Day 0, Seattle, 06/19/20

Tomorrow is the day! Picked up the tandem at the Speedy Reedy bike shop today, and took it for a test ride. Everything worked perfectly. Thanks to Speedy Reedy for putting it back together, and thanks to Nate in GR for all the work he put into our bike getting it ready for the trip.

We biked up a one mile long 13% grade. At the end, we felt we could have climbed more. Made us feel more confident. Tomorrow we will cycle 95 miles I think. The organizers characterize tomorrows ride as a "difficult day." We will ride on bike trails, city streets, mountain roads, I-90 (Yikes!), and suburban roads. There is one section where many trees had fallen across the road. The highway department has cleared one lane through the area. It's wide enough for a car, but not for one of our support trucks. We will also have a twelve mile long uphill. Best as I can tell from the cue sheet, this http://www.mapmyride.com/routes/view/38152508/ is the route we take. I-90 between exits 54 and 62 does not allow bikes, so we will be shuttled past this area. Are we doing 95 miles, or 8 miles less?

Don't really know, but I suspect our pedaling mileage will be more like 87. It's 8:30. I am both tired and excited, so excited I don't feel sleepy. We have packed and repacked our bags many times, discarding this and that so as to take only what we really need. (I hope.) Our alarm is set for 5 AM. We load our gear on the truck at 6 AM, eat breakfast from 6:15 to 6:45, and have opening ceremonies -

ALA higher ups will tell us what a nice job we did, and we will present them with a check for around $200K - around 7:00. Then at about 7:30 PDT we will get on our bikes and begin the ride. Thank you all for your support, both emotional and financial. We would not be here without your help.