Kicked ass! Oh, you mean it’s not a race?

Just a kick-ass great ride, didn’t feel even a little fatigue until 42 miles, and just kept pouring it on. The day was cloudy and cool, just perfect for long-distance riding. Lots of fun to be among so many other cyclists, everybody checking out everybody else’s gear, comparing pedals and computers and everything else. There were a number of other bikes with aerobars, so I felt a little less pretentious about them — and then I put them to excellent use, just punishing the course without punishing myself. There were a couple of hundred riders in the 50 mile, which started off a little late, and for the first couple of miles we completely took over one lane of Route 4, but slowly people spread out and we got over to the side of the road. Not much traffic at all, which was nice, and drivers were pretty respectful, which was also nice. There was one moment when I perfectly timed my approach to a hill with a tractor-trailer going by so that I was pretty much sucked up the hill, excellent use of superdrafting. Otherwise, I mostly stayed to myself on the road because 1) it’s not polite to draft on someone without permission, and 2) I was passing pretty much everybody I came upon. For the first 25 miles, I had an amazing (for me) average speed of 18.9mph. That slowed down some as we hit the rolling hills (but nothing like what I’m used to here in Rensselaer County), and I started to feel a little fatigue at mile 42, but I was damned if I was going to take it easy and cut into an amazing average speed, so I kept pushing on it and ended up the 52.3 mile ride with an average speed of 17.8mph, finishing in 2:55 ride time (not counting quick rest stops). The volunteers were fantastic, the food and water at the rest stops were great, everybody was in good spirits, and it was a lot of fun. It was NOT a race. But I still kicked ass. More than made up for my lousy footrace a couple of weeks back. The girls came up to greet me at the finish line, which was really nice, and we all had lunch and ice cream together. The whole thing was so great, and I was really wondering what it would take to get me through a century. Hmmmm…. Best of all, raised $1195 for the American Diabetes Association, which was very cool.

— Mr. Johnson isn’t even a little bit sore.