Team Flamingo Hits the Road for the Big One

Once a year, Team Flamingo takes the MASTER ride to Center Point. This is
the 78 mile ride that proves to us that we can ride a full day in RAGBRAI.
No matter what anyone says, this ride isn't about endurance nor distance nor
building teamwork (although all of those are important.) This ride is about
TENDERLOINS. It is a 39 mile ride to enjoy the tenderloins at Jonesey's in
Center Point.

Anywho, we met at the Evansdale Trail Head at 8 AM to begin our challenging
trek. The brave folks for the day included Big Bird (B-Bird was delivering
mail and preparing for their trip that they would be leaving on that day),
New Bird and Music Bird, Z-Bird, and a new rider who was a friend of one of
Big Bird's employees. This new rider was Deb. Rumor had it that we would
be meeting Salsa Bird in La Porte and that Ron and Denise Birds would be
meeting us on the way.

We took off and had a great ride to La Porte. It was interesting to meet
with Deb and have Big Bird tell her his stories of many RAGBRAIs gone by.

It was a Flory reunion at La Porte. Salsa Bird had driven there and Ron and
Denise had left Evansdale long after us but made it to LP only a few minutes
after we arrived.

We took off for La Porte. This was the first time that I (Z-Bird) had ever
traveled this far along the route. The trail turned into gravel after we
left McFarland Park. It wasn't too bad.

We made it to Center Point where we were overwhelmed by the size and
quantity of food. Look at the photo and you will see that the large
tenderloin is larger than Big Bird's head - and THAT'S saying something!!!

It was hot today. Probably about 95 degrees. That is the ultimate test for
RAGBRAIers. It's important to drink LOTS of water on days like this.
Otherwise we can become dehydrated and suffer from heat exhaustion. Some of
our riders had some problems with this and had to bag the ride. We are
deeply indebted to Kat Bird who drove down from Cedar Falls to pick them up.

We hit some rain on the way home but it was a good ride.

Perhaps my greatest accomplishment for the day was that I (Z-Bird) made it a
Century ride. I began my day with a 13-mile ride from home. This meant
that I left Cedar Falls at 6:30 AM for the 8:00 ride. After the ride, I
finished by riding my bike, Bertha, back to my humble abode. This actually
accrued to a 105 mile ride in 13.5 hours from door to door. Actually it was
about 9.5 hours of actual riding.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I don't live in Iowa. What's a "tenderloin"?