MS 150 Bike Ride - Best Dam Ride ever!

Special MS 150 Installment
Factoids:
• Distance rode: 143.69 miles over two days
• Average speed: 16 mph on Saturday, 14 mph on Sunday
• Number of riders: 3,000
• Money raised: Over 1.5 million!
Well, the MS 150 is behind us now, and it’s time for my account of Cassie’s and my adventures.
As is common for all events in Utah, our story begins with food. Since we left SLC for Logan a little after 5:00 PM, we naturally decided to stop someplace for our carb-loading supper. We chose to go to the Golden Phoenix, a Chinese restaurant on State Street, where we partook of most excellent chicken chowmein (noodlecarbs) and salt baked squid. They bake their squid with jalapeno peppers, which makes for a very intense flavor. Yum!
It would be pretty easy to say that everything was anticlimactic after that, but it would be a lie. True, we got stuck in traffic heading north, but it only lasted for so long. We got to the Logan Fairgrounds around 7:00 and found where Jane Santora had set up our team’s camp site. Team Dogmeat consisted of me, Cassie, Jane and Steve Santora, Jacques D’Astous and a couple of people I only saw briefly Saturday night. Steve and Jacques are surgeons at Shriners (Jacques was Cassie’s surgeon when she had her spine surgery). We set up our tent and sat around waiting for Jacques and Steve to arrive. Steve had spent the previous week at a mandolin camp in California and Jacques picked him up at the airport.
Saturday morning came all too soon. I don’t think I fell asleep until about 3:00 AM. There was a street light shining through our tent, and with the noise of 3,000 people camping nearby, I found it hard to get to sleep. (Funny, I had no problem sleeping - C) Regardless, we were up at 6:00 when we grabbed a bagel & muffin breakfast, got the bikes ready, and hit the road a little after 7:00. Jacques rode with Cassie and me as we headed on a 75-mile loop that went West and North of Logan. In fact, we actually ventured into Idaho for several miles.
The weather was beautiful. NO WIND! The temperature was probably in the low 70’s to start, and not a cloud in the sky. NO WIND! It was a pretty casual ride—we averaged 16 mph over the 75 miles. NO WIND! The MS people had rest stops set up about every 10 miles where you could refill water bottles and get some snacky food stuff. I was a little concerned because they seemed to only have fruit (apples, bananas, oranges), granola bars and fruit snacks. All too sweet for me to stomach. I managed to get by till lunch where they had ham and cheese sandwiches and chips (salt, m-m-m-m-m). At the last rest stop of the day, with 9 miles to go, they finally had cheese and peanut butter crackers and (shudder) tasty Slim Jims! I did okay.
Saturday’s ride was mostly flats. There were only a few smallish hills as we rode along the East bench of the mountains, as we turned South. It looked very much like pictures of (to be said with a French accent) Provence – only without the vineyards and gothic churches. Just beautiful! NO WIND! Jane and Steve broke a chain on their tandem bike along there somewhere and we stopped to help them. After that, Jacques rode with them.
The last nine miles, Cassie let me ride at my own pace, around 18 mph. It was nice to stretch out and go! (he makes it sound like 16 mph is a slow pace! I say it's a perfectly respectable clip for the distance we were doing - C) I even overtook the other three about a mile short of the fairgrounds. Cassie really wasn’t far behind.
After the ride, we all changed out of our riding togs, went over to the Logan Public Swimming Pool for a quick shower and rested up a bit. At 3:00 a live band started playing and we went over for supper (lasagna and salad) around 6:00. After supper, the MS people presented awards and had a raffle. Steve bought all of us raffle tickets. Cassie and I had no cash with us. The grand prize was a $4,000 Specialized road bike. Cassie and I would have really liked that, I can tell you. We didn’t win.
Cassie and I went over to the pool where there was an MS pool party. It felt good to just float around in the water. We went down one of the water slides once, but the water was ice-cold. You never saw so many funny tans and sunburns as at that pool party. Everybody had some kind of biker’s tan either on their legs, backs or arms. Or like me, all three places.
When we got back to camp, Jacques and Steve were practicing on their mandolins and gave a mini concert. Very pleasant. We sat around and talked till 10:00, and turned in. I had put the rain fly on the tent to block out most of the outside light, and I slept much better.
Sunday dawned much like Saturday. They served pancakes, scrambled eggs and hash browns for breakfast. Very good. We hopped on our bikes and took off.
The consensus of our team was that we weren’t going to do the whole 75 miles. There was a nice place where you could cut off about 15 miles. Sunday’s ride promised a lot of hills, so we were okay with cutting it short. As we approached the first rest stop, we rounded a corner and ran smack dab into a steep hill. I didn’t gear down so it was a strain to get up it. Rude. As we approached the canyon that goes up to Hardware Ranch, we encountered some nasty winds. There was a bit of South wind trying to knock us over and a canyon wind trying to stop us. The bottom of the canyon had some steep pitches, so it was a struggle the first three or four miles. But the canyon went on for 14 and most of it was fairly gentle and very scenic. The road follows a fishing stream and is flanked by high squared-ff mountains. And everything was very green.
I reached the rest stop at the top of the canyon first, then Jacques. I rode back down till I met Cassie, then rode back up with her. We had a ripping good time going down, although I would say the going up was harder than the downhill was easy. Unfortunately, as we exited the canyon there was a big ol’ stinkin’ hill we had to go up and over. I would say that was the steepest, longest slope we had to ride! Not fun. After that we only encountered small gentle hills, but the heat got hotter and Cassie kinda ran out of gas (that's implying that I had much to begin with. I was riding pretty poorly all day. But I finished the thing! - C). But we got back to the Fairgrounds in good time, packed up and headed home.