Kalispell To Missoula
It was a beautiful morning for riding. It was very flat leaving Kalispell and consequently very fast. I miscalculated the rest stop opening time, so I was dawdling, taking pictures, just noodling around. A couple miles outside town, a dog raced down his fence line parallel to us, unfortunately the driveway wasn't fenced and he shot out onto the street.
I yelled out, "Eddie you came out to play."
He chased me a little bit, but his heart wasn't in it. He then crossed the road and laid down in the tall grass to ambush the next group of cyclists. A short time later I got a flat, when I arrived at the first rest stop I realized my mistake and booked on to the next one. Which wiped me out for the stretch to lunch. I jumped on Harry's wheel (He was only riding to lunch) and did my best to stay there, I managed to hang on for most of the ride to lunch, but it was tough.
I felt rejuvenated after lunch and easily made it to the rest stop at 102 miles, but during the next section riding to the rest stop at 126 I drastically slowed down and realized I hadn't urinated in a while even though I had been taking in plenty of water, which led me to believe I was low on salt. I had some packets in my camelback from a fast food place, I cracked 'em open and downed them with just a little bit of water. Sure enough my speed picked up and by the time I got to the rest stop I had to use the rest room.
The last 22 miles into Missoula was a grind. We were descending alongside a river, but there was a really strong headwind, so it felt like we were climbing instead.
9hrs 40 minutes on the bike, my computer says 148.7 miles. I bought the Mapmyride App for the Ipad and tried to use it today. I checked it a couple of times during the ride and it looked like it was collecting data, but when I got to the hotel and checked it, it hadn't recorded any info. Bummer. I'll try again tomorrow and break the ride into smaller chunks.
