Groove Armada - "Super Stylin'"

Enter in the dance, Plug it in and we begin
Crowd up in the center, they watch (be dibidim)
Watch the way we drop it in a mix timing
Rise and amplifying when we come in with the swing
Just following the back an naturally harmonizing
Climb into position wit synchronized things
Live from out the ghetto, We maximizing
Sound of the Groove Armada, We Super styling
We Super styling...[2x]

- Groove Armada - "Super Stylin'"

Kindersley to Outlook – 154 kilometers

I was on Galley Duty so was up and out of my tent knee-deep in breakfast preparation (watching everyone else working while I tried to wake up) by about 6am. It’s amazing how early people get up – I thought I’d be one of the first at 6am but there were already a few people with their tents down and lathering the peanut butter on their slices of whole wheat bread..! Scottish John was working on his specialty – oatmeal. The perfect ballast for the longest day of biking yet..! We all spend a lot of time reminiscing about the ‘good old days’ when we thought a long day was about 85 kilometers..!

Brendan, Andrew and Ian, my partners in crime, headed back out to Tim Hortons for an early morning coffee post breakfast leaving me to clean up with my Galley Crew. They were sweethearts and didn’t completely abandon me as came back about 45 minutes later to help with the loading of the bags so I could get out earlier and join them for the day to perfect our pace line technique and travel as a team. Again, everyone was a bit nervous about the weather – post storm jitters still play a large factor in determining our pace. Brendan has now taken on the role of ‘The Weatherman’ thanks to a strategically bookmarked page on his Blackberry (those who know BC know his affinity for the weather forecast) and everyone consults with him prior to packing their gear for the day. The forecast was especially favorable – north west winds (blowing south east) and at about 10 km / hour. I prayed that the Canadian forecasting is more reliable than the BBC forecasting in the UK..! We were on the road again at around 8:30am and fell into our paceline the second we got onto the smooth shoulder of the Number 7 highway out of Kindersley and enroute to Rosetown.

Again, the pace line did not fail to deliver. The pace we were taking is perfect – start slow in the morning at an easy 25 kms / hour and then steadily increasing in speed up to about 30 - 35 kms / hour. We stop every 20 kms or so for a ‘butt break’ / ‘pee break’ / ‘food break’ / ‘photo break’ to get off our saddles, explore some local ditches (or cemeteries in today’s case!) and indulge in peanuts and bread. As this is our second proper day of drafting we are getting used to each others habits and signals and routine. The rotation is also getting smoother from the lead person through to the last person in the draft. We are a stylish, slick and suave bunch of cyclists..!

We drafted through to Rosetown which was 85 kilometers from Kindersley. We had high hopes for Rosetown in terms of diners and restaurants – and instead found a local convenience store / gas station and indulged in some beef jerkey, ‘nuts and bolts’ and the usual 1 litre of chocolate milk which we devoured sat on the curb of the parking lot. Whilst there were no restaurants there were 2 John Deere dealerships and one Case dealership selling a giant herd of combine harvesters. I could not abandon my rural roots and immediately pulled into the dealership and gave Ian a quick lesson in ‘how a combine works’. It’s nice to feel so ‘at home’ in an environment so near yet so far..! I’ve noticed that most prairie towns are built up around a grain elevator or around machinery dealerships. A coffee shop with free refills of coffee and an AM radio station is guaranteed to be nearby full of weathered farmers wearing faded blue jeans, john deere caps and big leather boots scouring the local paper for the weather reports and grain prices.

We pulled onto Highway 11 out of Rosetown and were immediately met with a road bikers dream come true (I know that I’m turning into a ‘hard core’ as I could actually feel heart palipitations over a piece of road…) – smooth, rubble free tarmac, no traffic, a straight long road AND a tail wind!!!! Rather than taking the pace line formation we decided to ‘go nuts’ and took on ‘born free’ personas, racing down the middle of the road whooping with happiness and seeing how fast the wind would carry us with the least amount of effort. It was fantastic and such an exhilarating feeling. The last time I felt this way was on Day 3 when we hit the downhill off of the Coquihalla – but the beauty of this particular road was that it was flat and still could provide the same rush of adrenaline, aided and abetted by a wonderful tail wind. We raced along taking a few breaks to take in the amazingly flat scenery, photograph the fields of canola and wheat, look at old barns, chat about the tailwind and how lucky we were to have this ultimate weather luxury. There were a few puffy clouds in the clear blue sky and the sun shone like a giant golden disc above our heads. It was bliss.

The road stayed smooth and even for the ride into Outlook. Brendan shot off like a rabbit about 15kms from Outlook on an impromptu race with Andrew against "The French Connection" whilst Ian and I continued on at a comfortable 35 kms / hour to meet up with Ross who had pulled into a field for a food break. The final 20 kms into Outlook went smoothly and we pulled into the campsite at around 4pm. It was a lovely campsite with huge showers and was overlooking the South Saskatchewan River Valley. It was strange to have a huge river valley in the middle of the flat prairie landscape but the views were spectacular.

A fabulous dinner was served by the Galley Crew – a rich and creamy pasta dish which I ate far too much of. Andrew dragged me out of my tent at around 8pm to head down to the Golf Course for a drink with the gang. It was a struggle to crawl out of my tent but well worth the effort. We sat outside on a lovely patio overlooking the greens and had a beer and caught up on the day. It was good fun and laughs were had by all. Yeo (who we suspect is a mole from the French Connection) was due to join Brendan, Andrew and I on our journey the following day. It’s nice to have the opportunity to bike with everyone. It had been a long but enjoyable day and I was happy to be safe and sound in my tent an hour or so later after having witnessed a lovely sunset over the South Saskatchewan River.