Thousands of Friends, Old Men on Street Corners

The thing which impresses me most about the Seattle to Portland Bicycle Classic is the impressive showing of supporters of the event. I had a lot of time to think about this.

First of all, the body of organizers for an event for ten thousand people must be fairly large. There were an impressive number of officials and support personnel at the start in Seattle. The showing of law enforcement to close down sections of city streets in Seattle and in other places was magnificent. Then there were the volunteers manning the stops along the way; the bicycle repair shops doing minor labor free of charge; the volunteers providing first aid at all locations; the support riders with on-the-spot first aid and communication with other bodies like paramedic crews. REI hosted a pretty cool party at their headquarters in Kent. Carter Subaru fielded a large number of support vehicles, and the Honda Goldwing Touring association was out running cover for us and offering assistance right up to the finish line. Darigold kept me full of chocolate milk, and at an event like this, when a stranger walks up to you and gives you a tablet to put in your water, you take it. (It was fine). They even shut down the bridge at Longview to usher a few hundred cyclists at a time into Oregon. The detailed directions in the map booklet and the tags painted on the ground never failed when we were alone on the route early this morning, without someone with more experience to follow.

Most impressive were the people not directly affiliated with any of these. The people that stood out most were the people who came out to cheer on thousands of identical cyclists as they passed by their homes and parks. There were old men in lawn chairs sitting on street corners who clapped for probably hours as these thousands of strangers came by. A family in Centralia built a misting station for us to ride through at journey's end on Day One. Citizens in Yelm, Washington greeted and applauded riders as though they were heroes.

After an accounting of the last two days and two hundred miles on my bicycle, the phrases I uttered most this weekend were "On your left!", "Car back!", and to me the most important: "Thank you!"

Tauntaun sleeping bag

I just saw this and it looked kind of cool:

http://www.thinkgeek.com/stuff/41/tauntaun.html

It's a kid-sized tauntaun sleeping bag, so kids can stay warm just like Luke Skywalker did in The Empire Strikes Back. It's a neat idea that I wouldn't have thought of.

STP is in three days. Getting everything together is kind of a challenge, especially when we're working out of a house where three guys are moving within a couple of weeks, and we're still trying to lead normal lives on top of it all. My biggest fear was put to rest today; I do, in fact, have a race bib which is to be pinned to my chest for two days. It's secure in the packet marked "Gary Jackson 7002", 7002 being my race number.

I decided to cut a little stress by cleaning my car and foaming the tires so they are unnaturally shiny.

Building a Laboratory and Muscle Mass

I've been allotted some space in laboratory at work to play with our new epoxy rifle. When it's loaded and ready, it looks pretty intimidating. I was told that I am in charge of the project. That's pretty cool I guess.

Drove up into the Idaho Panhandle last weekend. We left Pullman later in the evening due to an Eagle Scout Court of Honor. We ended up at the campsite around 11:30, not before having an adventure first. We nearly got lost, saw a gorgeous sunset, and nearly hit a cougar that crossed the road in front of us. All the while we were hauling five bicycles in a custom rack my team built.

The final leg of the drive was nine miles on a dusty road. This meant that we had to spread out to avoid choking or crashing, and a hundred fifty yards from our destination, I blew a tire. Derek and I took care of it pretty quickly, but the rest of the group was ready to send out a search for us.

The Hiawatha is a fifteen-mile stretch of the old Chicago-Milwaukee railroad, which means that the path is a fairly smooth and not too technical mountain bike path. Also, all the trestles and tunnels are in place. The longest tunnel and the main attraction of the place is over 8800 feet long, with no lighting in place. It's a unique experience riding in pitch black relying on a tiny headlight on the handlebars. It was worth the use fee and the drive up there. Also, thirty miles round trip in the gravel was pretty good.
Wednesday we rode faster for longer than ever before. I guess it was to celebrate having lost twenty pounds over the last six months. We did the Troy ride a half hour faster than ever before, and Derek was struggling to catch up the entire ride to Troy.

Clock is ticking on the STP.