Climb

First of all...a couple business items: Last week we hit the $80,000 fundraising mark and I was confident that we would be at $90,000 by the end of the week with a good shot at $100k. Well, I am very excited to announce that we have passed the $100k mark and our total is still on the rise! Thank you for your support!

Also we have added a few teammates. Bart Rupel and John Lockwood have joined us as cyclists and Bart's Buddy Tim has joined the SAG team. We have also added our Seattle crew as cyclists Sam, Max, Tom and Amy. Our team is growing and getting stronger. We now have 17 cyclists!

Day 9
Bakersfield to Tehachapi
36 miles
3500 foot climb

Thus far, my posts have not featured much cycling. Well today was all about cycling. We only rode about 36 miles but we climbed 3500 feet.

We started out on the outskirts of bakersfield and clicked off 9 miles in the flats.

Travis and Mike checking out the mountain


Then we started the climb. We climbed for about 5 miles at a 5% grade before any downhill. I was not a speed demon at 3mph but I just geared down and cranked it out. We had a spectacular view of the vally floor on the way up the hill and we had a long time to chat as we stared at the rolling hills as they passed at 3-4mph. When we hit the first downhill we let 'er rip and hit the top speeds of the whole trip so far. I think John Lockwood had the top speed of 42mph. We had one more small climb then it was downhill to the lunch spot. At lunch we had a decision to make, stay on highway 58 or take a side road. We found out that the highway cut out about 5 miles and has a much more gradual grade than the side roads so we decided to stick with the highway. The group in front of us left before us and went with the map on the side roads. They had much tougher climbs registering more than 10% at one point. In the end we all decided to stick to the highway for the rest of the trip(as long as it is legal and safe). Highway 58 actually has very generous shoulders and as far as I know, cyclists are legal.

We finally reached the summit and our hotel was about a block away...success! Our team had been dreading this day since the beginning and we all made it with no injuries!

Blur

The hours are passing like minutes. We must be having a lot of fun! I really n eed to get to bed in preparation for the big climb to Tehachapi tomorrow so I am going to make this short...bummer, I could spend a few hours here telling you about all the stuff that's going on. Also, my computer died tonight so tyhe posts might be few and far between from here on out (I am using a computer in the lobby of our hotel).

Day 6
Hanford to Wasco
57 miles

The rad stuff about this day happened off the bike. A local guy John (sorry John, I don't know your last name) provided our dinner at a local park. He and his people barbqed some killer carne asada and we had fresh tortillas. It was really nice to be taken care of by some great people, thanks guys.


Day 7
Wasco to (a little past) Bakersfield
45 miles

We added a few miles to this day so we could subtract from our climb day tomorrow. We also added a few teammates: Beth, Eric and Edie.


Today, once again we were taken care of by a local group. This group is driven to help out by a great young man named Jarod. Jarod was diagnosed with FA a few years ago and is surrounded by a great group of people who are driven to find a cure. They have an event of their own (5k & 10k walk/run) coming up on April 6 and they invite all to join the fun. For more info contact me.

Sean, Jarod, Me


Bonus Picture:

Days 4 and 5

First of all check out this short article that was in the Sacramento Bee the other day: http://www.sacbee.com/378/story/793372.html

Day 4
Madera to Fresno
25 miles

Day 4 was a short day. We took it easy and had a nice team lunch courtesy of Outback Steakhouse. They fed us great food and we didn't have to clean up!

Me and Sean at Outback

We met another ataxia friend at Outback. This is Mike Betchel and his Mother Beth. Mike and I met at the NAF annual membership meeting in San Diego a couple years ago. Mike has an undiagnosed type of ataxia and he was diagnosed at age 2. Undiagnosed means that clinically the diagnosis is ataxia but the gene marker has not been discovered for this type of ataxia.


That night we stayed at the People's Church in Fresno. They were gracious enough to let us use their showers and we had a roof over our head for the night. The best part is that we saved some cash by sleeping on the floor!

Stretching...

Day 5
Fresno to Hanford
49.75 miles


I dragged along for 50 miles today. My legs were aching by mile 10 and would not quit. I could not sustain a speed of over 10 mph for more than 15 minutes...so that was pretty frustrating. It felt like my brakes were on the whole time but I checked and rechecked and everything was cool. I guess I was pretty tired and maybe I didnt eat enough this morning. Another factor is that I put a new seat on my trike last night and it may have changed the configuration enough to make a difference. Either way, I made it. So did everyone else and they all had less trouble. Other than a crash resulting in minor scrapes and bruises we are all safe and well.

We had dinner at Ryan's Place right by the hotel.

And then we went out to a local ice cream shop. There is a faint smell of Dairy everywhere in this town so the ice cream was pretty fresh...mmmmmmmmboy!


This is a small scoop!