100 Miles of Nowhere: Liberty Park Division

I know this is posted a bit late but, Paul has been telling me that he was going to psot it. That has not happened obvioulsly. I am so proud of him and want all who are reading this to read about his amazing accomplishment!!!!
I am sure most of you have never heard of 100 Miles of Nowhere, so let me fill you in. 100 Miles of Nowhere is a ride that was set up to allow people all over the world to ride a bike 100 miles to raise money for cancer research. The only catch is your ride is supposed to take you nowhere, some people ride on rollers while others ride a very short course, the event is put on by fatcyclist.com.

Now for the ride report:

Early on in 2011 my mom decided that she wanted to ride the Salt Lake Century as a fifty-something year old cancer survivor. However a few months into her training, she was diagnosed with breast cancer for the second time. This meant that she would be in the middle of her treatments during the ride, and would not be able to do it. A few short days after her diagnoses I was visiting Fatty’s Blog and he had just announced the registration dates for 100 Miles of Nowhere. My first instinct was that only a crazy person would ride 100 Miles and go nowhere, but my second thought was that I should be one of those crazy people and do this ride in honor of my mom.

I picked Liberty Park in Salt Lake City as my official ride location; the outside loop of the park runs a little over a mile, which meant lots and lots of laps. When race day arrived I woke up early in hopes of beating the traffic as Saturdays at the park can get really busy, I started my ride at 6:05am and made the rookie mistake of thinking that sense the weather man said it would be 80 degrees I would be good to go in just my shorts and jersey, and let’s just say it took until about 8:30 for things to finally start warming up.

By 10:00 I had made it over half way through my 100 miles and was feeling strong. As I came around on yet another lap, I was greeted by waves and cheers from my mom and dad. It was a great motivator to have my mom there for a big chunk of the day as I was riding in her honor. One of the best things about riding 100 Miles of Nowhere is that it was easy for friends and family to come by and show support because they knew it would just be a few minutes until I was coming back around the park (thanks everyone who came out). I was even joined for part of the ride by my wife and son, who spent the entire day hanging out at the park and cheering me on.

The last 20 miles of nowhere were definitely a struggle, the combination of having ridden 80+ miles and the traffic at the park picking up, were really starting to get to me. Lucky for me on the last 10 miles my wife and son were right there at the curb cheering me on every time I came around for yet another lap, and I was able to finish strong with a total of 101.1 miles! Of course by finish strong I mean lay down on the grass for a while and wonder if my backside would ever feel the same.