Saturday was the big TA110 bike ride. The route was more or less the same as last year, equally as hard and equally as hot. There are a lot of these types of events, but this is probably one of the harder rides, in that the route is designed to be hilly.

Items of note include the fact that I was apparently in much better condition this year. I made it up every single hill, including the wall of death in Seneca and the never ending stairway to hell on OK-10 north of Grove (last year I had to push up at least 5 or 6 of the hills). Also I shaved an hour and 20 minutes off my previous ride time!

I figure the real reason I was so much faster this year was just that I was wearing spandex shorts. At first I was a bit nervous and awkward about sporting the banana hammock but once I was going I just enjoyed the fact that I didn’t have shorts bunching up everywhere. I kept feeling that people were staring at my junk but in retrospect they were probably just staring at the fact that I was doing the hardest bike ride around on a hybrid trek 7100 retrofitted with race tires.

All in all it was a great ride and I had a lot of fun. These bike events are a blast and I’m very much addicted to them…now I’m looking forward to the Gorilla Century in a couple months. I’m still not quite ready for a full century route, but I can feel it getting closer within reach!

Sometimes I like to spend my lunch breaks looking up old photos and historical things relating to the area. Since the Joplin area was a boomtown around the turn of the century it has a very elaborate and interesting history, much of which is still visible today, particularly in the plethora of extravagant homes found in the older areas of Webb City, Carthage, and Joplin.

Sometimes though, history is as funny as it is interesting and this photo is a prime example of how the perception of something can change if given enough time. What once said “we have the best”, if published today would be an embarrassment.