Day 11: Racked

Well the day started normal with an early 5:30 AM wakeup and Jay blasting his “wake-up” CD which usually consists of old horrible songs that no one likes which motivates everyone to get out of bed and pack up their stuff to be on time for breakfast. After breakfast every morning we circle up and talk about what the day is going to look like, what the terrain is going to consist of, the mileage, weather conditions, and any other precautions that need to be brought up. There is then a “disability of the day” that someone volunteers to educate us on, it can be any disability that the person would like to talk about. We then dedicate the day to someone, it can be anyone. On Father’s Day we dedicated it to our father’s but usually it is someone that we encountered at a friendship with a disability. So when the day gets tough, the lactic acid is unbearable, or you’ve got a negative attitude think about who we are riding for that day and our purpose for riding. We then pray for the day and depart. It was a little chilly to start the morning and my knees took a little while to warm up. About 20 miles in we had just gotten on I-90 when Lewis mentioned my back tire was rolling wrong. We pulled over and I checked it out, it was apparent that one of my spokes on my back tire had broke and there was no way of repairing it without a new spoke. This really was a bummer because it meant that I would have to rack the rest of the day. I had made it a goal to ride every mile, body permitting, but I did not take into account the reality that my bike may not function right and force me to sit the rest of the day. It was a frustrating racking for mechanical reasons but I guess that’s just how it goes, it could be worse, I could be sitting because of injury so for that I’m thankful.
About the same time I was fixing my bike the first pace line was about ½ a mile ahead. They were experiencing some worse problems than my own. Keagan’s chain locked up while he was riding and he took a good spill going at about 17 mph. He was ok but they rushed him to the hospital to clean up his road rash. We were all thankful he was fine, he suffered a little road rash on his leg and a gnarly gash on his right arm that is defiantly a deep wound. The rest of the day went well, I helped the crew set up pit stops and tried to encourage guys at each stop. It was very hot out and all the guys on the bikes were saying it was the hottest on the road thus far.