Another tough day today. We did 85 miles today and I was hurting more at the end of this one than I was at the end of the 125 yesterday. But my pace line and I killed it, I rode with Jeff and Cameron and we were really pushing each other throughout the ride and overall we were averaging just under 18mph, it was a blast. We also were doing an amazing job of keeping a tight pace line and drafting off each other, first time I have been able to do that really well. I may have pushed them a little hard cause by the end they were struggling and I ended up leading us the last 8 miles into town to our rack point. Also had our first of many days with a tough rack point (which is a set number of miles we have to finish by a certain time in order to make our friendship visit/programming) today was 75 miles by 12:30 and 13 of the 19 cyclist made it, the others really would have but got held up for some knee or wrist pain or too many flat tires.
Nothing today comes close to beating the views from yesterday but still some great sights to see, beautiful grasslands farms and hills, great scenery and on our way out we rode by a lot of hops fields, I learned Yakima produces 75% of America's hops and apparently tomorrow we will be riding through a lot of wineries. Only downside of the ride today was we had maybe 20 or more miles on this awful state road that was almost as bad as just riding on gravel. It claimed a lot of tires and tubes today including one flat for me.
When we got to Richland we staged up and had a parade formation arrival into The Tire Factory who hosted us for lunch. There I got to do an on camera interview with ABC KVEW (I don't know if they will use it, I think I had something in my tooth the whole time, but I will post the link if they do). We also had the honor of meeting the mayor and had today proclaimed as Push America Day in Richland. Thanks to a past crew member for JOH North route, the local Rotary Club sponsored lunch and dinner and will be sponsoring breakfast in the morning. We really lucked out in Richland already.
Today's friendship visit was with the Arc of Tri Cities, same organization my mom works for, in fact I met some staff that knew her. We had so much fun there getting to know new people and dancing until we worked up a sweat. This is only the first of many dance parties this summer. I ate dinner with Cassey and a staff member who had a lot of questions about what we are doing which I love talking about and Cassey was just excited about the food and dancing. I danced a bunch with Terrell who thought he was too cool for the cha cha slide at first but I convinced him to try it with me and it was so fun, everyone was throwing down the most goofy dance moves they could think of. It was crazy to me that after biking 85 miles, right after biking 125 miles yesterday and my legs being more tired than they have ever been, the second we get into a friendship visit none of that was on my mind. Now that I think about it though, this makes me realize I have already reached my goal I set the day I got my bike last summer, to be well enough physically ready for this trip so that biking is the least of my concerns and I can focus fully on the friendship visits. I am very happy that i have accomplished that and am ready for everything this summer.
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