on the link to go to their website, it is a really cool event.

2012 Trek 1.1

So... I had started training in April using my mountain bike... which I quickly realized wasn't going to cut the mustard on a 70 mile ride, so it was listed on eBay and sold for more then I paid for it, which is always good. With my newly found wealth, I bought a Trek One.One road bike and proceeded to train my butt off, which wasn't hard to do as I don't actually have much of a butt... thus I had to invest in padded bike shorts. Highly recommended by the way.

After many months of after dinner night rides, I felt confident that I had what it takes to take on a day of Ragbrai. I was wrong.

After 30 to 40 miles, my longest ride to this point being a 28 mile ride, I started wimpering like a little school boy and just wanted to go home. I wasn't having fun anymore. At all. My legs hurt. My ass hurt. I think even my hair was in distress... I recall at one of the stops telling Travis that I didn't feel very well, and I must have looked it as he started trying to get a hold of his wife on the phone to arrange an earlier meeting point. Turned out she hadn't left home yet, so we were better off pressing on. I found great comfort seeing the various ambulances and emergency personnel driving the course as we rode on.

With all my turmoil, we eventually made it to the end in Clinton Iowa where we dipped our tires into the Mighty Mississippi. I was luck not to fall in as my legs were jelly by this time. I was cheered on by my wonderful wife and child, which was awesome to have the support, especially Heidi as she was the one who would watch H4 while I was out training.

In the end, it felt like hell a huge accomplishment and I was never going to do something like this again proud of myself for finishing.

On the drive home, Travis asked me about doing it again next year. I told him it would be best to ask me in a month or so, as he probably wouldn't like the answer I had at that moment. :)