Countdown to Triathlon – 117 Days, 16.7 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 94 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY –  We used to get opossums in our garage when we lived in the country.  Our granddaughter Maddy, about age 4,  was with me one night when we walked out to the garage which was across the driveway and not attached to the house.  A possum, in the dark, hissed at us and scared us half to death.  She later said that it had "Ska-wy eyes, and shop teeth" (scary eyes and sharp teeth - she didn't say "r's" at that time.)  Well, this is the story about a "Ska-way" bridge.

The Journey - Installment Ninety-Four

THE "SKA-WY" BRIDGE

        The third and final day of the bike ride began.  We had spent the night at the same hotel in Napa as the night before.  After breakfast, we again gathered at the end of the parking lot where the black Focus van was parked.  Below is Lisa with the white and red jacket, blond hair.  We were waiting for the morning's meeting to begin. 

Terri and the lady from Kansas. I told you about the Kansas lady earlier.  She rode the Kansas ride, the northern California ride and again in July for the Focus on the Family Silver Anniversary in Colorado Springs.  SHE RODE IN THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS, THE CRAZY LADY!!!

        Since it was Father's Day, we had some devotions about fathers and the fathers that were present, including Bob, were given Father's Day cards from the Focus on the Family team.  We were again encouraged and congratulated for our riding the two days before and reminded again to keep consuming energy drinks and energy snacks.  We were told about the end of the ride where we would all meet at the entrance to the Golden Gate Bridge, cross the bridge together and ride the two miles or so to Marina Green where many of us would have guests waiting.  

         Once again, my group, "The Stop and Smell the Roses, Pick the Roses and Plant Some More Roses" group were given a head start.  Lisa, Yvonne, Terri and one or two others besides myself started out down the highway, heading for Highway 37 which would take us over the Marin Hills to San Francisco.  Once we turned onto Highway 37, we saw that it was a marsh on both sides of the road and a haven for thousands (maybe millions) of birds.  Unfortunately, the birds were flying into cars as the cars sped at about 70 mph just a couple of feet from us.  It really was very dangerous and I refused to answer my cell phone while we were teetering just inches from those speeding cars.  We were horrified to see the birds getting hit and dying right in front of us.  The ladies I was riding with knew my story about the dead birds .  Every time we saw one, we said, "Yes Lord, we know you love us and are with us."

       A couple of miles out on Highway 37 we came to a screeching halt. At the time I was on the phone with my sister from Virginia.  All of a sudden, I saw the bridge looming up ahead of us and almost screamed at her, "Oh no.  I can't do that bridge.  I've got to talk to you later."  I quickly disconnected from my conversation and pulled over with the other riders.  This is what we saw:

That's the sight we saw as we approached the bridge that day. This may not seem scary to you, but it is even scary riding over it in a car.

The pictures below were taken by Terri this March, 2011,  when she and I drove part of our trip, reliving our adventure. If you don't think this is bad, remember, we were on bicycles, pedaling with our own legs. 

These last four pictures were taken from the car as Terri and I sped over the bridge.

THIS WAS REALLY SCARY!  THOSE ARE CARS AT THE TOP THAT LOOK LIKE SPECKS.

        

Countdown to Triathlon – 121 Days, 17.2 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 92 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY – Babies are such a nice way to start people.
Don Herrold

I have the night shift tonight.  It's 3:27 am and the baby is sleeping.  I have been rocking him and burping him and changing multiple diapers so that my daughter Laurel can get a few hours sleep before his next feeding.  Then I'm going to bed!  I thought I would type the blog while I'm waiting.  Then it's "Good Night"!

The Journey - Installment Ninety-Two

Somewhere during the morning ride, I realized that no one was in sight and that I was riding alone.   This was not because I rode so fast and was ahead of everyone.  I probably was the last rider again.  I began to feel sorry for myself.  I was wearing the “No Whining” button, given to me by my Jewish customer from my drapery business.  I think I temporarily forgot about that button because I remember whining to the Lord that I was riding all alone and no one wanted to ride with me. I was having a one-woman pity party.  As it became lunch time I began to look for signs of where our lunch break was going to be held but could not find the trail that was marked along side of the road.  Maybe they should have left crumbs out for me to follow.  As I got to Calistoga, I saw up ahead on the sidewalk some of the volunteers who were wearing the very distinct goldenrod color tee shirts.  I headed toward them, up on the sidewalk and came to a screeching halt beside them.  As I began asking them where we were meeting, I began to swing my leg over the bike to dismount.  Distracted by my conversation with them, over I went.  I had forgotten to unclick my right foot from the pedal.  Not only did I fall over right at their feet and make a grand entrance, but I fell on the metal doors which cover stairs going down to the basement of a store which is used for delivering supplies to the store.  As I lay there I realized very quickly that the metal was hot in the noonday sun and it was burning me.  I began hollering at the men to get the bike off me and my feet out of the pedals.  Falling wasn’t bad enough without getting burned at the same time.  Leave it to me to be such a klutz.  

          

         I was really shaken up by the fall.  I don’t know why it affected me so severely.  I had fallen many times before because of not clicking out of my pedals. One of the men asked me if I wanted him to push my bike and I told him to “please do it.”  I was shaking all over.  We walked around the corner and down the block and there was the black Focus van with all the riders getting fed their lunch.  I watched what the others were eating and decided to do the same.  After lunch I asked one of the mechanics to look at my bike because it had been making a “rubbing” sound.   They checked it out and could find nothing wrong.  With lunch ended, we started back toward the hotel.

 

Countdown to Triathlon – 122 Days, 17.4 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 91 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

 Journey - Installment Ninety-One

 

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY – "You've not failed until you quit."

I have quoted that before, but it is certainly on my mind these day.  My arm is so painful that I cannot train for the triathlon.  Last night I slept in the recliner all night because no matter how I try to lie in bed, my arm pains me a lot.  Bob says I cry out at night because of the pain. As you see above, the triathlon is only a little over 17 weeks away.  I'm not sure whether I'll be able to train for it or not.  I'm supposed to be getting physical therapy but had to wait until I get home next week from helping Laurel with the baby.  The doctor really doesn't know what the problem is. 

I have found some notes I must have taken that second morning as we gathered before beginning our ride. It is written on hotel notepaper and I’ll summarize what one of the speakers had said.   It sounds like something they would have told us on the first day, but I wouldn’t have remembered all of the following after riding all those hours and sleeping on it.  This is in essence what was said:

         “Whether you are anxious about this ride or not, God will cause you to reach deep within yourself to pull out reserve you didn’t know you had.  It is such a blessing to finish the ride after you have done your very best. Unprepared or prepared, God has put you in this ride.  Be still and allow God to tell you the reason.  Just as Christ came to serve, you will see such examples of service by the Focus on the Family staff as well as the other riders who stop to assist each other in time of need, i.e. flat tires, etc. Be sure to enjoy the beautiful scenery.” 

One of the members of the staff told us that today we would start off differently than yesterday.  We would stagger our start from the hotel.  He said there were three groups of riders:

1)  “The Hammerheads” - they were the really fast ones who started up, rode a fast ride and got to the end of the day quickly, saying “Thanks Lord for the fast ride.”

2) “The Stop and Smell the Roses” group” who stop along the way to smell the roses.

3) “The Stop and Smell the Roses, Pick the Roses, Sell the Roses and Plant Some New Roses” group.

Can anyone guess which group I was in?  “Bingo!”  So, we got about a half an hour head start before the “Stop and Smell the Roses” group left the hotel.  The “Hammerheads left after that but I have no way of knowing how much time they had to wait..  Knowing that the second group would be trying to catch us, and knowing that the “Hammerheads” would overtake us eventually, we were determined to pedal as fast and as far as we could before they caught us. We had gone about 17 miles before the first guy overtook us.  After that we slowed our pace and headed up the Napa Valley for Calistoga.  We had beautiful weather for a June morning and the view of all the grape vineyards was truly picturesque.

.

Countdown to Triathlon – 123 Days, 17.5 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 90 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY -

"When you're on the starting line of your first century ride, it's not wise to sit there and think, 'I've got to ride one hundred miles today.'  I remember my first one.  My goal was to get to the first rest stop. I made each succeeding rest stop my goal.  When they're about twenty-five miles apart, you don't get intimidated by what seems an impossible distance.  All you need to ride is twenty-five miles, four times. "

-- Seana Hogan

Just think about it.  We had ridden 92 miles the day before. 

That is just 8 miles short of a century ride. 

Amazing!  Who would have thought I could do such a thing.

In the beginning of this blog I asked, "How do you eat an elephant?"

The answer - "One bite at a time." 

Yard by yard it's hard.
Inch by inch it's a cinch. 

The Journey - Installment Ninety

Day Two

       

        We all awoke early and met for breakfast in the hotel eating area.  The most miraculous thing had happened.  I had been on a bike the day before from 7 am to 9:15 pm (less breaks, lunch and flat tire fixing). As I walked into the breakfast room, many of my fellow riders asked me how I was doing.  They all knew that I had had such terrible knee trouble the day before and that I had been on the bike for so long.  I replied to each one of them that my knees felt fine and that I could never believe that I had been so many hours on a bike the day before. I didn't even have to use the muscle stimulators for the rest of the trip.  Good thing, because the batteries had run down halfway through the first day and since they were specialized batteries, I didn't know how to replace them.   The miracle was that thighs, bottom and knees were just fine.  In fact I didn’t feel as if I had ridden the day before at all.  Unbelievable perhaps to unbelievers who don’t realize the power of the Lord.

           

         However, Yvonne was having a very difficult time because her behind and thighs were so chaffed and she was in a lot of pain.  Lisa and I were upset with the person who sold her bike to her and sold her that seat.  She had ridden all day on a road bike with the tiniest seat.  Since she was so overweight, you couldn’t even see any part of the seat when she was riding in front of us.  I don’t think that anyone had given her the suggestion of applying the personal lubricant to her sensitive parts and she was even having difficulty walking.  We felt so badly for her.  We approached one of the volunteers and asked them to go and buy her a wider seat containing “gel” which really softened the bumping along the roads.  They agreed to get her a seat as soon as the stores opened.  They may have even had a spare one in the Focus van.  At some point, her seat was replaced and we shared our “little secret” with her.  I am not sure she could have continued for two more days without these adjustments.

        

 (Ryan Dobson in front of the van to speak with us the morning of the second day.

Sitting with him was mascot of the team, Traveler who accompanied the stafff on

all the 50 rides from January 2001 through July 2002.)

        After breakfast, we all gathered in the parking lot in front of the Focus van which was parked at the end of the hotel parking lot.   We had devotions and words of encouragement for the day and congratulations for the ride from the day before. Ryan Dobson stood before us and spoke about his life.  At the restaurant, the night before the ride, the reader may remember that I had prejudged this young man based on his appearance.  At the restaurant, he wore black wide rimmed glasses and had red spiky hair and to my 58 year old eyes, he looked like a freak.  The last time I had seen him was the morning of the beginning of the ride when we were at the State Capitol in Sacramento.  He had injured himself and rode in one of the vans on our bike ride and was unable to ride with us.  The day before while we were riding, he had cut his hair and actually looked “normal”.  He told us that he worked with the youth and therefore he would dress and wear his hair to  look like them.  He was not very old himself, probably in his early to mid twenties.  After telling us his story and how he came to the point in his life where he now was, it was very moving.  He told how difficult it had been to tell his parents that he and his wife were getting a divorce.  After his talk, I felt so ashamed of myself that I had judged him on appearances only.  After all, the Bible says we are not to judge others.  Only God is the holy and just Judge.  Will I ever learn and stop judging others?

Countdown to Triathlon – 124 Days, 17.7 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 89 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

 THOUGHT FOR THE DAY – I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.  ~G.K. Chesterton



The Journey - Installment Eighty-Nine
      

         With darkness approaching and having reached the bottom of the last hill, we rode like the wind.  I looked at my speedometer and we were going 20 mph.  I had never ridden that fast on the flat land, ever!  This was after riding all day and just finishing four steep hills.  As we rode toward the hotel, Tom would call periodically to the FOTF team up ahead who were waiting for us at the hotel to let them know where we were.  It was almost dark.  To our left were the Marin Hills that we would have to cross on Sunday to get to the Golden Gate Bridge. That thought of that crossing  never entered my mind.  I was solely concentrating on getting to the hotel before dark.  As I looked to my left (that would have been west), I saw the sun go down behind the last hill.  Soon it would be dark.  I remember that I had my left hand up in the air, like a traffic cop, and I was crying and begging the Lord to “hold back the dark, please, hold back the dark.” We were riding on the side of a busy highway. With my arm outstretched and my hand raised, with fingers spread out crying out to the Lord, any motorist riding on that highway passing us must have thought I was a nutcase.  I begged and pleaded with the Lord to let us finish the day’s ride before it got dark otherwise we would have had to get into Bob’s pickup. At one of the stop lights, we turned on our bike lights.  After about 20 minutes of riding as fast as we could we reached the hotel.  As we pulled into the driveway of the hotel, many riders from the team were there to greet us and cheer.  Just as we drove into the driveway, the curtain dropped.  It was dark.  NO KIDDING!  God held off the dark until we arrived.  It gives me goose bumps now, just thinking of it.  We had just completed 92 miles of riding.

         Some thoughtful people had set aside some dinner for us.  We were too late to get our clothes washed, but fortunately Terri and I each had a spare suit.  We went to our rooms, ate dinner and I stripped down to take a shower.  I put some cleansing cream on my face and was totally shocked because my face was caked with grit from the wind.  I could actually scrape it off.  I don’t think I have ever been that dirty.  Bob and I went to bed and slept very soundly after a very long day of riding.  Just think – we had started the ride at 7 AM from the hotel in Sacramento and when we rode into the hotel parking lot in Napa, it was 9:15 PM - Fourteen and one quarter hours on a bike (minus 2 break stops, lunch and time to fix a tire.)   Who would have ever thought I could stay on a bike that many hours?  I certainly never did.  That was the end of day one of the bike ride and I was a very grateful rider, thanking God as I fell asleep..

Countdown to Triathlon – 127 Days, 18.1 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 88 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

And are we ever doing that?  Well, not me exactly, but I'm Laurel's sidekick, handing her what she needs, sterilizing breast pump paraphernalia, changing diapers, etc.

The Journey - Installment Eighty-Eight

        When I reached the top of the hill, Bob was pulled over to the side of the road; Tom and Terri were straddling their bikes waiting for me.  As we began to ride again, I asked Tom if my wheels were okay. I remember telling him that I could feel every pebble in the road. He looked down and said, “Well no it is not  okay; your tire is flat!”  Amazing!  I had ridden up the last two hills on a flat tire.  No wonder the first hill was so hard to ride.  I was riding on a flat tire.  The really amazing thing is that God protected me from flat tires the whole eighteen months I had trained.  I had ridden out in the middle of nowhere with no cell phone reception and no human beings in sight and had never had a flat.  Now, when I had a flat I had people to help me.  We pulled over to the side of the road and Terri, alias “MacGyver” went to work.  We called her that name throughout the ride because she was always fixing tires and bikes with only a few tools.  MacGyver was a 1980’s television character who was an intelligent, optimistic, laid-back, resourceful secret agent named Angus MacGyver, played by Richard Dean Anderson.  He was shown as a resourceful agent able to solve complex problems with everyday materials he found at hand, along with his ever-present duct tape and Swiss Army knife.  I don’t know who dubbed Terri “MacGyver”, but it stuck.   She was always being helpful, fixing flats or whatever she could do to help. Remember that it was she who pulled me over earlier that  day and raised my bike seat.  That small action was the one thing that allowed me to continue riding when the pain in my knees would have caused me to be unable to finish the bike ride.
      
         With Bob and Tom standing by, Terri fixed my flat.  The tube had several holes in it and she repaired them.  After re-installing the tire on to the bike, we found that it still wasn’t holding air.  At that point, I remember saying, “Just forget it.  We’ll just ride with Bob to the hotel.”   I was ready to quit but Terri was insistent.  It was getting close to dark and I think that it was the final straw for me.  Terri was not so easily discouraged.  She took the tire apart again, and looked for more holes which she repaired.  We were then off for the last two hills which we accomplished in short order.  What a difference riding hills can be when your tire isn’t flat.  How would I not know I was riding on a flat tire?   I had never had one so I didn’t know what it felt like.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!  Come back Monday for the last installment of Day One, Focus on the Family Bike Ride.  Two more days of riding to go.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY – There is no finer investment for any community than putting milk into babies.
Winston Churchill

Countdown to Triathlon – 128 Days, 18.2 weeks to Race Day (See Installment 87 of "The Journey", 220 mile bike ride, below)

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY – There are no thoughts when it's 3 am and I am waiting for water to boil to sterilize breast pump parts. 

The Journey - Installment Eighty-Seven

        The second hill was higher than the first.  Even though I had pedaled fast at the top and down the other side of the first hill, about one third of the way up I slowed down, down, down until again I had to click out of the pedals and jump off the bike to avoiding falling over.  I continued up the hill on foot, pushing my bike beside me. Tom and Terri were already at the top, as was Bob.  From my vantage point I couldn’t see them; they were just over the crest of the hill.  I later learned from Terri that she had suggested to Bob that he at least go down with the truck and get my bike so I didn’t have to push it up.  I remember seeing Bob drive down toward me, make and U-turn and pull up beside me.  Rolling his window down, he told me that after this hill there were only two more and then it was downhill all the way to Napa.  He said he had driven to Napa and that he promised that there were only two more hills.  He then drove back to the top, leaving me to walk up the rest of the way.  Terri told me later that she was surprised when Bob drove back up the hill without my bike.

        Here’s where a miracle occurred. I called Terri the other day just to confirm that she remembers the same thing as I.  I wouldn’t want to make up any part of this story.  She believes also that what I am going to write next is fact.  The next thing I remember is riding up over the top of the hill.  I had been walking and was probably half way up when Bob came alongside of me in the pickup.  It is impossible for me and perhaps most riders, although I don’t presume to speak for them, to start up riding in the middle of a hill – not even to start up at the bottom of the hill. I don’t have enough strength to pedal from a stopped position to climb a hill.  I know that is true beyond a shadow of a doubt.  But here I was, riding up over the crest.  How did that happen?  There is no human explanation. It certainly wasn’t a matter of adrenaline taking over. I had no adrenaline left at this point.  There is only one explanation as to how I got up that hill.  That was the Lord’s doing.  Remember, He had told me to complete this ride and He assisted many times in helping me to complete it.  I would swear on my life that I could not have ridden up that hill on my own power.  The interesting thing is I have no recollection of anything from the time I last saw Bob while I was walking the bike until I crested the hill. This miracle was to occur again before the ride was over two days later.