El Tour de Tucson - 111 Miles (November 19, 2011)

Race day!!  And what a day it was... 

We got up early and planned to leave the house at 5:15, I hit the alarm button and the car horn honked for a nearly a whole minute before I could shut it off, it was so loud we feared we woke up the whole neighborhood!  We set out only to turn back to get Carolyn's gloves we nearly forgot.  

We parked at Scott and Congress and rode about three blocks to the start line.  We got in line with other “Bronze” riders (people who did not expect to finish before 10 hours).  The Platinum, Gold, and Silver riders were far ahead of us.  McDonalds Restaurant was passing around free coffee.  The line grew by the minute. 

At 6:30 they played the national anthem, and then had a light ceremony – everyone was given a small light to wear on their collars – and these lights represented the children that would be benefiting from the efforts of the ride, the money raised would be going towards the hospital and various organizations that worked to help people in need of medical attention. 

At the Starting Line

Ben’s Bells was there and had a bell ceremony right before the ride.  Their mission is to inspire, educate and motivate each other to realize the impact of intentional kindness and to empower individuals to act according to that awareness, thereby changing the world.  http://bensbells.org/ BE KIND!! 

Bill Walton and Barry Bonds were both riding in the race.  Cool eh?  

The ride started downtown, went to the southwest, down around the south side of Tucson and then up the east side, north side and back downtown.

At 7 miles, we crossed the first dry river… we had to pick up our bikes and walk with the other thousands of riders.  When we came up out of the river, there was a mariachi band!!  What a trip!

We had our first stop at 17 miles.  Spirits were still high.  While we saw beautiful scenery the entire ride, one of the interesting things was the AMARC, the Aerospace Maintenance and Regeneration Center... literally hundreds of airplanes lined up in the desert.  See images here: http://www.stockwellphotos.com/catalog_amarc.htm

At 30 miles, Carolyn’s back tire was flat.  We stopped to fix it and got assistance from a Bike Patrol rider.  He popped on a new tire, and it went flat again in a few minutes!!  He tried to help us figure out what happened, but we never did find out.  At this point we were about an hour behind where we thought we would be, and close to the very end of all the riders. 

At around 50 miles, we came to the second riverbed that we had to walk through.  This one was much longer than the first, and because we were so far behind, we were walking through with very few other riders. 

I started to worry about our time.  Because of the flat tires, I was worried we wouldn’t finish the ride before dark and the route would be closed.  Carolyn felt my stress… she reminded me the ride should be fun!  I changed my outlook from that moment on.

At about 60 miles, I lost Carolyn!  I stopped to go to the bathroom, and thought she would be pulling into the stop behind me.  By the time I got out of the bathroom, Carolyn was nowhere to be seen.  I looked back on the route, and forward, and couldn’t see her.  I was worried that her tire had gone flat again, so I hopped on the bike and rode back about a mile.  I didn’t see her, and I was sure I had seen her in my mirror not too far back… so she couldn’t be this far away.  I realized that she was probably ahead on the route.  So I booked it down the road. After 8 miles, riding 22-25 miles per hour, I finally caught up with her!!  She had been following someone she thought was me, but wasn’t!  Whew!

Even though the ride advertised food, each stop only had BANANAS and ORANGES!!!  We knew there would be no electrolyte drinks, so luckily we brought our own Powerade powder.  We were also thankful we had our Clif Shot Blocks and an old Luna bar in my bag.  We ate mostly bananas and oranges until mile 72 when they provided peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. 

One thing that was very cool about the ride, was at the stops, volunteers would come right out to the road and hold your bike for you while you went to the restroom or to get a refill or food.  One of the bad things?  Each stop was in the dirt, so after walking thru it, the dirt was packed into our clips which made it hard to get them into the pedals.  I had to stop a couple times and use a bike tool to clean out all the muck!

The wind started to pick up at about 70 miles, a headwind… making it very difficult to ride.  The wind sure does a number on the level of motivation and energy!   At 88 miles – when I was sure I couldn’t go any further, I saw a man riding an arm pedaled bike – he had no legs.  I thought, if he can do this, I CAN DO THIS!!

For the remainder of the ride, I tried to chat it up with others that were near the end with us.  This made it a bit easier, to see all of the people that were working so hard to finish.  We also did a lot of self-talk, to keep ourselves motivated and push ourselves to make it to the end.  Even though every muscle in our bodies were screaming, we just kept saying, “I can’t quit!!”  One of my favorite quotes is from Lance Armstrong, and I used it often, he says: "Pain is temporary, quitting lasts forever!"  

One of the hard things about the ride was that we did not know exactly where it ended!  We didn’t know how much farther we had to go.  

Once we were back in the downtown area, we knew the end was near.  It was dark and most of the spectators had cleared out.  We kept pushing ourselves and when we finally crossed the finish line, it was an amazing and tearful experience.  It was one of the hardest things we have ever done physically.  

At the finish line! WE DID IT!!

The next day, our knees was hurting, our hands, feet and arms were sore, but our spirits soared!!  What an accomplishment!  It is an experience that will live in our memories forever!