Tour de Cure 2009, Puddin's Version

I new I was in for quite a morning when I woke up at 5:00 to the sounds of heavy rain, thunder and lightning. It's not supposed to storm during the Tour de Cure, I kept telling myself. Oh but it did. I laid in bed awhile longer and then finally got up and got dressed. I filled my Camelback water bag with ice, went over the checklist of stuff, and then started on the 30-mile trip out to Prospect. It poured all the way there, and as I pulled into the parking lot for the event, you could see streaks of lightning in the distance. Yep, lightning. Yet there was still quite a few cyclists there.

I trudged on over to a gigantic tent and turned in my collection envelope and was happy when they told me I was one of the top individual fundraisers ($1260 to be exact). But that happiness quickly faded when I heard a clap of thunder and it started raining harder. I walked back to the Blazer and had a cup of coffee and half of a muffin while listening to the radio, trying to get up-to-date weather info. I walked back over to the tent, and was just in time for an announcement -- the Tour start was going to be delayed at least 30 minutes due to a tornado warning that was for an area that the 60 milers would be travelling through. It was still raining pretty steadily, and I made the Executive Decision to go on back home. If it had been sprinkling, I wouldn't have minded it, but the lightning and tornado warnings were a bit over the top for me. Plus, with the way the drivers here act on the roads when it's raining, it wasn't worth it to risk life and limb riding a bicycle for 20 miles on slick pavement in the rain. As I was leaving the area, there was a steady stream of other cyclists loading their bikes back up and leaving also, so it's not like I was the only one that bailed. Driving back home in the rain, I decided that when I got back to The Compound, I would have my own Tour de Cure.

I still had on my cool Tour de Cure cycling jersey and my black cycling shorts that Mom made for me, and I grabbed my iPod and a bottle of water and rode 10 miles on the recumbent bike in the back bedroom. After a bite to eat and a nice nap, I filled my water bottle, grabbed my helmet and iPod and headed out to the bike path, where just minute ago I completed 19.8 miles, for a grand total of 29.8 miles ridden in my version of the Tour de Cure.