My wife, Becky, is off on RAGBRAI this week. This is 50th year they’ve had the event and the 19th year Becky has done it. Only skipping 2020 when they only had a virtual ride (lame) because of the pandemic.
RAGBRAI stands for Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. It was started by the Register newspaper in Des Moines and has grown to a huge event with international participation.
The year before she started riding RAGBRAI, Becky did the Heartland AIDSRide, which was a fundraiser. She got sponsors and then road from Minneapolis/St. Paul to Chicago across Wisconsin. That was the last year for that ride. It wasn’t raising enough money to make it worthwhile. She started looking for something similar and ended up settling on RAGBRAI. She’s gone every year they’ve had it since.
She drove to the east side of Iowa, to the ending town, last Friday and camped that night. She got up Saturday morning and got on a bus at 6:00am that took her to the starting town on the west side of Iowa. Sunday was the first day of the ride and this Saturday will be the last. There’s usually a big party the night of the last day, but Becky isn’t interested. She’ll get off the bike, load her stuff in her car, and head home… a 5-6 hour drive…
Yesterday was particular brutal for her, since it was the longest day of this year’s ride, at 86 miles, and the hottest so far, at 98 degrees. Some of you know that I’m also on Twitter, so I had to jump into this climate alarmist’s response thread with Becky’s “vacation”. If you can’t open the link, the original post said sitting outside in the shade when it is over 90 degrees is deadly. The first response was, “Arizonians say, ‘Hold my beer.’ ” My response to that is to the right.
She also sent me this picture, which I used to follow up the first one.
She does meet up with a lot of interesting characters! The event is known as the biggest party on two wheels, but the range of riders is huge. There is generally a beer garden set up in the first town each morning and for some, that sets the tone for the day. There are all ages and in some cases whole families. Some people ride a little and then take the SAG wagon. Some persevere (Like Becky) and ride the whole thing no matter how long it takes. (She’s gotten in close to dark a few times.) Then she’s talked about a few hard core bikers that get up in the morning, ride to the end town, back to the beginning town, and then back to the end town each day, riding each day’s route three times!
I am often asked why I don’t do this with her, and my two standard responses are either, “Because I’m not Crazy!” or “Pigs haven’t flown yet…”. While I could maybe, potentially, possibly, see myself getting into shape for the ride, I’ve never been a camper. After a day of that much exertion, I can’t imagine sleeping on the ground that night. Which is pretty much the standard option. On average, they expect around 30,000+ riders and since they try to stay off the main roads, that’s like 30,000 people descending on small towns like Plymouth for a night. Kind of like one night of the Blueberry Festival. Those towns mostly have to shut down, but on the bright side, all of the service groups get their fundraising covered for the year, by selling pies (RAGBRAI is known for pies) and having Church suppers with lasagna or chicken & noodles or some other high carb, easy to make in mass meal. Becky says sleeping on the ground is never a problem for her, because she’s tired enough to sleep anywhere. The biggest issue for her is setting up the tent at night when she’s tired, and breaking camp in the morning… when she’s still tired…
Four more days of this and she’ll head home. She’ll sleep most of Sunday and be up and off to work Monday morning, with a few sore muscles and some interesting tan lines.
If you’re interested in daily reports, I have an email chain I send out with pictures and updates. Just send me your address and I’ll add you there. Be sure to congratulate Becky if you see her. Or confirm that you agree she’s crazy! Ha!
For those of you that don’t know, RAGBRAI is an annual 7 day bike ride across the state of Iowa. It’s not a race, but more of an adventure/challenge. 10,000 riders are pulled from a lottery to participate each year, dipping their tire in the Missouri River on the west side of Iowa to start and finally in the Mississippi River on the east side of Iowa at the end. They estimate as many as 20,000 additional riders are on the road any given day. RAGBRAI stands for the Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa.
Becky (my wife) has been doing RAGBRAI for nearly two decades. (Our Sister-in-Law Toni has been doing it with her for at least 10 years.) Becky & Toni train (less and less every year) throughout the Spring. The ride is always the last week of July. Generally that means it’s hot in Iowa, but since they camp every night, sometimes that’s cold. Generally the shortest days are 40-50 miles while there are longer days of 70-90 miles. For those that want an additional challenge, they usually have at least one day where they add a loop that makes it a Century Day, i.e. over 100 miles. This year the mileage total for the week was around 460 miles.
Becky and Toni leave for Iowa on the Friday before the ride. They camp the first night in the ending town and then board a bus Saturday morning to ride across the state to the starting town. They camp Saturday night and the ride starts on Sunday. A charter truck moves their tent, luggage, etc. to each day’s ending town where they pick it up, set up tents and camp for the night. This year the last day was long and they didn’t get in until after 6. There are all kinds of ending festivities, but at that point they just want to get home and usually just hit the road.
If this interests you at all, there are posts at Becky’s website, Berger Audiology, where she has recounted some of the trip highlights along with pictures from along the way. Look for the blog titled Bergerology Blog on the ribbon under the logo.
I included her first post from the first day below:
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My sister-in-law Toni and I headed out for RAGBRAI today around 12:30 pm today. We had a few setbacks that lengthened the trip, but overall it was uneventful. We have gotten stuck in traffic in Chicago almost every year, so we decided to go cross country this time, since the start was farther south in Iowa. As it turned out, that put us on a lot of county roads, so we really didn’t make any better time. I drove and the Jeep isn’t the smoothest ride!
We had to get my bike carrier modified (Thanks Burt’s Body Shop), because both of our new bikes have frames that are too small for the carrier as it was made. There aren’t many options for Jeep bike carriers, so it was good that we could “fix” it. That seemed to work well for us. We both like the newer bikes (Mine from last year and Toni’s from a year or so ago), though I’ve been struggling to find a saddle that works for me. I’ve also been having some issues with my left wrist and Toni is still having some shoulder issues, so this trip could be more challenging.
Becky is off for RAGBRAI 2012. She drove to the east side of Iowa today. She’ll camp tonight in Clinton, catch a bus to Sioux Center on the west side tomorrow and start the 500+/- mile ride back on Sunday. Seven days of biking (the shortest day is 42 miles, the longest is 104 miles, if she does the Karras Century Loop), tent camping, cold showers, Port-a-Potties and fair food. Yeehaw!
Not my thing, but I think this will be the 10th year she’s done it. Our sister-in-law, Toni, will be going with her. This must be Toni’s 5th or 6th time. Apparently this sickness is contagious, but you have to be someone susceptible!
Becky rode nearly 1300 miles in preparation this year. Sometimes that’s down around 1000 and sometimes as high as 1800. Wish her luck! It would take more than luck for me to accomplish what she has.
Becky usually emails me or calls me once or twice a day and generally I reformat that into an update email blast that I send out to anyone interested. Let me know if you want to be on the list for the updates.