Team Amici Veloci (and other TE'ers) do ALC 6

[RoadRaven]

Wow, Trek! UK!

Somehow I completely missed this thread and have only read it this morning - and its all over!

I am so impressed... multi-day tours... they are so beyond what I can achieve

Trek - it was great to read through your updates (Thanyou Duck for posting them)... I just wish I had been following this right through.

What a great achievement and very impressed with you for pulling out - a sensible decision but it must have been a very hard one to make.

Trust your foot heals quickly

[shadon]

Congrats to each of you on a good ride! For those of you doing it for the first time, I hope your first ALC was as amazing as mine was. It was a truely life changing experience for me.

Sleep well and have good trips home!

[Trek420]

I'm baaaaaack. More musings as I process all this stuff, impressions, sights, sounds, feelings and all. I'm bummed not to have ridden every mile this time.

But this is my 3rd ride and I did very well the previous ones, especially the year I tented with Bikegoddess, all but 10 miles .

3 cheers to UK who rode (and I mean rode, didn't even cross-train which I do a lot) every mile!! And hats off to all riders and crew. The ride raised a record 11 million dollars this year.

[Trek420]

Wow, Trek! UK!

What a great achievement and very impressed with you for pulling out - a sensible decision but it must have been a very hard one to make.

Trust your foot heals quickly

My bad. I broke the # 1 rule of ALC or any other multi day event for that matter:

Don't change anything 2 months before the ride.

Say you're training in Birkenstoks and Leiderhosen, and all around you folks are wearing Sidis and Scottish kilts. But the Birks and funny leather shorts are comfy training and worked fine on your previous rides.

I don't care how much you want to wear Sidis and how good you look in a kilt or how good they feel in the store, on training rides .... Don't change a thing. I knew better, my bad.

[KnottedYet]

Funny observation:
Y'know how when you drive you have a spatial sense of the car around you? If you drive a truck, you have a sense of how big your truck is, then you get in a little car and you still drive like it's a truck? And vice versa?

Well, Trek spent a week on a bike, and when she started driving her car she still had that spatial sense of a bike! It was funny, but there were occaisional ummm, *thrilling* moments.

(she's a very good driver, I just noticed the "driving the big Pontiac like it's a little Mondonico" syndrome.)

[Trek420]

and calling out "on your left" and pointing out "bump"

On a sad note, there have been two crashes caused by families rushing onto the bike route to cheer their rider. (other bikers crashed trying to avoid hitting the family members)

Those weren't crashes per se because of this just near misses. I noticed that Day 1-2 there were several riders whose families followed them. Those of you who do centuries and such know just how crowded and hectic rest stops can be. These same people would be;

parked near the entry of the rest stop causing congestion

walking in a group with their protective loving arms around afore mentioned loved one so that riders coming in, or trying to leave were navigating around what seemed to be a human wall of Mom, Dad, a rider and her bike.

Somewhere here we have debate on personal SAG vehicles. I don't think there's any place for it. Observe from a safe distance and let your rider ride.

There were at least two crashes I heard about that were the standard rider outa control going downhill too fast for his/her comfort or skill variety. One of those I think was Day 6. In terms of climbing Day 6 is the mildest. Less I think than even the short 47 mile day. We start with a 20 mile or so climb but it's the long gradual I could do this all day type.

But it has one very steep gnarly downhill.

I was already in the SAG but having done the ride before it's quite tough descent, and on a Hwy to boot. It's a bit of a canyon so you get the wind, plus gusts from trucks.

This is were I discovered on the last ride that I love my aero wheels but they act like a sail and can skip sideways

We picked up one rider, looked strong and experienced if muscles and gear and previous ride jersey are any indication and he'd stopped at the top, looked down, just not doing it.

A hard decision to make but a wise one given that he might have seen the crash.

[LBTC]

or getting set to hop the pothole

H&B
~T~

[snapdragen]

Trek - is the day six downhill the same as years past? If so, I remember it well. I got hit by some kind of bug, right in the ear. By the time I got to the bottom I was bleeding something fierce. There just happened to be a Medical Tent worker there - got me cleaned up and on my way. Ears bleed like madness from little bites/scratches!

[Trek420]

Trek - is the day six downhill the same as years past? If so, I remember it well. I got hit by some kind of bug, right in the ear. By the time I got to the bottom I was bleeding something fierce. There just happened to be a Medical Tent worker there - got me cleaned up and on my way. Ears bleed like madness from little bites/scratches!

Probably, my route sheets are with my luggage which thankfully Duck on Wheels took back up north.

I can look it up unless they could not stand the stench and threw it out

The medical staff and all the crew are amazing and seem to be magically everywhere. The support and volunteer crew on this ride spoils you for any other event.