I'm guessing this was Dennis...
...as he was the only other recumbent I saw all day!
My experience was a bit different, doing the 74 miler. I started out with a group of GDBers, and within a few miles found myself at the head of a pack of ~75-100 people, heading down the road at 20-22mph...
This lasted until we got to the "mountain," a fairly lengthy climb at mile 17, where I backed off and let the whole group pass, since I planned to stop at the next rest stop.
Having let that group go, most of the rest of the day was solo riding, with the roads changing every few miles from smooth asphalt with rumble cuts to nasty chipseal... The "Mountain" was the only significant climb of the day - very flat route, overall.
Had two flats around mile 35, both due to having to ride on the shoulder of the highway, where I picked up some leftover retread wire...
Rest stops were unremarkable, although friendly. Wine samples were at the 57 RS, which was fun... Then when we got back to Greenville, they routed us along the service road a few extra miles, just to mess with us (to make it 74 miles). I finished around 1:15, with an average just under 17mph. Like Dennis said, there wasn't much going on at the finish line....
Don't think I'll do this one again... too much chipseal and busy highway shoulder riding. But, it was a good distance warmup for BDB100 next weekend.
PB