I am very pleased and thankful that I was able to do this, especially in the fashion we traveled with hotel stays, meals out, and in the company of two friends with the support of their wives. I am certainly thankful I had the health/fitness at 66 years old, funds, time off, and the opportunity. What a privilege!
People ask if I will do another cross country with different end points. All I can say at this time is that I am currently more interested in doing rides in unique destinations. I hope to travel with my bicycle to Europe, and also try some challenges with great scenery closer to home.
Being on the road for 45 days is a lot, and I have been glad to be home in Virginia and back in my daily routine. I am glad I did not attempt a self-supported bike packing trans-USA trip, like we witnessed with other riders on the course. Doing hotels and dining out, without any need for camping is the way to go if you have the funds, and I have done backpacking hikes and primitive camping on several occasions. With riding four to over seven hours a day, I could not imagine also packing all my possessions, tools and provisions and sleeping in a tent that I would have to set up and take down every day. However, I recognize that people who do this have accomplished something more physically challenging. Also, camping with occasion hotels gives you flexibility on daily distances and coping with unplanned delays.
Riding long distances is a mental challenge. Many riders who do long distances play the mathematical fractions game. Any long ride, like a 100 mile century, is where this helps. You can do something like recognizing when you hit ¼ distance, then ⅓ distance, then ½ , ⅔, ¾ then you start counting down the remaining miles in increments of 5 or 10 miles. I played this mental game in my head every day of the tour. Funny, as much as I love cycling, I am always glad to finish each ride.
At some point halfway through the trip, I realized we all had conquered this ride from a physical standpoint. We just had to handle it mentally, while coping with a bit of anxiety that a mechanical equipment problem, illness, severe weather event, or crash related injury could end our tour. Everyday, we didn’t want to exert ourselves, but instead saved our legs for tomorrow’s ride. It may sound funny to say we weren’t exerting ourselves, riding for 50 to over 100 miles, but our effort was different from a training fitness ride with the local club or a group of friends. On those rides you may exert yourself with speed and hill attacks to improve overall fitness, and in my case I typically take a recovery day or two, so it doesn’t matter if my legs are toast the next day.
In a cross country trip you are required to ride some places that are just not interesting , or perhaps not scenic, nor even safe. The miles can be tedious, but when that happens, I thought about it as our job we do until about 4:00 – 5:00 PM, while taking a significant bite out of the total journey. It was a daily sense of accomplishment, and I never felt overwhelmed by the mileage.
When I tell some non-cyclists, or casual riders about the trip, I often get a comment, like, “Geeze, I couldn’t even do 30 miles, so how do you ride so far?” My answer could be the same as playing an instrument like a virtuoso, or most anything else in life. It takes love of an activity to practice, prepare, and make incremental improvements needed over time. However, unlike the gifted talent needed to be a virtuoso musician, I believe cycling great distances is for everyone with an interest and commitment.
Let me know if you have any questions in the comment section. I am considering a more wonky cyclists discussion about my choices for equipment and provisions for the trip if I sense there is enough interest. Thanks for following me!
Nice summary. Sounds like you needed the month to ruminate over the experience.