First off, a huge thank you to everyone from Huntington who allowed a person who doesn't work at Huntington (me) to ride with you this weekend. I've attached 4 pictures I took this weekend. My thumb may obscure a couple of them. The start on Saturday was pretty chaotic. 2,200 people lined up in that little chute did not make for a quick start. I had wondered if Lance would ride easy amongst the crowds for the first few miles; turns out that was not the case. After realizing my only chance to ride with Lance was to catch him up the road, I rode 30+mph down Olentangy and Neil. I finally caught the "Lance" group in downtown Columbus before the statehouse. There was about 140 people who were pushing themselves to ride along with Lance in the first twenty miles. Luckily for most, a tailwind and a not so crazy speed helped people get a good look at the 7x tour winner. I'd say we averaged about 26mph for the first 25 miles.
As the pace started to get a little harder, the Lance group started to dwindle down. I found myself rolling up to the front next to Lance like it was any other group ride. Determined not to be star-struck, I didn't say anything at first. Lance, being an all around nice guy, actually turned and said hello to me. I thanked him for doing all of the work (he had been) and we really just chatted about a few random things. He asked about the route, I told him there were some hills after we got past mile 50. We talked about Mapmyride.com, bike computers, and bike racing. After a few more minutes he asked me how many people were "left" in our group. I told him it looked like almost 100. He looked back and guessed it was 80-90 at that point. I asked him if I could take a picture or two with my phone, he didn't mind. At that point we were about at mile 40, just about where the rolling hills started.
Lance and his good friend College (who is the current U.S. (35+)National Champion) started drilling it. Our group of 80 quickly became a group of 10. Lance kept the pace high, reminding all of us that he indeed was a world champion cyclist. One of my favorite memories is trying to catch up to College with Lance on my wheel. We're going up a little roller going somewhere around 29mph with some pretty nasty cross winds, Lance rolls up next to me and tells me to, "Get on his wheel!" After flying through the 50 mile rest stop (we never stopped), our group was down to 5 people plus Lance and College. We had a car or two get in the way. At one point Lance bunny hopped up onto a sidewalk to avoid a parked car. Additionally, we may have taken a wrong turn or two. All I know is that for the first 50 miles we averaged 27.5mph. Our small "Lance Group" went through that first rough road around mile 56 and we approached the biggest climb of the day. I had been prepared for this hill and knew how steep it was.
For the only time in my life, I can say the following: I was on Lance Armstrong's wheel heading into the steepest climb of the day. Our group of 7 split immediately. Lance hit the climb and didn't really seem to slow down. I stuck on his wheel for about 10m before I was dropped. Over the next half a mile, I turned myself inside out trying to stay in contact with Lance. Garth Prosser (local Pro mountain bike racer) and College ended up going by me. At one point College shouted to Lance "You better wait!" and Lance turned around to look, just as he had done in the Tour, and said something funny. I'd say I went up the hill at around 10mph. I'd say Lance did it in about 14 or 15mph. Needless to say, there is a reason why he's a 7x tour winner and I'm not. After that, the remaining 4 riders from that Lance group worked together to try and catch Lance. We never had a chance of course, but it was fun. We rolled across the finish line, finishing 4th-7th, at about 11:55 a.m. We had missed Lance by about 15 minutes.
Our group - Distance 102.22 miles; 24.1 mph average; 48.9 mph max
Lance - Distance 102.22 miles; 25 mph average; ?
The Dispatch took some photos of us after we crossed the lines. Hopefully my Team Huntington jersey is shown! The 80 mile ride home wasn't nearly as fun or as fast without Lance there. I left with the group at 7:15 and rode with people until the first hills. After that I was by my lonesome for 40 miles. I was the first person to arrive at the finish that had started at 7:15. (A group of 4 beat me there, but they left at 6:45!) Again, a million thanks to Huntington for giving me this once in a lifetime chance. I had a blast and we raised a lot of money for a great cause.
No comments:
Post a Comment