Great Bicycle Ride Part 9, Analysis

This last Ragbrai* post will attempt to answer several oft asked questions.

1. The first question was usually disguised. Why in heaven’s name did you do this? Who told you riding your bike across Iowa the last week in July was a good thing? Did you really think this through? These are all the same question of course, just asked with differing levels of disbelief.

2. “Did you have a good time?” Friends who asked this question generally disguised it as well.

3. “Are you planning to do it again?” The inquisitor usually asked this with a presumed negative answer.

4. A fourth question I would like to answer is one nobody asked. Nobody asked if I would recommend Ragbrai to a friend. Imagine that!

1. Why? Well, Why not? If 10,000 people do it every summer, and you have to win a lottery to get in, and most do it more than once, it can’t be all bad. I made a list of all the things we enjoyed about the ride, but my friend Robert reminded me you can enjoy almost all those things without riding your bike 470 miles, in high heat and humidity.

So I think it all boils down to this, we were looking for an adventure to rival thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail that we could do with a bum knee. And in that, we didn’t come close. We finish with only the satisfaction that we did it.

2. Yes! and No! The bike riding was fun, but then we already discovered that on the training days when we just rode for 40 or 50 miles, stopping to rest, eat lunch, talk to strangers, etc. Riding with 10,000 friends was awesome. Burning 5000 calories per day, I have no idea how scientific that number is but it left room for lots of carbohydrates. Dealing with the heat and humidity after the ride was no fun.

3. Probably not. We have a list of other adventures we would like to attempt before age catches up to us. For those of you who think our adventures are too taxing, I will share with you a saying one of my college coaches used. “Let’s go boys, you can sit around when you get old.” I don’t want to be old yet.

If we do tackle it another year we plan to change some things. We will take our own support driver and either stay in a motor home or motels along the way. I think I would like to try it on a road bike.

4. If something like this interests you, do it. Because of the late spring we got a late start on training and rode about half as many training miles as we had hoped to. We are not seasoned bike riders. Before the first day of Ragbrai, we had never ridden in one day the distance we had to ride every day, 7 days in succession. We were concerned that we might not be up to the task. You can do it, and you won’t be sorry.

*My friend Mark wanted to know if this was Ragbrai or Bragride. It is not my intent to brag, but to inform. Of course this is the same friend who has taken to calling me Herculegs and the other night presented us with trophies to celebrate the accomplishment.

Final saying of the week: In order to increase our chances in the lottery, Steve suggested we join his bicycle club, The big dogs. Jen decided our trail names, as members of the big dogs would be Runt (her) and Mutt (me). She bought stick on letters and posted them on the back of our helmets.

My suggestion for a motto for the Big Dog Bike Club when we ever get bike Jerseys to post them on: “If you can’t ride with the big dogs stay on the porch.”