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I did the Crazy Kicker century too. It was mentioned to me by a friend from PBA (Plano Bicycle Assoc) and I checked the online route map and realized I had done most of the course at one time or another. I figured this could be fun as it was only 100 miles. Many of the brevets I've done out Mineral Wells way use the roads that make up that course. I didn't see any recumbents at the beginning but I arrived in the starting lineup with a minute to spare. Ray Torrey did happen to park right next to me so we chatted long before the ride started. I didn't see him in the crowd, though. I lined up with the hundred mile participants and left with them when the starting gun blasted. I more or less rode the first 40 miles with my friend from PBA although she was faster on the long climbs (such as the 3 Amigos) but what ever ground I lost on the uphills I quickly made up after cresting the tops. She is a fast rider so she attracted guys who wanted to paceline with her. That was fine with me as then I would feel free to ride my own pace. About 5 miles or so from the PK Lake rest stop, I came across another recumbent and it was manned by Mike McDonald. I had never met him before but I'm always interested when I come across another recumbent (if I'm not flying down a hill at that moment). We rode together to the rest stop and he told me about the Carbent he had on order and we chatted about that for awhile. My friend was at the rest stop and while I didn't need food, I did need to put my sunscreen on. After a short search in the brainbag, I determined that the sunsreen was not in there! Dang, that meant I was going to have to do the entire 100 without sunscreen. Right then, I thought I should not dally but should get after it, pace wise and try to finish before lasting damage was done. I decided to leave with Susanne and not wait for Mike. I said goodbye as I needed to press on and we went back out to the main road and resumed the ride. There were two things working against speed at that moment - a mother of an uphill (7%), and headwind. Of course, it wasn't all uphill as we headed for Metcalf Gap - there were some truly awesome downhills too. I took full advantage of those, but did wait for Susanne before each climb. Eventually, she hooked up with more paceline hopefuls and I climbed Metcalf Gap solo and took off down the other side. I was anxious to reach the 2nd rest stop as I would need to replenish my Sustained Energy. Once I did that, I could do the remaining 50 miles without stopping again. Susanne came in and was in a hurry to leave with a couple promising paceline buddies as I was finishing up preparing my bottle. She took off ahead of me but I wasn't particularly concerned. I knew I'd catch up even though it was uphill into the wind. I did catch up too, just before the Apple Pie downhill. The 3 were still working together so I had no problem waving as I went by, round the corner, and plunging down the Apple Pie descent. I knew the rest of the course very well. I flew down 919, hung the left on 3137 and made quick work of getting over to FM4. I knew Cherry Pie Hill was ahead of me but it still felt relatively cool and I had lots of liquid with me, so I skipped the fire station rest stop at Lone Camp and headed for Cherry Pie. I've climbed this on the middle ring but have found the small ring to be the most pleasant as anything prolonged over 8% gradient is better in the granny. Cherry Pie has a couple prolonged sections at 9 to 11%. There were 2 more rest stops - one at Palo Pinto and another at Graford. I skipped them both as the rest of the course to that point is pleasant rollers and downhills. The final 3 obstacles were the repeat of the 3 Amigos. I didn't need granny on these - the incline was 7 to 8% for most of it and my speed was a similar 7 to 8 mph. It felt slow, but I still gained on road bikes ahead of me. I really enjoyed this ride. I consider rides like this to be recumbent friendly - lots of ups and downs are more fun that a straight flat course. I finished up with an 18.5 avg and an elapsed time of 5:40 and showed 4000' of climbing on the Garmin. If you like hills and challenge, this is a good one to try!
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