In my quest....

I was able to find a video of TSH on RAAM 09. Well, its actually me and the story is funny. When we came to the salt lake area, we had lost Steve off the front. What that means is that the wind was so fast that all the riders were flying past the time stations and gaining enormous amounts of time on their crew. Steve continued on the path across the landscape that looked like the Iraqi plains. The bad thing is we didn't know exactly where he was b/c he was so far out front.

After about an hour of searching here and there, we knew he was up the road but wow...it took a LONG time to find him. The cars needed gas and night time was soon to follow so we had to fuel up and that meant Steve was alone in the tailwind. This normally isn't a bad thing - but come 8pm we had to have a car behind us... Brett and I were in the RV heading up the road at 70mph and the two cars were concerned that Steve may have taken a wrong turn so they were looking on other roads - it was a bit confusing at that station. After about an hour we were worried that Steve was out of water - he was - and it is hot. We put the pedal down and found a yellow / green jersey about 1/2 mile ahead of the RV. We didn't think it was Steve b/c there was NO way anyone could have made that kind of ground on the cars...it was Steve. We passed Steve quickly then and yelled to transition to get him OFF the bike ASAP. I got out and realized that my bikes were on the Jeep and Steve had his back up bike on the RV - we have the same pedals.

In haste - I grabbed his bike which is about 3 sizes too small and Steve blasted by at about 35 mph - not stopping. Back into the RV and up the road we go. I yelled again - GET OFF THE ROAD WHEN WE STOP!!!! In this transition - I found out why Steve was so far ahead - 30 some mph tailwinds had ALL groups holding major speed for miles on end. Problem - Steve had compact cranks on his back up bike and it was TOO SMALL. Just then, a car came up from behind and I thought it was our Jeep....I had been riding for about 40 mins at that time at 35 mph and at times 40 mph and figured my time on the bike here was to just relieve Steve until Tim could make it up. The car turned out to be a Media Truck and they took some pics and vids of me cruzin - maxed out spinning on the compacts biggest gear...LOL. I look like a circus performer on a small bike - no offense Steve as you are not a circus performer...but one bad #$$ biker instead.

So the vids are of me on Steves bike...lacking leg extension and with close to an hour or just under on the bike I was dry as the salt air was creating breathing issues. The Jeep finally got up to me with 1 min to go before lights and follow veh became mandatory. In this stretch - Steve and I were able to make ground on the 8 person team - donate life - and passed them. they eventually passed us for good in Missouri I think but it was a healthy battle for 2000 miles...yes, they were an 8 person team.

Just a note - the form here is not that good as the bike is too small for me...I did end up sitting way off the back of the seat to make it work so my knees wouldn't break but my quads were burning. That was the most fun on a bike in a long time. 35-40 mph for about an hour on a flat. I made a comment to the media truck as they rode along side me saying " So this is what its like to be Eddy Merckx on a training ride..." We all laughed a bit and I pressed on ... wondering if our Jeep was going to make it up in time for night riding. They did and it was dad and Ed that brought relief. Steve and I later said it was way too much fun on that section but the heat and salt were too much to deal with at times.

Looking for more vids....

Andy