Weather:
Patchy clouds, low 70's and muggy in the
am with minimal wind.
Continued patchy clouds, very hot, over
100 in the shade, 10 mph crosswinds with occasional headwinds
-- the sun beating down on the black top with cross winds simulated
the feeling of a space heater blowing on our shins.
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Points of Interest:
More oil fields.
More dogs chasing us down the road.
We went through a city with a population
of about 1,000 where the motto could be "In Haskell, TX
we have are more pick-up trucks than people!"
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Highlights:
There was a Dairy Queen at mile 108 that
saved a lot of riders from heat exhaustion.
Both Ed and Rich surpassed Bruce in total
flats - each had three today giving them 9 and 10 respectively.
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People We Rode With:
Brian rode with Jim and Tracy until lunch
and then solo the last 40 miles.
Bruce rode with Rich in the early morning.
After the first SAG, Bruce rode with Greg who had suffered another
fall sustaining a large scrape on his other arm. Greg did extremely
well and was able to complete the days ride. After lunch, Bruce
rode with Ed again reuniting team Michigan for another afternoon.
Saddle time for Bruce was 7 hrs 59 min.
- this was the toughest day yet due to the heat, heavy head winds,
and the human suffering that occured (the falls, the flats and
the other medical issues that arose).
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Comments/Quotes:
After arriving at the Dairy Queen, the
extreme heat and winds prompted one of the riders, Lois, to comment
that she was in "survival mode" and decided she better
stop and cool off.
The swiss riders blew by Jim, Tracy and
I (Brian) before the 3rd stop and I said, I bet Rolf is in a
hurry to get his beer...sure enough he was searching the cooler
for a beer and realized it was in the other truck.
We attempted to capture some of the more
unusual pictures along the way today.
The initial fear of the mileage and climbing
have started to fade and the peace and calm that comes from just
focusing on going from point A to point B are thankfully starting
to emerge.
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