hooray to Harry for his stunning graphic work on the cover of Urbanite. Beautiful. I hearby nominate Harry for fulltime designer for Tour du Port.

How were the flies? The last time I did the 2 x 100 mile trek from Front Royal to Waynesboro and back, the flies were chasing and biting. I had to stop in Big Meadow to grab a can of Off insect repellent. I took a bath in the stuff, but I was sweating so much that it got diluted and the flies were after me again.

No problem with flies. or at least the biting variety. Gnats however were bountiful, clouds of them sticking all over our sweaty selves. The heat really took some of the enjoyment away from that ride. It's such a beautiful place, I kept thinking I would like to do it again in much cooler temps --end to end but at a very leisurely touring pace. The overlooks were all hazy. I did take time to notice the laurels blooming, probably at the end of their bloom. The descents were thrilling. I enjoy the long relentless climbs, though I can't figure out how guys older and heavier than me can still climb faster. One guy, younger at 29, was suffering repeated dual quad and ham cramps so I hung with him which was about my speed. I need to get a stress test, cardiac checkup etc.

@GB-Thanks-You obviously remember my rejected t-shirts designs for TDP. The Urbanite cover was actually done about a year ago for Cincinnati Mag. Urbanite called about two hours before press and asked if I had any bike related art as their previous illustration wasn't cutting it. I just so happened to have that piece, it even had row houses at the bottom, perfect right? But they wanted to crop. Glad you noticed it.

Would like to do that 180 mile ride though I doubt I am up for it, despite having a 200 mile ride to do on 6/25. Gals from my RFF team are asking if I'll do the Tour dem Parks, not sure 60 miles of urban riding is appealing to me though. There is also the Crystal Ride down near the Pentagon, you ride the closed course before the Airforce Classic, see how many miles you can do in 3 hrs. Tomorrow thinking of doing that Oxon Hill Rural Legacy ride, though would want to add some miles to it.

Ok. Jack has decided not to do the ride today due to "transportation" problems.

I'm trying to get some breakfast in me, but the cold shrimp fried rice is not going down very easily. The double-shot coffee (1 tablespoon of instant coffee, 2 tablespoons of sugar in half the water) is going down better. I'll be ready to go once I start gritting my teeth from the coffee! YIKES!!!

Susquehanna Paradise Ride Report:

https://www.baltobikeclub.org/index.p...1119&Itemid=64

and the Bob version:
https://bikingbeerandtoast.blogspot.c...squehanna.html

Good report, Bob. I think you made the right decisions as well. You just had and "off" day and I was having an "on" day.

Great reading your report as well. The two of them have a wonderful "two angles of the same scene" feeling. I love it.

Ironically, one of the good things about being "under-trained" for this ride is that today, I've been going over the ways in which I could complete this ride successfully. It's as if I'm ready to try again tomorrow.

The indomitable spirit of the long distance cyclist!

Talk about indomitable spirit. Alec just made us look like a couple of newbies:
https://velo-orange.blogspot.com/2011...200k-ride.html
Not sure if he stops by this thread any more, but CONGRATULATIONS dude!

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
I'm sure that he stops. Sleep deprivation is too dangerous while on a bike. But, they still have to observe the check-in requirements for controls.

84 Hours 50 minutes / 1,200K = 8.8 mph - so, yeah... he must have stopped to rest.



THIS WEEKEND'S PLANS:

I'm planning on riding the BBC's Delaware-Maryland Flatlands Tour.

My plan, originally, was to ride up Saturday morning and do the century, then ride back home. That morphed into "I want to enjoy the ride", so instead, I'm going to ride to Elkton Friday after work, check into a motel, ride to the school on Saturday for the century, ride into Chesapeake City for the "after century" celebration at the Chesapeake Inn, then ride back to my room in Elkton.

Sunday, I'll check out and ride home.

That's the plan.

<jealous>

Sorry, dude. I wish you could do more of these.

Isaias and GB well done! That's a lot of miles. And the weather was friggin tough. Lots and lots of rain. Enjoyed both of your reports. I can't log on at work anymore so must be at home to post these days...which ain't much.

Smartphone, Charlie, FTW.

I still have a Dumbphone, but I can at least do some Twitter and Facebook stuff.

BF is not phone friendly, so it sux trying to do anything on a phone here. It's possible, but it sux donkey-D. Same for the BBC website.

I pulled a Ben Bassett on the way home. I killed my left pedal. The spindle held together long enough for me to get home, but when I took it apart, it was dead--bearing balls falling out and one of the bearing race stuck inside not able to be coaxed out.

DEAD!

Back to my Speedplays, at least until I can pick up another pair of Shimano MTBs.

bummer, i had a crank arm fall off on the way to work this week haha

Yeah, that would suck, especially if you don't have a way to re-torque the bolts or whatever is used to lock the thing in place.

If anyone want to ride with O'Malley and possibly do an ask for more on-road accommodations.
https://www.baltimorespokes.org/artic...10615153417841

Stopped in at Biller's Bike Shop in Havre de Grace (HdG), yesterday, after work. Walt had a single pair of clipless MTB pedals (by Origin-8). They're on the bike today, but I realized that I missed my Speedplays. I didn't miss carrying cleat covers, though, and even forgot to take them off of my shoes trying to clip in on the way home from HdG.

I may put the Speedplays back on for this weekend.

Having returned from 5 days in the extremely humid mountains of Trinidad, I can now say the same thing. I did a little bit of (not too hard, but very steep) hiking there; I think a bike ride would have Killed. Me. Dead.

NR, GB, loved the parallel reports on the Susquehanna ride -- what an effort, as always!

Got to ride with some Severna Park Peleton folks on Friday and again today, good times!

Hi, Carl. Good to hear from you.

I need to make an effort to get down for one of the SPP's rides.

Take care and see you on Facebook!

Hey! I saw my name in the BF email digest and had to write in.

Thanks Isaias and Bob - no one could call you guys whimps, though!

I want to come out for the ramble this weekend, but looking at the Time Station Estimates, Randy is going to be coming in on Sunday, so I think I'll miss you guys unless he kicks it up or slows down...

Chesapeake beach looks like a great ride, though - have fun guys!

Darn! I wanted to be in Annapolis for that, too! Thanks for the reminder, Alec. Well, if I won't be in Annapolis, the least I could do is write something on Randy's blog for the crew to read to him. He -REALLY- appreciates that.

Here's the RSS feed for his crew's posts coming from the blog, if anyone is interested:

https://www.google.com/reader/view/fe...lt%3Falt%3Drss

If you could, please send him some words of encouragement!