Today has not been a good one. It’s annoying that despite 3 fairly straightforward days, I’m instantly on the back foot again after just one bad day. I’m not going to get much sleep tonight, and quite frankly I don’t really want to dwell on the details of today too much so this probably won’t be very long.
Things were going reasonably well for the first hour or so. The road I was riding on was an alternative to riding on the main freeway and it was actually quite nice… Until it stopped. Long story short – I had to turn back, so I ended up riding very close to 20 miles for no reason. (I also can’t put this distance towards my 18,000 mile total which is very annoying). This whole diversion did not amuse me as I was already a bit later than anticipated after forgetting to set my alarm. To add insult to injury, I had a crosswind this morning so it hindered me before and after I turned around.
Once back on the main road, I started to calm down a bit and began to relax into the day. Then I got a puncture. After removing the offending piece of metal, replacing the tube and a lot of cursing, I was on my way. After less than 5 kilometres a spoke decided to snap.
It was at this point that I had a pretty major sense of humour failure. I managed to fix the spoke but I was pretty much fuming until I hit my planned stopping point at what would have been 50 miles (but was instead 70).
I managed to calm down a bit as I ate some food, but this was short lived as I realised it was already close to 2 o’clock and I still had 75 miles to go. After stopping at Miles City, the road turned a corner and the crosswind became a headwind. I guess that was the only way to top off such a fantastic morning!
I didn’t really enjoy any of today and considering it has been the longest riding time of the whole trip, this is not a good thing. I’m glad it’s out the way.
Distance: 139.21miles / 224km (Of which only 119.7miles / 192.6km are going towards my total)
Riding Time: 9.5 hours Approx.
Av. Speed: >14.5mph
Tom Davies RTW 
Oh dear, does not make great reading, I feel for you, funny actually, well not so funny but I was wondering what you might have been faced with as I did my pedal this morning, it’s as if in my mind I attempt to compare, but then it’s not really much of a comparison, I mean I am going out each day, but it’s about 15% of what you are doing each day, so I guess it’s like me having couple pints whilst you have 12, every day, that’s not going to work, I will have to think of another analogy. On the plus side, sometimes you have to have less than great things happen to then enjoy the good times, Christmas would not be Christmas if it was Christmas every day. I have got some theories about the winds Tom, but will save for another day.
LikeLike
Incredibly frustrating….you’ve done very well even to type the daily update fairly calmly when a few asterisks might have described your day even more accurately! Well done for getting to the end of the day in the right place though!
LikeLike
Not a great day Tom, sorry to hear about that. Frustration all round however one good point is that you’ll get a job in any cycle repair shop after this! Stay strong!
LikeLike
No, I’ve re-read that a couple of times and can find no up-side to your day at all. Real bummer. And then you end up in a town that sounds like its named after a bad nightclub in a Scottish valley. Who names these American towns? At least there’s only one of them so you satnav thingy didn’t get confused with that.
Only another 5 weeks or so until you mother’s cooking! Yeah
LikeLike
Great work Thomas, well done. Psalm 97 says that the “Light shines on the godly and joy to the upright in heart”. Now you didn’t write about what you got up too last night, and frankly I don’t want to know. I just saw that you got up very late.
May I suggest that if you want tomorrow to be a trouble free day with the wind behind, you tone down the Vodka Red Bull rampages around the mid west nightclubs and let moderation enter your life. .I also note that you didn’t plan to get much sleep tonight either, so I just hope you read this before you come off the highboard into the dens of debauchery in Glendive.
All best, Charlotte
LikeLike
Thanks Charlotte I appreciate the advice…. although maybe I’m not the only one who should tone down the Vodka Red Bull rampages…!?
LikeLike