Ride distance: 53 miles; ride time: 2:19; cumulative distance: 1744 miles; average speed: 23 mph; calories: 3597; ascent: 348 feet; descent: 636 feet. We started the day with a delicious and hearty breakfast provided by our host church, the United Methodist Church, in Page. A mentally handicapped young man on his 3-wheeled bik
e led the riders out of town. Once we got to the highway, we headed east with the wind at our backs. Zack, Arek, Paul Bayfield and I took full advantage of the tailwind and averaged 28.5 mph for the first 13 miles. We got quite a bit ahead of the rest of the group so after about 28 miles of riding, we waited for the others to catch up. Two of the men passed us by and didn’t stop. We found out later that the reason they passed us was for “character building”. We couldn’t follow them immediately because we had chairs and a mattress pad from the van which had gone back to check on the rest of the riders. About ten minutes later, the van came back, collected the chairs and we began our pursuit. We finally caught up with the two men after about 40 miles into the trip and passed them by with pizzazz and our own bit of “character building”. It was all good fun and we elicited howls of laughter by some antics which I won’t mention. I had shot my wad in the pursuit, so for the first time in the trip, I dropped behind the young guys. Oh well, there’s always this week when I can attempt to reestablish my somewhat tarnished reputation. We arrived in Fargo before lunch and went to the beautiful city park on the Red River. We had lunch and spent the afternoon there. Some of us rode back into town for ice cream and another group went to the mall. At about 6 o’clock, we had a chicken barbecue in the park hosted by the Red River Youth for Christ. Dennis, the YFC director, provided all the food including the chickens which he had raised on his farm. It rained during dinner and grew cold but luckily for us, we were under a picnic shelter. Some of us warmed our hands over the coals after dinner. At 7 p.m., we made a presentation about our ride to the host families and YFC supporters that had come. After the presentation, we rode our bikes back to the YFC office in downtown Fargo to store our bikes for the weekend.
e led the riders out of town. Once we got to the highway, we headed east with the wind at our backs. Zack, Arek, Paul Bayfield and I took full advantage of the tailwind and averaged 28.5 mph for the first 13 miles. We got quite a bit ahead of the rest of the group so after about 28 miles of riding, we waited for the others to catch up. Two of the men passed us by and didn’t stop. We found out later that the reason they passed us was for “character building”. We couldn’t follow them immediately because we had chairs and a mattress pad from the van which had gone back to check on the rest of the riders. About ten minutes later, the van came back, collected the chairs and we began our pursuit. We finally caught up with the two men after about 40 miles into the trip and passed them by with pizzazz and our own bit of “character building”. It was all good fun and we elicited howls of laughter by some antics which I won’t mention. I had shot my wad in the pursuit, so for the first time in the trip, I dropped behind the young guys. Oh well, there’s always this week when I can attempt to reestablish my somewhat tarnished reputation. We arrived in Fargo before lunch and went to the beautiful city park on the Red River. We had lunch and spent the afternoon there. Some of us rode back into town for ice cream and another group went to the mall. At about 6 o’clock, we had a chicken barbecue in the park hosted by the Red River Youth for Christ. Dennis, the YFC director, provided all the food including the chickens which he had raised on his farm. It rained during dinner and grew cold but luckily for us, we were under a picnic shelter. Some of us warmed our hands over the coals after dinner. At 7 p.m., we made a presentation about our ride to the host families and YFC supporters that had come. After the presentation, we rode our bikes back to the YFC office in downtown Fargo to store our bikes for the weekend. 
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