Tour de Fun

This weekend was the annual Tour de Fun cycling festival to benefit Teen Action and Support Center in Rogers.  TASC is an organization focused on helping teens and the Tour de Fun is their only public fundraisers to support their mission.

WE BELIEVE:

...YOUNG PEOPLE ARE STRONG, INTELLIGENT, AND TALENTED IN UNIQUE AND POWERFUL WAYS.

...YOUNG PEOPLE CAN AND DO
MAKE VALUABLE CONTRIBUTIONS
TO THEIR COMMUNITIES AND SCHOOLS.

...YOUNG PEOPLE HAVE THE
ABILITY TO TAKE CONTROL OF
THEIR FUTURES. 

The Tour de Fun offers several different distances and each year I have increased my distance so it wasn't a shocker that I was easily talked into signing up for the 100K distance.  I had done some 3 hour and 3 1/2 hour training rides so I figured as long as we took it easy it would be manageable.  The hills were something that I was worried about though! I'm not a fast hill climber and for this ride I didn't need to be fast I just needed to make it up and over quite a few hills! 

The route is in an area that I don't normally ride.  The opening 10 miles or so are on a busy-ish highway that heads out to one of the main marinas on Beaver Lake.  It includes an almost immediate climb...why warmup when you just warmup as you climb a monster of a hill!  I was a little surprised to see a few people stopped and either walking or working on bikes on this hill.  We were maybe 3 miles into the ride and there would be a lot more hills ahead.  

I rode with a group of friends of varying abilities.  It was tough to stay together with all the rollers but we did the best that we could to stay in pairs.  Two friends were doing the 50K which would split off around mile 11 at the first rest stop.  The remaining four (Mark and Pauline and Mandy and I) of us would be in for the full 100K.  We had no time ambitions and just enjoyed ourselves on the ride.  We decided to call ourselves Team MoFo...we had two Moe's since Mark and Pauline's last name shortens down to Moe so then Mandy and I made up the Fo.  We got Mo hills and Fo Sure we got em done!

 Here's some pictures from our day!

Rest stop 1 before splitting into 50K and 100K groups

Rest stop 2

Rest stop 3 in the shade! 

Rest stop 4

Definitely a Tough Chik after finishing! 

Overall, it was a great course...challenging but great.  The roads were fairly safe with most of the traffic providing ample room when passing.  The rest stops were well stocked and all of the volunteers were amazing and so helpful.  The hills were definitely challenging but nothing that couldn't be managed.  I found that the further we got in the distance the sooner I would drop to my granny gear on the climbs.  There was just one hill where I had to say a few choice words as I was ascending.  It was just stifling hot and such a long climb but I made it to the top and then everything was good again.  I rode with Mark for a lot of the ride and after our last climb he pointed out that we just had a few cool down miles to the finish.  Somehow he and I have very different definitions of cool down since he started to hammer out 20mph speeds and I had no choice but to stick to his wheel.  I was shocked to still have some leg speed in me at that point but we were on a nice flat road and it actually felt good to hammer for a little while.  

The race starts and finishes in downtown Rogers which has cobblestone streets.  Not my favorite to ride on but as we finished I just wanted to hit the finish line! After we finished we headed to a local Mexican restaurant and we all were starving.  All in all a great way to spend a Saturday morning!