After a long day in the Black Hills yesterday, everybody was hoping for an easier day today. It wasn't to be, as we battled headwinds for the full 148 miles. When I finished, I felt like I had ridden 200 miles. If one was unfortunate enough to not be part of a paceline, then the best you could manage was 12-14 mph. In a paceline, working hard, we did closer to 18. In addition, we entered the Central Time Zone today, so we lose another hour tonight. I feel sorry for the slower riders in the group, because they will have essentially no down time before they need to go to bed tonight.
Rapid City is relatively large (population 70,000) but has little to distinguish it. We rode through the city this morning, and quite soon we were out in grassy plains that looked like a movie set for Dances With Wolves. We spotted an occasional farmhouse, but it didn't look like very productive land. At this point, the wind wasn't too bad, so we got a nice paceline going, with Karen, a Cal Tech graduate who now teaches college chemistry, Robert, a retired comparative religion professor from Ottawa, and Michael, a quality engineer from Ford (is that an oxymoron??). We were cheered on by innumerable paririe dogs, who chirped and whistled as we rode along. We made good time down to the first rest stop, but then the winds got worse.
At this point, we entered Badlands National Park, which has multiple eroded sandstone rock formations. Looks like a good place for a Clint Eastwood western. It reminded me of Bryce Canyon in Utah, although without the vermillion and orange colors that Bryce has. It even looks a bit like the Valley of the Kings near Luxor in Egypt. We had lunch in the Badlands.....by this time the temperature was up to 95, but fortunately in cooled down to the high 80's for the rest of the day. We then joined up with our friend I-90 once again, and followed a frontage road for 70 miles over one roller after another, very reminiscent of the Coulee City to Spokane stretch on day 2. We finally got to Murdo after a long 8 1/2 hours in the saddle. Murdo is not very big; apparently most of the motels and restaurants are only open in the summer, catering to families on vacation on their way to the Badlands or the Black Hills, or bikers (the motorized variety) going to Sturgis, which is nearby.
Today we completed the first half of our journey across the country. We aren't quite halfway in terms of mileage, but we have already done more than 1/2 of the total climbing. Bodies and bicycles are starting to break down a bit. The clydesdale came up lame today with a sore ankle, and had a bad day. More folks are getting sagged for part or all of some days, but there is still a hard core of us that wants to ride "E.F.I" (every blanking inch). Last night, I noted a problem with one of my pedals; its attachment to the crankarm was becoming dangerously loose. I'm just glad it didn't break during some 50 mph descent. The problem was with the carbon fiber crank arm, which, because it is one unit with the chainrings, means that I need a new crank and chainring set, as well as a new bottom bracket. So I got on the internet and ordered the parts, which will be delivered to a motel several days down the road. In the meantime, I have temporary parts in place which seem to work OK.
Tomorrow we have another long day, 145 miles to Mitchell, SD. Everything will be fine if we just get a break from the winds.
148 miles. 3200 vertical feet
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