6 inches forward and 5 inches back...
Minot, North Dakota. Been battling headwinds for the past 4 days. Not fun. Yesterday was the most challenging cycling day so far. There were gusts of up to 30 mph in my face. All you can hear is the roar of the wind. In a 30-mph headwind, every inch you gain is an inch you have to fight to cross. You put in about 3 times as much energy and get back lest than a 1/3 of the result. And after a day or so, a steady headwind can start to work on you both psychologically as well as physically. By the end of the day yesterday...a 48 mile day at barely 9 miles per hour, I was not in a great state of mind. But that quickly passed as I started to think of the headwind in a more abstract kind of way and stood the physical headwind next to all of the other headwinds in my life. Puts it all into perspective. Also: I need to mention that 5 days ago I was enjoying a 20 mph headwind. It's the fickle finger of fate people! You never know when it will point at you (Jeez, I just channeled my 10th grade Latin teacher. That nazi said stuff like that all the time and threatened to have me expelled from school if I didn't change out of my Bon Jovi "Slippery When Wet" concert t-shirt. 20/20 hindsight, it was a fashion boo boo to wear said t-shirt in the first place, but still...what a headwind that guy was.
Today was a decent cycling day. Still headwinds, but they're diminishing somewhat. I've made it another short day for me and will probably Motel tonight. I think I'm going to try and make Grand rks, ND for the forth. If anybody knows of anything exciting to do in Grand Forks, ND on the forth of July, please let me know.
Stats for the past week are forthcoming. Tomorrow, I think I'll be in the geographical center of North America, Rugby, ND. Uh...woo?
No comments:
Post a Comment