400K Brevet - May 16, 2009

The event du jour was a 400 kilometer (251 mile) ride starting and ending in Edwardsville Illinois. After the alarm woke me at 2:45 AM, I got up, applied sun screen on my face and neck, and turned on the television to check the progress of the storm we had overnight. Looking at the weather radar, the front line of the storm had just passed St. Louis heading south east but there was more rain trailing the front. The current temperature was 60 degrees with a projected high around 65 degrees and winds out of the north-north-west all day. With this news I put on wool socks, a long sleeve jersey as well as my rain pants and jacket.

I was out the door by 3:00 AM on my want to pick up fellow rider, Guy Oldfield who came in from Maryland for a graduation. Guy was ready and we hopped on the highway and made it to Edwardsville just after 4:00 AM.

Riders began showing up shortly after our arrival and once everyone had filled out the appropriate forms, received their maps, cue sheets and brevet cards I held a brief meeting and inspection of lighting and reflective equipment.

In addition to the twelve riders on the 400 K route, one rider (Guy) was doing the 300 K route, and another rider a 200 K route. With thick clouds overhead, but no rain falling we headed out at 5:00 AM.

My last 400K event was back in 2003. I was six years younger, trained more over the winter and rode faster back then. I had totally forgotten how difficult a 400K brevet was. It is no wonder why I have only ridden this event once before. The challenge, aside from pedaling the 251 miles, is staying awake long enough to complete the ride. At my pace this year, that meant staying awake a long time. The rules provide 27 hours to complete this distance.

I hooked up with Ralph Rognstad pretty much right from the parking lot in Edwardsville and found ourselves chatting away the early miles and keeping together. Guy Oldfield, who was riding the 300K route also stayed with us. The three of us pulled into the gas station in Pocahontas to use the restrooms and refill bottles. Dennis Smith and George Jarad where pulling out as we pulled in. David and Mary Esther Rost pulled in right after us. In less than ten minutes Guy, Ralph and I were back on our bicycles and heading further down the road.

With a really nice tailwind this time, we rolled into the Breese checkpoint, mile 52, around 8:20 AM. George and Dennis were just finishing their checkpoint ritual and getting ready to roll when we pulled in. Mary Esther and David pulled in right behind us again. Our paces were just a little off, but it was nice seeing people right ahead and right behind at each checkpoint.

We were on Highline Road and came to a particularly low spot in the road which was flooded. The area was maybe 75 feet wide and the water was flowing across the road. Even though I had ridden this road many times I was not sure how deep the water was. We all stopped and decided that since we could see bicycle tracks on the far end and no one had back-tracked that we saw, we figured we could cross it.

Riding a recumbent, my feet are up high and I stayed dry with the exception of some spray to my posterior. Ralph and Guy followed once I was safely across and they finished the crossing with soaking wet feet.

About ten miles later I felt a change in my bicycle. I could feel every little bump in the road. Ralph confirmed that my rear tire looked low. We pulled over and sure enough I was very soft. As we were still in a very wet area I was not in the mood to change a tube, and seeing that it was not a blow out, I decided to pump it back up and see if I could make it to the next checkpoint before changing it.

In the next thirteen miles I stopped two more times to pump up my rear tire. Each time, Ralph and Guy would stop and hold my bicycle while I used my mini-pump to get air into the tube.

It was sprinkling again when we pulled into the gas station in Okawville, mile 78 at 10:20 AM. After having our brevet cards signed I went outside and took the rear wheel off and pulled the old tube out and checked the tire for debris. I did find one sharp object which I removed, checked everything again, wiped the rim and tire down with a paper towel and installed a new tube.

Guy was ready to roll again, and decided to ride with a George and Dennis who were just getting ready to head out. Ralph was eating and waiting patiently. Once I had the tire pumped up, Ralph held my bike again while I re-installed my wheel. I quickly bought water, made a bottle of Perpetuem drink mix, grabbed a Hammer Bar (Almond & Raisin) and prepared to go.

With the wind at our backs for a change, the ride east to Hoyleton was very relaxing and done pretty quickly. I remember looking at the clock and thinking that I was already two hours ahead of my pace for the 300K ride a few weeks ago. What a difference the wind direction makes.

As we approached Pinkneyville mile 130, Ralph and I started talking about lunch and where to eat. Subway was on the route and sounded good. Ralph told me about a sandwich with flat pita bread. It sounded good to me and I ordered one. With my flat tire back before Okawville, I had not had time to eat a sandwich so I was ready for something more than just drink mix.

George and Dennis popped in the door to say hello. They ate up the road at the Dairy Queen. They told us of being chased by a farm dog back a few miles and the dog was hit and killed by a passing truck when the dog tried to cross the road. I am sorry to hear that the dog was killed, but on the other hand, there is now one less farm dog to chase cyclists.

After one last short southern section on IL-127 we turned onto Mudline Road and saw a lot of flooding from the rains. Thankfully the road is well above the water here. There were many fallen trees, but all the big stuff had been cleared away from the road.

We made a right turn heading west on West Stein Road which is a new road this year. I chose it as the previous road, Beaucomp Road, no longer exists. A local coal company has stripped mined the area and this required a reroute.

West Stein is very hilly and not in great shape. It is paved, more or less, and has some potholes, as well as patches of gravel. The good side is that it is not heavily travelled and keeps the mileage pretty much the same as the original route.

Ralph and I rolled into the Fleetwood Gas Station in Ava, mile 150 around 4:10 PM still holding onto the five hours of time. Just as we were pulling in we saw George and Dennis heading downhill along Route 4.

Both Route 4 right out of Ava and Brick Plant Road in Campbell Hill have some good hills. It was 35 to 40 mph downhill and 5-8 mph uphill, then repeat over and over and over again.

The worst of the hills ended just short of Sparta and we pulled into the Casey’s General Store (mile 177) around 6:50 PM. To my surprise John Prindable a veteran of many a brevet was standing by his car. I immediately went over and shook his hand and greeted him. He wasn’t there for me, but drove over to SAG Bob Bruce who blew his knee out and was in a lot of pain. John’s generosity in coming over to SAG a rider back to the start is so like him.

Scott Thompson caught up to Ralph and me at the checkpoint. John Prindable said his good byes and reminded us to be safe. Ralph and I were ready to go, and Scott said he would be right behind us.

We made it through the little town of Coulterville and half way to Lively Grove when we needed to turn our lights on. Ralph and I pulled over to the side of the road at Lively Grove as my brain had suddenly turned off. I was having a hard time focusing on anything and could barely keep my eyes open. Ralph had some caffeine pills and I took two. Scott pulled up and the three of us headed north towards New Baden.

We made it into New Baden, mile 216, and stopped at the Shell station around 10:35 PM. The temperature had been dropping a lot since the sun went down, and thankfully, the winds had died down as well.

Ralph and I were pretty cold and found the store to have a hot chocolate machine. I bought a turkey sandwich along with the hot chocolate. Scott kept things short and I could tell he wanted to push on, but my mind needed a short nap. Ralph had his head down on a table and I joined in.

When we woke up later Scott had already pushed on. I got up and went to the bathroom and bought some water to mix another bottle of Perpetuem. While still inside the store I started shivering uncontrollably. I couldn’t stop. I walked out to my bike to get my bottle and the temperature was very cold and I went back inside quickly. While continuing to shiver, I made my bottle and bought a pair a long finger leather gloves for $6.00. It’s amazing what a gas station sells.

Ralph told me we needed to get on the bikes and I would warm up once I started moving again. I had my doubts, but I also knew that the finish was still 35 miles north. We rolled back onto the road at 11:45 PM. I was still shivered pretty hard for the next ten minutes until my body started generating heat again. After that I was fine, and having the long finger glove made a big difference in my comfort.

We rolled through the town of Summerfield, and north into St. Jacob where there is a bar on the corner. The bar had a bonfire going which looked inviting, and a few people called out to us inquiring about what we were doing riding a bicycle at 1:30 in the morning.

The last town we came to was Marine, mile 237. There is a quickie mart/gas station on the corner, and we had hoped it would be open, but at that hour it was closed. We would have to make due with what resources we had for the last 15 miles.

We pulled in at the Edwardsville police station at 3:01 AM. I had hoped that we would break the 3:00 AM barrier as we were coming into town, put I didn’t have any sprint left inside of me. It just wasn’t worth it.

After signing the check-in sheet and filling out our brevet cards, we noticed Scott Thompson made it in 20 minutes earlier. I had planned to catch a few hours of sleep in my van before heading home. I just wish part of my plan would have included a blanket. It was 43 degrees but I managed to drift off.

As for the final statistics, I rode the official course of 251.1 miles in 22 hours one minute. This included 18 hours 22 minutes of pedaling and 3 hours 39 minutes off the bike fixing flats, eating, napping etc. My average riding speed was 13.8 mph which isn’t nearly as good as six years ago, but that was six years ago.

The weather stats showed a low near 64 degrees at the start, a high of 65 during the day and a 43 degree over night low. No wonder I was so cold and shivering. We did experience a little rain, but nothing too bothersome. The winds averaged 9 mph with maximum winds of 21 mph and maximum gusts of 29 mph mostly from the North-North-West.