It all started 4am sat. april 28th,we had to get off work early fri eve.Bill came in to fill in at the shop.Drove the Escort with 150,000 miles on odo to Decorah, meeting at 7oclk we got there 2mins late , got our race packet with 70 other riders these packets included our first 10 pages of instructions (cue sheets) which laid out the first 130 miles which we needed to finish by 6pm,the ride started in the dark,it was quite a sight after about 45mins we looked back what seemed miles of headlights could be seen,and in front of us many flashy tail lights.I started in tights and long sleeved baselayer camelback long fingered gloves and froze,temps in the bottoms were 15d cooler,our feet were cold ears,hands and core temps were going down.Then the sun came up lights got shut off and we forgot about being cold.As time and miles went by the temps kept going up,Mark said to me take those tights and sleeves off your making me hot so we did a quick pit stop then continued on.Temps went from aboout 35 to upper 80’s on Marks speedo.We had a great day for riding the winds for the most part pushed us the gravel mostly was dry,now when covering that many miles on gravel one notices how many different types of surfaces there are some good some ok some very loose dangerous,we hit 38 mph on downs with brakes on trying to keep it under control.