Day 6 of the Tour de Cure

Start	Finish	Distance
Killington, VT	Rindge, NH	90 miles

Here we are at the end of Day 6, in Rindge, NH, at Franklin Pierce College. Total according to my odometer was 88.5 miles.

What to discuss today? Maybe we should have a contest. Anyone who can figure out what my biggest problem was today wins. And the hint is the list of synonyms that I spent most of my time coming up with.

ass, butt, bum, bottom, behind, bootie, can, duff, derrière, end, gluteus maximum, hiney, junk, keester, pants, posterior, rear, rump, sit bones, seat

Seemed longer in my head. Anyway, feel free to submit new entries, or to submit your own list of synonyms for "really hurts a lot". Now, given these two clues, can you guess what was bothering me the most? (Entries must be postmarked before midnight tonight. Employees of this station, or of any affiliated station, or anyone employed in any way, or anyone who received an email describing the location of this contest is not eligible to win. Participants must be 17 or older to enter, and must be no more than 16 years of age to win.)

The ride today was really very nice. It was smooth and relatively flat for the first 20 miles to the first stop, and not bad to the second stop at 40 miles. It wasn't until after that (30 miles until stop #3) that there was anything particularly challenging. At this point, though, these small challenging things can be pretty brutal on my legs. I used to ride looking only at my pedal speed (rpm) which I would try to keep at around 80. Today, though, I tried something new and looked only at my actual speed (mph) since I found (yes, Steve, I know) that I could actually increase my ground speed even with a slower pedal speed. I was even shifting into higher gear going uphill. This was a big help to my legs, which are definitely starting to feel the strain at this point. I've been thinking that if I go on any longer I should also get a hear monitor. Because the pedal speed tells you how fast your feet are going, and the speedometer tells you how fast your bike is going, but a heart monitor would tell me if I were still alive. And every now and then I feel like this is something I should check out, because I'm not always completely sure.

Oh, speaking of speed, Erin and the kids tagged along for the ride today. They kept arriving at the stops after I got there, and at stop #3 I was actually chastised for arriving at the stops too early. It is not often that I am accused of biking too quickly, especially by someone driving a car. So, for what it's worth, that's a way to give a bike rider a real boost. Tell them that you can't keep up, even in your car.

So without a great amount to complain about today (OK, Franklin Pierce College has no Wi-Fi, as far as I can tell, but that's really not relevant. But I wanted to complain briefly.) I think this would be a good time to discuss food. At every rest stop there is water, Gatorade (sometimes blue, sometimes yellow -- so be careful!) and little snacks. All of the snacks looks great on Day 1, but by Day 6 here is my take:

You know those peanut butter crackers? They are so brilliant -- it's like having peanut butter on crackers, and yet doing no work to make it happen. No need to take out peanut butter, or even crackers. Just tear open the plastic, and there they are. What could be better? But I have to tell you, after 6 days, even these little crackers begin to lose some of their charm. Hard to believe, I know.
We have so many bananas at each stop that it's really incredible. A big box, full of bananas. Some of the rest stops have actually been attacked by marauding bands of famished monkeys, looking for bananas. And that story is completely accurate, insofar as it contains the words "rest stop" and "bananas". The monkey part may be an exaggeration. I'm not sure.
Clif Bars. What are these actually made of? If you weren't really hungry, would you actually eat one? They look like asphalt, or compressed wood chips.
What the hell is with all this "athlete" food? Shot Blocks? People seem really happy that they can get 25 grams of protein "without", I heard someone say, "having to waste any energy chewing." I had some of these once, and I actually thought they weren't bad. But then I had some when I hadn't been biking for 5 hours, and, actually, they are pretty bad. I guess I don't have very discriminating tastes when I'm famished, since, as someone reminded me, I once was biking home from work after biking in the same morning (and probably forgetting to eat either breakfast or lunch) and I was starting to scour discarded pizza boxes by the side of the road for food remnants.
That goo stuff? That stuff really is awful. I mean, really, who wants an apple pie squirted out of a plastic envelope straight down their throat? It's like the worst ideas from sci-fi movies, but I don't even know what's in these things. At least they finally figured out what Soylent Green actually was. But I bet that "goo" is something even worse. (For those of you who can't follow this, just Google Soylent Green.)

You know what they don't have? Nuts. That's what I could really use. In everyday life, when I'm just biking for fun, or training for this crazy thing, I basically live on nuts. Peanuts mainly (ok, not a nut, but still), almonds, cashews. I like them any way -- usually unsalted, but sometimes under duress I'll go salted as well. But the point is, nuts.

The only remaining thing to fill you in on right now is my tan and/or burn. It's totally ridiculous. I think the beach is out for me for this year. I'm pretty sure I can't go anywhere for the rest of the year without a T-shirt on.

Last entry tomorrow. See you then.

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