32.3 mile

32.2 mile

Not so good as yesterday but still a 20mph avg. The knees hurt a little.

37.5 mile

The wind picked up throughout the day and I ended with a 12-17mph head wind going home. The 105F heat also did not help much. I stopped at a service station to get something cold to drink. The lady behind the counter asked me to follow her and she took me straight to the walk in freezer to cool down. Is that service or what!

32.2 mile

The ride to work was amazingly fast. The tail wind must have helped but still it is the best time I have made to work so far.

ROAM - D.C.

We made it to the mall just in time for the rain. Did get some photos though. It started to rain to hard so I left the group and went to find a restaurant. Great steak sandwich!

Wednesday 8/24/11

It was hard to get up. The day started with a very nice bike trail that was a good warm up. But if you get a bunch of excited guys together and put them in something fast it will most definitely end up in a race. So just before the coffee break it ended in a heavy sprint. I got a little behind on the uphill and started to make up on the other side. I then saw the railroad xing up ahead. Usually I would slow way down for them but this time I had some velos in my sight and there were no slowing down. The railroad tracks were on a little bump so I decided to speed up even more. That way if they are. very rough then I will be a little lighter going over them with the help of the bump. I hit the bump and the velo went straight into the air! It rolled a little to the right, my heart skipped and the Pterovelo was flying. It landed slightly skew and on the right front wheel. With more luck than anything else it straightened out and put all wheels on the ground. I will have to admit it took a whole coffee to get my legs to stop shaking. From coffee stop to lunch I was a bit zapped from energy and it was a hard ride with slow uphills. Lunch could not come soon enough and after the fuel up the engine ran much smoother again. Daniel, Markus, Andreas and I followed a very nice strong steady pace to the next meeting point. The whole groups assembled again and we did the last 15 miles as one group into Georgetown which was an amazing experience. The day ended with lots and lots of celebration and cup cakes.

Just before I hit some rocky trails

Tuesday 8/23/11

Monday 8/22/11

The last two days have been a blur. There were lots and lots of mountains and here and there some pretty bad roads. The best is my mom came to visit for the three days so it kind of was like a small holiday as well. I also want to thank my mom Rina, my dad Frans, Orman and Betsie for the donations they made towards my cross country ride. It was very unexpected and very much appreciated. Also to all the family that help with encouragement through facebook and emails. It helps much more than you think.
For the ride there is only two days left and I am right now busy climbing a nice long long hill.

Sunday 8/21/11

Hard day.

HWY 82 in Ohio

Saturday 08/20/11

Went past Medina today. Sure is a town everyone should visit.
My Mom came to visit me and we arrived at the hotel in Streetsboro at the same time.

A town called Medina

Friday 8/19/11

Ohio is flat! Velomobile country. Everybody here should have one. On the highway today I was able to keep between 25-30mph for the most part. I did not follow the track today, but stayed on the highway as much as possible. It made for some fast runs. If the computer is correct the. it was a 22.3mph avg but I will have to check the GPS.
Tree weeks into the trip and now I am starting to feel strong and fit. The only problem, my throat and stomach is acting up a bit. Just maybe I've had a little to much chocolate milk and not enough vegetables.

Thursday 8/18/11

8/18

I was the first to be out of camp this morning. The raccoons got into my bread and peanut butter and helped themselves to some nice sandwiches. So I got out early to find some breakfast. Went through some very nice country roads in the morning. Daniel caught up with me again and they meant my speed went also went up. That put us at the lunch stop very early so we missed out on a catered Amish meal
that was organized by Cyber. We made it to camp early and had a very nice relaxed afternoon.
The left tube blew out today so I replace the BigApples with Kojak's. Later the day I also had a flat. That now puts it at 9 flats.

Farm road

Very nice farm roads in ID

Wednesday 8/17/11

8/17

It was real good to sleep in a bed last night. We had Chicago style pizza last night and again this afternoon. I am pizza'd up. It was so exciting to see Chicago again. There is nothing to report on the cycling because it was only 60 miles and was in city traffic for the most. We only have 7 days left and part of it will be nice and flat and the other part might be very hard. We will just have to see and hope for the best.

At Chicago at the fountains

Tuesday 8/16/11

Tuesday 8/16/11

And again my GPS did not want to load the track for the day so I had to stick with people that had a working GPS. It made for a slower longer day but it was a lot of fun to stay with Hasse and help each other with drafting. Nick and Wes also joined us for parts of the ride. We stopped at a little town and had the best sandwich ever with fried cheese! Four cups of coffee and lots of water. We stayed there for quite a long time and watched all the others passed. So tonight we are treaded with a very nice hotel stay in Evanston.

And again the GPS wants to make a turn in Africa for some reason.

Monday 8/15/11

Monday 8/15/11

Started of very slow with three big hills to cross. Grade 7&8! Avg 12mph for the first half of the day and it brought the moral down a bit. Lucky for me Daniel caught up with
me with his electric Quest and it helped a bunch. He stayed in front of me so I had someone to chase. The last 40 miles we stayed between 25-32mph. It make time goes by pretty quick then. We got to the pub in Madison and enjoyed a nice Guiness. Stayed there way to late and only got to camp at 8:30 in the dark after a couple of wrong turns. It started of hard and boring and ended in a blast!

According to the GPS I made a stop in Asia but don't believe everything a computer tell you.

Sunday 8/14/11

Sunday 8/14/11

We went from Hastings to Onalaska. Left Minnesota and are now in Wisconsin. I did not feel very strong today but still kept up a good speed and made very good time.

8/12 & 8/13

8/12 & 8/13

I took it very easy these two days. Fri was only 100mi and Sat was 60mi. These rest days were very good for the body and everything is starting to feel normal again.

Thursday 8/11/11

Thursday 8/11/11

One long day! One of the hardest so far. Mentally and physically I was a little tired. I am trying to go as slow as I can but maybe I am pushing still to much. Tomorrow I will make sure I am first to leave and last to arrive.
The road surface was also bumpy today and without suspension it is hard on the already hurt feet.

Wednesday 8/10/11

Wednesday 8/10/11

The day started off with a moderate climb. I felt good and fresh so I did as much as the achilles would allow. I caught up with Josef Janning in his blue car on Quest and we stayed together for the most part of the day. He is a very strong rider and thanks to him I was pushing a little more on the climbs. There were construction on hw12 so we had to take a detour that ended up on a 5 mile gravel road. The quest was able to manage the rough road but I opted to get out and push. No fun! By the end of the gravel road the rest was starting to caught up with me. Once on the Tarmac the lunch stop was not to far away. I bought a bag of ice and I iced my feet while I was enjoying a Subway sandwich. With nice fresh feet the last stretch of 28 miles was a lot of fun. I was able to keep it up to 30mph for a good part of that 28 miles.

Tuesday 8/9/11

Tuesday 8/9/11

Today was the biggest millage day of the whole trip. We did 166miles today. Unfortunately for me I had to take it slow because of the Achilles. So all the uphills were super slow but I was still able to speed up on the downhills. When I scoot fwd in the seat it is a bit better on the achilles but worse on the knees so I had to play around with my seat position all day. With bad feet and all I still made good time. To to

Frans
www.pterovelo.com

Sent from my iPhone

Monday 8/8/11

Monday 8/8/11

The rest day helped with stamina today. It started of with a fairly big hill this morning. I was able to push fairly hard up the hill and made a good start. The rest of the day was more rolling hills and the tail wind picked up and just got stronger through the day. The rest of the day was nice and fast. Once we entered ND the road turned super smooth, what a pleasure. Until the road stopped and turned into dirt. There were about 6miles of construction going on and I decided to push the velo most of the way. Martin and Machiel caught up with me just when I got back on the asphalt and we pushed pretty hard on the last 12 miles. I could feel my right ankle complain a little. Tonight I iced the feet, soaked them in some Epsom salt and rubbed some Voltaren on them. Right now they are much better.

Frans
www.pterovelo.com

Sent from my iPhone

Saturday 8/6/11

Sat 8/6

153.9mi. 7:57
avg 19.3mph
max 58.4mph

The day went very well right up to the last 15 miles. Had two flat tires that broke my wind a little, but all and all it was a great day.

Friday 8/5/11

94.4mi 4:19
avg 21.8mph
max 56.1mph

Was a very nice short day today. Mostly downhill with a couple of good climbs. Felix and I stayed together for the most and it was very nice.

Thursday 8/4/11

126.9mi 7:30
avg 16.9mph
max 64.9mph

Blood, sweat and tears today. Crossed one more mountain today. The good thing is it was real pretty.
It felt like I had flat tires all day long! The legs just did not want to perform. I did not do very good today.
Was running on a 53 teeth all day and really missed the 72 on the down hills.

Wednesday 8/3/11

130.9mi 8.01
avg 16.3mph
max 66.5mph

We left Missoula today fairly slow. Just had some written direction to follow. Once we got to the interstate it picked up a bit. Mark came up with a brilliant idea to paint arrows on the road where we should turn and once I got to those it was smooth sailing until I missed one arrow and came to a dead end. Had to turn around but my luck it was not to far off.
At last we got to our big climb. It was a little shorter and about the same grade of 5% just like the last one but I made a point to take it as slow as I could. I swapped the 73 tooth chain ring for a 49 tooth the night before and that allowed me to spin easy at 4mph but still I found it a little harder than before. Got to the top at last. The Rockies was concord! Going down was good but I did not have the 73t to push so gravity was the only option.
So we got to the bottom and reached Helena and I thought game over but the gps said still 20mi to go. So it turned out that the 20mi had 2 big climbs of grade 7.5% !!!!! Very tough and I was very glad I swapped those chain rings.

Daniel in his electric assist Quest

Monday 8/1/11

117.5mi. 6:45
avg 17.4mph
max 43.3mph

We started the day at Three Rivers Resort. Followed the river again but it was a slightly higher grade than yesterday. I stayed with the Quests for a while. They were going up the steep hills a little faster than I was comfortable with and had one or two lower gears than me. But I could out run them on the down hills and they did not catch back up. Half way up the hill I found Daniel with his electric Quest. We played touch and go for a bit and then I tugged in behind him and we made very good time going up. The last 9 miles going up the pass was between 4% to 6% all the way and I could keep a steady 5.5mph up the hill. We got to the top just in time! Feet got real hot. We hanged out for while before we took on the down hill. The road down was a little bit twisty at first so I did not pick up to much speed, but it was long and steady. I managed to keep it around 40mph all the way down to a gas station just before Lolo. We stopped again and for a while. Went down another 3miles to Lolo and found a place to eat. Then it was a nice fast pace through Missoula to the KOA.