Written by Curtis

Day 42 – July 9 – 76 Miles, 1,650 feet climbing (Murdo to Left Tailrace near Fort Thompson)

Roughly the last 1000 hours is the duration which Chris or I could tell you where the other was and what they were doing, if not reach across the road, hotel room, or table and tap the other on the shoulder.  Nancy and Dave have also had to put up with me for nearly as many hours as Chris but they are afforded breaks most nights.   Twenty years or more is how long it will be before I anticipate accumulating that many hours in such close proximity with any of my family members beyond my wife.  Now it is time for this bike family to go our separate ways.  Tomorrow the Chris-cross team continues East while I turn South/South-East on the Lewis & Clark trail heading for the start of RAGBRAI where I will meet some of my family including my brother from Sacramento and wife’s nephew and niece coming from Cayman.  

From a hotel, even Chris would agree, we could normally start earlier but 7am this morning seemed early because today was the first day starting in the Central Time zone and eyes were not closed until after 10pm last night.  This morning no vests were needed because the morning temps are now on the warming side since the heat bubble is catching us.   I personally started with ice water in one bottle, planning to keep it in reserve for the warmer afternoon heat.  Having insulated metal bottles meant that ice cold water stayed that way until after reaching camp. I intend on making diligent use of these bottles as I head into heat of Nebraska, Iowa, and Illinois.

Today’s landscape was green rolling prairie hills with some of the least amount of climbing so far on the trip.  During the later morning Nancy, Dave, and Chris noticed a wobble in my rear wheel.  Upon close inspection, with 18 miles remaining to reach our campsite below Lake Sharpe on the Missouri River, I found 3 drive side spokes beginning to pull through the rim. This type of wheel failure comes from fatigue of rough roads and climbing very steep hills with very heavy weight over and over.  Basically everything we have been doing for the last 2 months and pretty much the only type of riding done on the 5 year old bike/wheel.  Yet miraculously the failure revealed itself the day before I would have been alone not noticing the issue until the failure had become catastrophic.  By the time we reached our campground 8 drive-side spokes had notable cracks in the rim near the nipple. Total rim failure is likely only a few loaded miles further down the road.

A new rim or wheel would be a must before the second half of my trip begins.   So I checked a bike shop in nearby Pierre, which turned out not to have the correct wheel.  The next closest bike shops were in Rapid City and the second shop in Rapid City had a viable replacement wheel.  The problem was Rapid City being 200 miles back the wrong direction. 

A few days ago you heard Lynn’s in Rapid City’s description of how to host bicyclists.  But it turns out Lynn left out the last step:  Block their numbers or you will hear from them again.  By the time I had found the wheel Chris had already reached out to check if Lynn, who has family around these parts, might know someone near today’s destination who might be able to help out.  However, Lynn being from South Dakota where trail and bike angles come from, volunteered to handle the situation by acting as courier from the Rapid City Bike shop.    

A few hours later and the new wheel is installed.  Lynn also stayed long enough to make sure we got Tacos from her home town down the river and some of that great dinner time conversation we enjoyed in Rapid City. 

With the confidence that I now have an upgraded wheel, I will head off toward RAGBRAI alone.  I really enjoyed every one of the last 2k miles.  I wish the best of luck in the next 2k miles for Chris, Dave, and Nancy.