A Good Day Ride, or Tour of Honor Revisited
Posted: Tue Apr 02, 2024 5:21 pm
Had a good 1,000 plus mile day yesterday. Dry, and temps from 58F to 78F all day.
I’m smart enough to know I’m not tough enough for actual rally stuff, and I’m not that smart when well rested, so plotting and routing on no sleep is not a possibility for me. But Tour of Honor lets me pose for 1 day a year.
I put my distance comforts on the bike. Garauld’s hydration mount and Laam seat, for starters. Temps were forecast to approach 80F, so I left the more minimal touring screen on.
I love my clearwater amber lens covers, but I’ve begun to think they mask certain four-hooved colors on the roadside. Covers swapped for clears, and Erica’s adjusted to point a degree or two walleyed, the better to watch the ditches. Cause Bambi.
The night before, rtic jug iced, coffee thermos filled. I set up my computer, patrol notebook, pen, and iPad, the better to quickly determine my route order, once sites were released at 12:01am 1 April. (In years past, site pages could be difficult to load, costing precious time. This is no longer the case- Tour site and app function superbly, but my habit of just switching devices rather than trying to work through a glitch remains).
Various cords, jump packs, and extra light sources strategically placed, hated but distance-essential tank bag affixed, it’s all coming together. Gatorlyte, sugar free Red Bull, jerky, and low-fat snack bars loaded. All calories, and almost all hydration will be consumed at speed.
I moved last-caffiene time up. Dinner time and a nightcap (the better to sleep abnormally early) were moved up as well. My careful planning assured that I would get 2 hours and 5 minutes of sleep.
Well f@$k. That didn’t work….
So I was already showered, shaved, and dressed when midnight struck and I saw what I was dealing with.
I am cringinly low tech in my route load-in, because I need it done fast.. I write down the site labels, names, and addresses in a patrol notebook. I look at the sites represented on the TOH map for the state that I’m running and number them in the notebook in visit order.
I punch each of the coordinates straight into the gps, as locations, not as a route. (Actually, I punch them into my phone, which loads them into the gps). I use the notebook (in my tank bag) to revisit the location and requirements for the next-up site. I tell the gps which site we are going to next, and punch only the city up next into iPhone nav. This helps detect location-specific gps weirdness, and decreases my chance of overlooking a detail while fatigued.
Getting moving immediately is key. I can ponder and refine the route on the first long leg.
My zumo xt runs primary nav. And it does great. My personal iPhone runs backup nav, tpms monitoring/alarms, and Waze. My iPad, for the first time, became the solo photo/submission tool. TommyKraft’s TOH app and my iPad were a flawless combination.
This year, I figured out that a spot X will not work as a body-worn tracker. Not using their strap, anyway. It flaps and bangs against you in the wind. PITA. On the upside, I can send and receive messages, send an okay or trigger ann sos, all through my phone to the X.
So I tore off, headed for the southern part of the state. Sites near zombieland, my state capital, are bagged first, while traffic is low. Then it’s all points south, (more circular this year), finishing the northernmost targets last, since thst puts me within a couple of hours of home.
Sites were interesting and well planned out. And they involved very little interstate. Their placement caused me to crisscross the state on rural highways and backroads.
As years have passed, competition has increased. The first couple of years I ran, no one was close. Two years ago, a rider had to have been certain he was taking first place in the state. I never saw him, but he had to be less than 7 or 7 or 8 hours behind.
This year, at my second site visit at around 3am, another rider pulled up to bag the site. Two at the same time at 3am isn’t common. (That site required, for my route, a near 50-mile jaunt through thick deer infested forest…. And back, through that same stretch.)
I told him to ride safe and rode on, not sure if this was a sign, or just a random crossing of paths. Much later, when I bagged the next-to-last-site of the day, that same rider would do a double-take, as we passed one another, me leaving the town, he riding into it to score the site.
When I passed him, I wasn’t 100% sure it was the guy from 3am, on the other end of the state. But I was pretty sure. That kicked it up a notch, renewed my energy and focus after so much day and so little sleep. (Okay, actually, sugar free Red Bull did that, but the competition was stimulating).
Wonderful weather, wonderful roads, the excitement of a little competition (the unnamed rider’s “board” would go green very shortly after my own, sort of confirming my suspicion all day that I had no time to lose), and getting home early enough to enjoy a curated rye whiskey, along with homemade vegetable pizza from Mrs. Lumberg, made it an almost perfect day.
Life is short. Live well.
I’m smart enough to know I’m not tough enough for actual rally stuff, and I’m not that smart when well rested, so plotting and routing on no sleep is not a possibility for me. But Tour of Honor lets me pose for 1 day a year.
I put my distance comforts on the bike. Garauld’s hydration mount and Laam seat, for starters. Temps were forecast to approach 80F, so I left the more minimal touring screen on.
I love my clearwater amber lens covers, but I’ve begun to think they mask certain four-hooved colors on the roadside. Covers swapped for clears, and Erica’s adjusted to point a degree or two walleyed, the better to watch the ditches. Cause Bambi.
The night before, rtic jug iced, coffee thermos filled. I set up my computer, patrol notebook, pen, and iPad, the better to quickly determine my route order, once sites were released at 12:01am 1 April. (In years past, site pages could be difficult to load, costing precious time. This is no longer the case- Tour site and app function superbly, but my habit of just switching devices rather than trying to work through a glitch remains).
Various cords, jump packs, and extra light sources strategically placed, hated but distance-essential tank bag affixed, it’s all coming together. Gatorlyte, sugar free Red Bull, jerky, and low-fat snack bars loaded. All calories, and almost all hydration will be consumed at speed.
I moved last-caffiene time up. Dinner time and a nightcap (the better to sleep abnormally early) were moved up as well. My careful planning assured that I would get 2 hours and 5 minutes of sleep.
Well f@$k. That didn’t work….
So I was already showered, shaved, and dressed when midnight struck and I saw what I was dealing with.
I am cringinly low tech in my route load-in, because I need it done fast.. I write down the site labels, names, and addresses in a patrol notebook. I look at the sites represented on the TOH map for the state that I’m running and number them in the notebook in visit order.
I punch each of the coordinates straight into the gps, as locations, not as a route. (Actually, I punch them into my phone, which loads them into the gps). I use the notebook (in my tank bag) to revisit the location and requirements for the next-up site. I tell the gps which site we are going to next, and punch only the city up next into iPhone nav. This helps detect location-specific gps weirdness, and decreases my chance of overlooking a detail while fatigued.
Getting moving immediately is key. I can ponder and refine the route on the first long leg.
My zumo xt runs primary nav. And it does great. My personal iPhone runs backup nav, tpms monitoring/alarms, and Waze. My iPad, for the first time, became the solo photo/submission tool. TommyKraft’s TOH app and my iPad were a flawless combination.
This year, I figured out that a spot X will not work as a body-worn tracker. Not using their strap, anyway. It flaps and bangs against you in the wind. PITA. On the upside, I can send and receive messages, send an okay or trigger ann sos, all through my phone to the X.
So I tore off, headed for the southern part of the state. Sites near zombieland, my state capital, are bagged first, while traffic is low. Then it’s all points south, (more circular this year), finishing the northernmost targets last, since thst puts me within a couple of hours of home.
Sites were interesting and well planned out. And they involved very little interstate. Their placement caused me to crisscross the state on rural highways and backroads.
As years have passed, competition has increased. The first couple of years I ran, no one was close. Two years ago, a rider had to have been certain he was taking first place in the state. I never saw him, but he had to be less than 7 or 7 or 8 hours behind.
This year, at my second site visit at around 3am, another rider pulled up to bag the site. Two at the same time at 3am isn’t common. (That site required, for my route, a near 50-mile jaunt through thick deer infested forest…. And back, through that same stretch.)
I told him to ride safe and rode on, not sure if this was a sign, or just a random crossing of paths. Much later, when I bagged the next-to-last-site of the day, that same rider would do a double-take, as we passed one another, me leaving the town, he riding into it to score the site.
When I passed him, I wasn’t 100% sure it was the guy from 3am, on the other end of the state. But I was pretty sure. That kicked it up a notch, renewed my energy and focus after so much day and so little sleep. (Okay, actually, sugar free Red Bull did that, but the competition was stimulating).
Wonderful weather, wonderful roads, the excitement of a little competition (the unnamed rider’s “board” would go green very shortly after my own, sort of confirming my suspicion all day that I had no time to lose), and getting home early enough to enjoy a curated rye whiskey, along with homemade vegetable pizza from Mrs. Lumberg, made it an almost perfect day.
Life is short. Live well.
