Day 6: What a Wild Ride it has Been

Editor’s Note: Tim Case is cruising into the Midwest portion of the Race Across America. This is a solo bike race that will have him cross the United States in about 10 days. He left Oceanside, Calif., Sunday morning and had completed 1,503.9 miles by 1:45 a.m. Saturday, passing through Platt, Kan., on his way to to Colwich, Kan. His rested team was finally able to give a full update today. Tim is riding for Team Strong Heart to raise money and awareness for Camp Odayin, which is dedicated to serving children with severe heart problems.

Let me tell you, 36 hours straight turned into 48 hours straight of working beside Tim. I was a non-functioning human being, but now I have had 5 hours of sleep and a big cup of coffee.

A lot has happened since our last full update. Unfortunately, we lost two of our crewmembers. We had to make decision. Basically there was just a conflict of interest in the goals and the needs of Tim. This was for his benefit; we just allowed those crewmembers to move on.

It was kind of a mutual thing, and Tim was OK with the choice. Needless to say, we had to quickly change the course. Again.

We are down to four crewmembers, and it’s working out well.

Before I go onto the real time updates, I must tell you more about Tim’s medical issues. Tim was really struggling because these saddle sores were really bad. This was near Taos, two days ago. Because of the saddle sores, he was getting this horrid knee pain on the right. He couldn’t really do a real down struck. He had these two injuries going on, and he was in so much pain because he could only pedal three strokes and then he had to coast.

This came at the worst time. We had this amazing tail wind. Everyone was taking advantage of it, going 25 to 30 miles an hour. But because of Tim’s pain, he couldn’t.

We were close to calling it quits. We figured it was worth our time to stop and figure something out for his bike. Looking in the car, I thought, “oh my god, my massage table, the face of the table—it’s a doughnut.”

We basically put the face cradle on top of his seat saddle so we completely take all the pressure away from his saddle sore. We were all hysterical. His knee pain has almost gone away. Since then Tim has gained a ton of time. We have eliminated all medical issues.

He is starting to gain time on all the racers.

Our big adventure today was in Platt, Kan. This guy at the McDonald’s gives you what ever you want for free. He wants to support the RAAM.

It was really cute. Tim pulls in the middle of the night. He had his big sweater on. He ate. Ooh boy, he ate. He ordered two breakfast wraps and the deluxe platter with pancakes, eggs and a large OJ.

When we pulled into McDonald’s, everybody was jealous of our seat. We also put egg crates near his handlebars so he can just lay there in comfort. I’ll send pictures soon.

At the McDonald’s, we got advice on the sleeping thing from Danny, the RAAM historian. We were about to get a hotel room, and Danny asked us to take his hotel room. We all got to sleep—it was so nice and generous.

Because of the medical issues being gone, he is on the bike more during the day, so he can sleep more at night, up to 3 or 4 hours.

We are strong now. Tim is strong. We are going to get in 7 hours early of the cut off at the Mississippi River.

Tim’s whole attitude since we alleviated the pain is different. He is a racer now.

We are in this 100 percent.

He is heading toward time station 26. We are ahead of him by about two hours. He is with the crew behind us.

We just passed Sedgwick Fire Department (Tim’s a Boulder firefighter). Tim’s going to be rolling through there in two hours; they are going to roll out the engines and do a little parade for him.

That’s going to motivate him.

He is excited to show people what he can do.

That’s it for now. I’ll update you guys tomorrow.

—Michelle Pearl, Tim’s girlfriend and crew member. Dictated to Jacob Harkins.

Other Posts:
Some thoughts from Tim
The Finish
Day 11 1/2
Day 11
Day 9
Day 8
Day 7
Day 6
Day 5
Day 4
Day 3
Day 2
Day 1