Yesterday in the afternoon it was crazy south wind at 20pmh with gust in over 30 in central Illinois. I had run 8 miles early in the am so I did not feel just great but my wife was at her mothers house 50 miles due north. So I thought I should just jump on the bike and go and have her give me a ride back when she left.

Normally I am decent rider for 50 years old but I just did not know what to expect. I thought basically I could average over 24 mph. Well I did. In fact I held back in places just because the wind whipping and really giving me a push. It was all flat no hills and went 52 miles in 2:05 no stops. I was a real roller coaster probably could have gone a little quicker but frankly in places the road was not so smooth I did not want to get off balance. I guess this is the flatlands answer to the decents in the mountains. Not the same thing but fun. I wonder what the time would be if I did not have to slow at intersections in the country in places.

Still I feel like I cheated the ride did not really take a huge energy drain like even 1 hour into a headwind. It was fun once but I think i would not do it again.... unless I had already run that day for a workout.

Sounds like you had alot of fun and now have a great memory

I am not sure I would call it cheating though. In one of the RAAM she competed in Seana Hogan used the wind to her advantage. She put on two (quite daring) disc and took off. Not only did she open a good gap between herself and the rest of the women but most if not all the men too

You are allowed to ride just for fun, you know...

You didn't cheat: Watts are watts, whether they are applied to riding 20 mph on a flat road in still air or going 35 with a 15 mph tailwind. Blessed with a tail wind get into a taller gear and peddle just as hard.

Well, maybe catching that lift home was a little bit of a cheat.

You don't have to share ALL the details. You went 52 miles in 2:05. That is all anyone needs to know! Sure glad you weren't riding the other way!

This sounds a lot like my sunday....minus the part where I had to ride back into the wind for the last half of the ride. Would have preferred the other way around : )

If you put a sail on your bike that would've been cheating. It's been done, both on recumbent trikes, and on standard bikes.

Thats not cheating, that's an awesome day on the bike. Going that fast for that long is a blast, everyone should do it at least once in their life.

Huh? Faster is always more fun, even if you're old and slow.

there was a ride i used to do on a regular basis.

it was about 25 miles and at certain times of the year there was a consistent 15mph wind from the north. i would check the local weather on weather.com in the morning and if the winds were strong enough, i headed south. then took the local mass transit home (BART), for five bucks.