Day 14, Rest day, Billings, MT

Billings is a large and beautiful city of 200,000 people, about 25% of the population of the entire state. The town was founded by, and is named after Frederick Billings, who was president of the Northern Pacific Railway from 1879 to 1881. I assume he did some other stuff in his life to merit the statue on Montana Street that was erected in his honor in 1993. Apparently, "HIS FORESIGHT AND KEEN BUSINESS MIND RESULTED IN THE ESTABLISHMENT OF BILLINGS - THE MAGIC CITY - WHERE IT IS TODAY." So sayeth the plaque on the statue.

We are again staying in a dorm, this time at Montana State University. No air conditioning, but they do rent fans for $3. Margaret got one before they ran out. Free laundry again, so all our clothes now smell as though we eat with forks and belong in polite society.

Synopsis of our rides since last rest day. Mileage is according to our bike computer, and varies from the published miles due to impromptu explorations (getting lost) and equipment disagreements.
6/29/11 - Missoula to Avon: miles 101.45, total climb 3471 feet.
6/30/11 - Avon to Townsend: miles 61.86, total climb 2080 feet. (Including one Tour de France category 2 climb.)
7/01/11 - Townsend to Harlowton: miles 101.38, total climb 3422 feet. (Including one cat 3 and one cat 4 climb in the first 28 miles.)
7/02/11 - Harlowton to Billings: miles 92.54, total climb 1171 feet.
That's a total of 357 miles and 10,144 feet of climbing in the last four days, and a total of 868 miles since we began. (I'm too tired right now to figure out total climbing feet since 6/20.) The best part about this is that we feel really great. We pushed the last 20 miles of our ride into Billings despite the heat. I/we really are confident in our souls that we will do this ride and do it with pleasure.

What we have not been able to do is decide whether the road is ascending, or descending, and by how much. There was a down hill into Odessa on day 3. We were unsure whether we should coast or continue to pedal. We decided to try coasting even though the hill didn't look like much. We reached 37 mph. On day 8, Thompson Falls to Missoula, there was a 15 mile up hill that began around mile 60 that we perceived as flat, or even down hill. Drove us/me crazy that we could not move the bike at a proper speed. Later a fellow rider who is equipped with a Garmin GPS informed us we were going up a 2% grade the whole time.

We have decided to modify our riding to accommodate this lack of perception. Margaret and I will continue to put effort into moving the bike according to our capacities of the the moment, and the bike will go however fast it goes. We tried that approach the first day out of Missoula, and it worked better than we had hoped. If we are going only 10 mph, we must be going up hill, even if we can't see the hill. Certainly takes the pressure off.

Short day tomorrow, 56 miles to Hardin, but it is 11:52 and I need to go to bed.