Day 3: Shippensburg, PA to Bedford, PA

• Distance: 38.11 mi (shuttled ~30 miles)
• Elevation: 4,360 ft
• Dedication: My great aunt, Carol Krush
• Ride group: Jake, Bethany, Rose, and Collin
• Host: Bedford Presbyterian Church

After how bad I felt on the climbs yesterday I was really dreading the ride today, given this elevation profile:

But, it ended up being a pretty awesome day! I had a great ride group and we absolutely crushed the hills. We were the third group to roll out from the host (who sent us off with a crazy amount of food– thank you so much, Memorial Lutheran!!!) but ended up being the first group to reach the first water stopand held that position for the rest of the day. I was very proud of myself and my team, dubbed “The Swift Climbers” due to our reliance on Taylor Swift to get us up the first mountain, for totally powering through all of the climbs we got to. We didn’t have to stop at all on the way up and had very little walking– I didn’t really have to walk at all! I do attribute our lack of stops to Bethany, who said if she stopped she wouldn’t start again… so we just kept chugging along.

Unfortunately the rest of the day was a bit of a logistical nightmare. Our ride groups got very spread out because of the terrain and we didn’t have cell service, so the water van drivers had to do a lot of running back and forth to set up food and water stations and go pick up riders who needed to be shuttled. And, of course, it started raining right around the time we rolled into the post-mountains water stop. We were set up under this neat silo/shed situation though, so we stayed pretty dry.

The rain let up after a while and Jake, Collin, Rose, and I headed out again, but the rain picked up again shortly thereafter and it was a true downpour. We hit a bunch of short climbs, which weren’t too bad but felt pretty awful after sitting for so long at the rest stop. After a few miles we hit gravel, which is awful for road bikes. Our tires were big enough to not go fishtailing through it but the pieces of gravel looked sharp so we opted to walk through to avoid flats. During that time the water van passed us and then called us a few minutes later to tell us that the gravel would last a while, so we opted to rack our bikes and get shuttled past the gravel.

THEN we got a call that one of our teammates, Bailey, had a medical emergency and had to be taken to the hospital. At that point we decided to call it for the team. Conditions were miserable, the roads were getting slick, and it was just a tough day all around. But, we all made it to the host safe and sound (eventually, and despite feeling like MJay was going to kill us all driving on twisty roads in the pouring rain) and I am feeling so, so proud of what this team accomplished today.

We’re currently chilling at the Bedford Presbyterian Church, where we were blessed with a great dinner, showers at the local middle school, and LAUNDRY!!! I’ve been shoving a bag of wet clothes in my duffle each morning so I had never been happier to see a dryer. There was one more hiccup in the day though– Jake shut his finger in the door of the car that took us to showers and he’s definitely going to lose a fingernail. After dinner a few of us went out to a local bar for a few minutes to celebrate getting through a very eventful day.

Here’s hoping we see some flatter roads, sunny skies, and no emergency rooms tomorrow!

Until then,

Lauren