PRAIN in the Rain

By John Bassett

I believe one of the key ingredients to getting people to volunteer to work the BBC’s RAIN event is to provide a pre-do, or re-do, of the event so that those volunteers also get to participate as a rider.  This is something of a tradition and has gone by various names including, most recently, the BRAIN (Before RAIN) ride.  For various reasons, BRAIN did not happen this year.  However, a few individuals in the club expressed interest in a Post RAIN (PRAIN) ride, and I set about trying to get that organized.  In consultation with interested parties, a Saturday, September 1 date was set.  This was Plan A.

Plan A went awry when Hurricane Isaac moved into the area late last week.  We reset the date to September 3 (Labor Day) hoping to get behind the worst of the weather.  This became Plan B.  Unfortunately, we lost a couple of riders due to the date change but added Dana Marsh who had the day off.  After drenching rains on Sunday morning and some consternation over the advisability of a cross-state bike ride through a near-stationary tropical storm, a group of five riders, Jim Schroeder, Jen Miers, Laurence Kohler, Paul Toth, and John Bassett headed over to Terre Haute Sunday evening.  Stan Ellis and Dana deferred on a decision to ride until early Monday morning.  This became Plan C.

Monday morning in Terre Haute was dark, gloomy, and excessively humid - but at least the pavement was dry.  Rain chances were 60%, with thunderstorm potential, and a constant east headwind.  After a quick breakfast we headed to the start at the intersection of St. Mary of the Woods Road and US 150.  In the spirit of the event we put out an official RAIN traffic cone to mark the starting line.  We began at 7:43 AM, about as early as daylight conditions would allow.

My goal for the first part of the ride (before lunch) was to make sensible pedal strokes and to burn as few matches as possible.  The five of us worked as a group, alternating pulls, to the first designed rest stop at US 231 (38 miles).  The ladies got out ahead at this point following Jen’s ‘minimal-stop’ ride strategy.  The guys did not object to this since we were having difficulty with Laurence’s furious pace at the head of the line, anyway.

Meanwhile, Stan and Dana had decided to try it.  They started in the middle of the route near Southport Road and SR 37, rode the route backwards until encountering the Terre Haute group, then joined for the ride to Richmond.  The meeting point came near Stilesville on US 40.  We welcomed their additional help with the headwind.  Dana reported that the route from SR 37 to Stilesville was totally in the rain and lamented the fact that her shoes overflowed with water and made a lot of squishy noise.  This was PRAIN in the Rain.

We pretty much rode as a group of seven from Plainfield, along Camby Road, and across Highways 67 and 37 to our designated lunch stop at a Subway (Mile 79) at the intersection of Southport Road and Bluff Road.  The ladies opted to do a minimal ‘snack-and-go’ and got on down the road.  We wondered if we would see them again before Richmond, but lunch sure did hit the spot.  Here are the guys ready to go after chowing down.

The weather improved slightly on the southeast side of Indianapolis as the four guys kept a pretty brisk pace into an east headwind.  We nixed an optional stop at New Palestine and decided to press on to Casey’s at US 40 at Greenfield (Mile 111).  We got there just in time to see the ladies saddling up and heading off to Dunreith.  I was able to stay with Stan and Paul until Mile 126 at the grade just east of Knightstown.  The legs just did not respond to that hill.  The last 30 miles of this ride can be a real test of will.  The road is flat and should have been fast, but fatigue, a battering east wind, and blowing rain frustrated progress.  Various pains came and went, but soon Centerville appeared on the horizon (Mile 155) announcing an imminent finish in Richmond less than 5 miles ahead.

Pat Toth and Susan Bassett arrived at the official Earlham finish line ahead of us and set out our orange cone to mark the official finish.  Here is Dana admiring the cone at the conclusion of her second state crossing this year!

There was even an official medal presentation.  Here are our hard-working Jim and Jen accepting their medals.  RAIN could not have been done without them.

Laurence (above, right) enjoyed her medal by biting it Olympian style.  This was her longest ride ever, and she did a fantastic job battling the wind.

Comparing notes at the finish, it was apparent that all of the ladies had done the entire 159.6 mile RAIN route, which included a construction detour on US 40.  On the other hand, all of the guys blew through the construction zone and used no detour.  There is probably a life lesson here somewhere.  Here is an ad hoc comparison of the RAIN and PRAIN in the Rain events.

Criteria	RAIN	PRAIN in the Rain
Distance	159.6 miles (with detour)	159.6 (ladies route) 156.9 (guys route)
Riders	About 1,500	7
Riders Completing	1,216	7
Weather	Hot Dry Headwind	Cloudy Tropical Storm System Same Headwind
SAG Support	Optional	Provided
Rest Stops	Provided	Optional
Orange cones at Start / Finish Line	Yes	Yes (0ne)
Medal Ceremony	Yes	You Bet !

On a personal note, I missed my best finish time by 3 minutes, which was a little disappointing.  But, considering the day-long headwind, a good average pace of 16.7 mph, and the fact that I felt very good at the end, I am not going to complain.  I got to spend the day with some good friends, and can’t complain about that either.  The GPS totaled right at 157 miles and a surprising 3,210 feet of climbing.  I had burned an estimated 8,400 calories which is significantly more than I had for lunch.

So, don’t be thinking you will miss a legendary ride if you volunteer for RAIN next year.  Despite the weather, this was a great substitute, complete with personal SAG support provided by Pat Toth and Susan Bassett.  We are all gratefully indebted to these ladies for making this a great ride.