The plan for Friday the 16th of May was to depart Calgary early in the morning and ride as far as I could get form Calgary. The plan was foiled in some sense by a pretty stiff breeze from the south that cropped up after about 80 kms of riding. It got stronger the further south I got and eventually got to the point where I only managed 20 kms per hour for my last hour. While that is a fine pace and is more than respectable it’s not an hour that is going in any of my record books.

The grand total for the day was 201 kilometers and I followed this route south from Calgary until I arrived at the Burmis Tree which is a local landmark in southern Alberta. The tree is long dead and is severely disfigured in it’s growth due to the heavy winds it experienced over it’s lifetime. I had hoped to make it quite a bit further if the wind agreed but it wasn’t going to be the case last Friday and I surrendered to the parents’ van knowing I’d be able to get in a lot more riding if I didn’t push the envelope too far that day. I’ll post some photos when I get my hands on them as well as videos when I download them to the computer.

OK, here are the photos: first is the arrival at the little rest area on Highway 3. Two and Three are rather self explanatory… me my bike and some random tree that looks kinda cool:

This was my second ride in excess of 200 kilometers, the first one I did and documented back in August 2007 when I rode 215 kilometers and it only took me 7 more minutes including my stops! (I timed that with a watch, not an automated bike computer). A couple observations about the ride were that my cadence seemed to speed up as the day went on for about the first 100 miles and then began to tail off towards the end. The cause of that is probably partly due to the headwind but it seems to me that it’s probably a decent indication that my fitness is on par for about 160 kms of riding at what I’ve learned to call a “steady plus” pace (Ask Gordo Byrn about that if you want).

In other Sea-to-Sea related news I have been very encouraged recently by a large number of people making responses regarding the fundraising aspect of my life at the moment. Things are moving along at the moment as numbers add up bit by bit. That $10 000 that has seemed a rather distant goal at some points during the last year might not be as ludicrous at it seems.

A huge thanks to all of the people who recently made donations! I’ll get a new tally of things sometime in the next week or so for an update.