Day 7 - RAGBRAI - 43.2 miles

Today is my final day of riding! I can't believe I'm going to finish it. Since Gene (driving duty today) and Ron had to leave by noon to start their long drive back to Texas, we started the day extra early at around 6:15am. According to the route maps, today's 40+ miles was easy - relatively flat with one long uphill, but also one huge downhill. We were traveling north and then east to the final destination of Burlington, IA. The best part was that the winds that we fought so hard against the other day, were now our tailwind. While it was a bit nippy at the beginning of the day, once the sun completely came up, we were nice and toasty warm. The route was indeed flat and we were traveling pretty fast with the wind pushing us along. It was fun riding the rolling hills. We'd gain enough speed going down to make it up to the peak of the next hill relatively effortlessly. Up and down we went, but, I was still waiting for the big uphill to come. Since this was my last day, I was going to go all out and pump my legs until I couldn't take it anymore. I saw this huge downhill and expected it to be followed by the huge uphill, but then, as we flew down the hill at probably 50mph, Rick started to hit the brakes. I thought, what's happening? Is there another accident? I don't see or hear an ambulance. Nope, it wasn't anything bad. It just wasn't the right downhill. Rick had to slow down because we had to make a left turn. As we turned left, another rider came up to us and said "what a waste of good momentum!" Our friend Tash said he was drafting us down the hill. Eventually, we got to the big uphill and oh my goodness it was long. There wasn't a huge downhill for us to gain momentum, so we just had to spin through the whole thing. It was difficult, but I just let my quads burn until I couldn't take it anymore. Once we finished that hill, we knew it was all downhill or flat. We rode through beautiful Geode State Park and stopped at a huge Christian Church around 8:15am to meet up with Ron and Pete. The church was pretty cool. They were playing Christian rock music, and when I went in to use the bathroom, I noticed a nice drum set and guitars. Very modern!

We didn't ride all the way to the finish line because we had to get back to the hotel so that we could pick up our bags. We finished pretty quickly at around 9am, traveling an average of 19 mph. I was kind of bummed out because our pick up point was less than 42.5 miles. It was only 40.5 miles. I would be shy 2 miles from my 400 mile goal. So, rather than having Gene pick us up, we rode the final 2 miles to the hotel in traffic. Actually, the distance was only 1.8 miles, so Rick rode past the hotel and made a u-turn so that I could clear the 2 miles. Hooray, I made 400 total miles on this trip. In the end, I rode the most out of the entire group. I totally deserve my stud muffin title :)

This has been a great adventure for me. I came into the week-long bike ride with a lot of self doubt. I'm coming out of the trip feeling confident that I can do almost anything. Rick and my friends were right, my legs and body became much stronger after the third day. Heck, my quads are the strongest they've ever been, and I now see major muscle definition in my calves. I plan on upgrading my bike when I come home so that I could ride more regularly. If I come back to RAGBRAI next year, I want to do it on my own and not on the tandem.

Time for me to get some sleep. Our flight departs at 6am, which means we have to get into the airport no later than 5am. It's going to be good to see the children. I miss them terribly, even though I've been talking to them every day.