Jun 9-11 - Yet another 400k

There's a reason that I find 400k my least-favorite distance.  I want it to be over.  Somewhere well short of 400k I'm ready to stop.  300-350k is a nicer distance.  It's even worse here in Ontario where "tradition" has 400k's starting at 6am.  I'm guaranteed to not finish on the same calendar day.

All that said, this was a good ride.  Starting at 6am, Robert Woodhouse and I finished at 3:23 the next day.  That's a couple of hours faster than the last time doing this ride but then again both Henk and I had mechanical issues the last time so there was an excuse.  The wind was generally cooperative; it didn't rain; I had good riding company.

Of course good riding company actually slows me down.  I spend more time at Controls than I would otherwise.  It also slowed Robert down as he's younger and faster !  This was his first 400k, so congrats to him !  He lives in Orillia and we rolled right by his house early in the ride.

I also let him guide my eating.  Why I did that, I'll never know.  I had a double quarter chicken dinner in Parry Sound.  Duh.  It was double because the fellow said that it was small, so they doubled up.  There's no way that I could eat that much chicken.  The milkshake was awful.  Ugh.

We hit some unexpected gravel on Southwood, 6.3km in fact.  It's stonechipping underway so we're hoping that it's clear for the Granite Anvil in August.

With about 10k feet of climbing on 400k, 21+ hours doesn't bode well for the Italy ride.  It's also going to be a lot hotter in Italy, for the most part.  We shall see.  I leave next Tuesday !  Yikes !

Backing up ...

I left here mid afternoon and stopped in Parry Sound at Sobeys to pickup a couple of things, getting to Stef's at 7pm.  Cassie quickly settled down and the dogs mostly ignored each other (thank goodness !).  Cassie slept in Kylie's bedroom with me.  I took her out to pee early in the a.m. and then put her back into the room when I left at 5:15 a.m. 

I was expecting two other riders but only one showed.  An email exchange afterwards cleared that up -- an accidental registration.

Once the ride was over, I went back to Stef's, picked up Cassie and headed north.  I stopped for a 15 minutes snooze at Mt. St. Louis road, not too far north of Barrie.  That kept me going for the rest of the trip.  Once home and showered, I had another 1.5 hours sleep and headed to Britt for Mass.  That afternoon I had another snooze.

Sandy made it back late afternoon with a record time trip.  It seems that the roads were empty north of Ottawa.  Jason and Lorraine had arrived next door while I was snoozing and we got together at the end of the day in the gazebo for a glass of wine / beer. 

Sandy used up the last of the veggies in the fridge for dinner last night so she may make a Parry Sound run today. 

Onward !