Thankfully, our second full day in South Dakota treated us far better than the first. Little to no wind, no turns, and mostly just rollers gave the groups the opportunity to make easy and fast work of today’s route. Afternoon clouds kept the temps from getting too hot as well. The weather gods were very kind to us today, which is exactly what we needed after yesterday. Not much by way of scenery today. Almost every mile looked exactly the same – lots and lots of agriculture as far as the eye could see.
Speaking of yesterday, I wanted to elaborate a bit on how the crosswinds impact the riders. Gusty (in this case from the South or the rider’s right) tend to want to blow you into the traffic lane. They make it difficult to communicate both verbally (hard to hear), and via hand signals as you really don’t want to take your hands off the bars. Worse, it makes eating and drinking while riding challenging for the very same reason. Lastly, many people don’t realize that riding in a paceline really doesn’t help much when there are crosswinds as the aerodynamic advantage is severely negated. (Riding in an echelon helps a lot, but isn’t always practical on busy roads.) So the crosswinds end up making things harder both mentally and physically.
Two celebration notes today:
1. We entered the Central time zone
2. I was awarded the Sasquatch. The Sasquatch is a little keychain which is awarded daily from rider to rider. Yesterday was the first Sasquatch and it went to Tony for getting lost the day before and having to ride extra miles and extra elevation to get back on track. Today, Tony awarded it to me for telling him he had a flat tire and for waiting with him while it got changed. Quite possibly my greatest cycling award ever 😁
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