Friday, we traveled from Utica to Johnstown.

A strange thing happened while riding out of Utica. Our route had us on a bike path for a while, then we turned left for a short distance on a secondary road before turning right on a main road. It was time to turn the cue sheet over, and I remembered I hadn’t added the Nuun to my water bottle, so I stopped on the secondary road to make adjustments. I heard a big CLUNK. I looked up and all the traffic on the main road seemed to be fine, so I continued with the cue sheet and water bottle. When I was ready to go, I looked behind (I always see what’s coming before I start) and there was a truck on its side with a man pinned underneath and another truck that looked like it had a near miss or possibly a collision. Well that was the clunk (with only one ear, I can’t tell where sounds come from!). While I was there, cops arrived and shut down the road, several ambulances arrived, and big equipment started to arrive (the truck would have to be lifted to free the man and then righted to move it).  I asked about the man pinned under the truck and was told he would be alright. I tried to tell one of the cops that there would be a lot of cyclists coming down the path, but he seemed totally uninterested. (I think he didn’t even know there was a bike path.) I also called and left a message for FANY describing the situation in case they wanted to re-route, but I think the message wasn’t received in time to do much of anything.

We packed up our tent in the rain, but by the time I hit the road, the rain had stopped. It was humid, and it felt like it might rain any time, but it never did.

Friday’s ride was the hardest of this year’s FANY ride. I followed the cue sheet for 75.5 miles and 4645 feet of climb.  I walked parts of six hills and towards the end had to take a lot of breaks. I arrived in Johnstown a little past 6, having been on the road for almost 12 hours.