116 miles ridden – 5259 feet climbed.

I was with the early starters today after pulling a muscle on yesterday’s climb so I was on the road just before 6am this morning. The weather held great promise – clear sky and around 13C even at that time – and the forecast for John Day meant I left with spring weather layers. What wasn’t forecast was that after we started our first climb to the first SAG stop the temperature dropped to about 6C. When I arrived at the SAG I was absolutely frozen even though the sun had by then come out. Fortunately I managed to get into the luggage truck and get out leg warmers and my waterproof which was fabulous as we then started a 12 mile downhill!

Of course when you go down a hill it just means that you have to go up another hill which is exactly what happened – I even got a picture taken. The wind was with us today which definitely made a difference on such a long distance but even so when we rolled into John Day I had just abut had enough. Even with the pulled muscle which meant I could push down hard with my right leg I averaged 14.2 mph which I am pretty pleased with. My backside however is regularly reminding me that I was on the saddle for over 8 hours!

So at the end of day 5 I have cycled 410 miles and climbed over 19,000 feet – that’s like cycling up Ben Nevis over 4 times. Now I need to stretch and sleep: