Marty Hamilton's Ride Report MTF  50CC/100CCC Iron Butt Association Ride

About 1630 Al (Carey) and I hook up with the fellows from Arizona who also will do the 50CC.  Actually they plan a 100CCC returning to San Diego from Jacksonville, FL with a bunch of riders doing an East to West 50CC.  Very nice people and it is a treat to meet folk from one’s Internet experience and find them more pleasant and sociable than expected.  Al and I leave for our second corner and complete the requirements uneventfully.  We head for bed about 2000, as we are to meet our 50CC witnesses at 0145 in the morning.

 Day 4.  50CC Start 

We get our paperwork signed and dash off at 0200 as planned.  The others have departed about 15 minutes ahead of us.  It is cool, about 55 degrees.  It gets colder as we ascend through the mountains.  The descent is flat out scary.  High wind gusts, tight corners, and trucks where you would prefer they not be.  The ST does not like sudden gusts of wind from the side so I drive conservatively till we get down.  Then I whack the throttle and build a moving average of just above the speed limit.  I’ve calculated we need to maintain a 60mph moving average to have enough time for fuel stops and 6 to 8 hours rest along the way. 

The sun is coming up as we reach our first fuel stop in Arizona.  We blast on and stop once the temperature raises above the get some clothing off level.  Once stripped of cold weather gear we proceed at speeds suffiecient to maintain our moving average as we can assume the cities ahead of us and traffic will eat into our rest time.  The daytime temperatures seem to be around 85 to 90.  Not bad.  I’m drinking lots of fluid and that really helps the endurance.

Things are going well until Al declares Bingo fuel in El Paso.  I take a wrong exit and we are downtown where gas stations don’t exist. Not good – it eats up about 40 minutes getting out of there and back onto the freeway for a real gas stop.  After that we just deal with the construction and traffic until that thins out and we can make up some time.  I notice that Al is losing speed, and well into our approach to San Antonio I lose sight of him altogether.  I pull into our scheduled fuel stop and wait for him.  He said he was sleepy and had pulled over for a short stretch.  He didn’t have much sleep after his 1200 mile straight through ride to San Diego so I locate a rest sop 50 miles ahead on the GPS and we pull in there so he can sleep for 30 minutes.  I’m not tired but try to nap anyway.  30 minutes later Al is good to go and now I’m not.

A couple hundred miles on and we notice a big thunderstorm ahead.  Lots of lightening and the wind is picking up smartly.  I didn’t like pounding through those last year in the daytime and don’t like the prospect of dealing with this at night while also looking for the famous Texas hill country deer.  We decide to take a few hours sleep at the Iron Butt Motel (Rest area picnic table top) and let the storm pass, as it seems it will.  The Sheriff who checks us out agrees with the plan noting the rain is hideous ahead and there have been an accident due to rain and wind.  He rides bikes so I tell him to go get his and join us – guy actually looked like he was considering it for a moment.

We get moving after about 3 hours and it seemed the storm had passed until we got to the top of a rise.  Unfortunately it just passed to a location farther ahead of us – at least it is close to daylight.  We did see tons of deer and highway blood smears from deer victims in the remaining hill country we pass through, so feel we made the right decision. 

After San Antonio we stopped for food and pressed for Houston in the rain.  The rain became more intense with each mile covered and the wind picked up considerably.  Horizon is black.  All hell breaks loose as we get to Houston.  Traffic, worst downpour I have ever ridden in, and I’m unsure if it is wiser to take the toll loop or got through the middle.  I opt for the latter and we hit a time eating traffic jam caused by the rain.  Once through the worst of that the car drivers just go nuts and speed through the flooded downtown freeway sending giant rooster tails of water at the ST and me.  Trucks raise the pucker factor exponentially and I discover the joys of high speed motorcycle aquaplaning.

Navigating lane exchanges becomes a nightmare – it is hard to see things like signs - and my soaking radar detector decides everything is a laser hit.  Thankfully it just drowns out altogether. The idiotic alerts were driving me crazy. My little AM/FM radio drowns, and I can’t reach Al on our FRS communications link.  I get fully into my vowels when a young woman in a purple car decides it is my day to die. 

Had I not raced bikes as a young guy I probably would not have made it. She cut me off within inches of contact and I instinctively jammed the bars to escape, which I barely did, but that induced a magnificent drift that I instinctively steered into and added some throttle to.  After gliding across a couple of lanes without hitting anybody I was able to straighten it out into an enormous puddle in the high-speed lane.  Had I hit that a bit sideways… The front wheel of the ST felt very light as it must have been aquaplaning and I let my grip go soft on the bars and eased off the gas.  Made it!  Mental note to self: Change underpants soonest!

Al and I met at a rest stop outside town.  He almost got to taste a tire tread as it unwrapped from an 18-wheeler he was passing and his AM/FM radio got washed off his tank bag by some surf produced by another 18 wheeler.  2 very luck guys – enjoying every moment but it cost us a lot of time.

We essentially just drove on through high wind and torrential rain and dealt with lunatic drivers and more trucks that I have ever seen in one place. I notice some car drivers who pass us look us over and just shake their heads.  I figure we are the ones having fun and give them thumbs up.  Our pace however is slower for safety reasons and maybe because the Houston adrenaline was wearing off and we are eating time.

Somewhere into Louisiana we pull in for some fuel and food.  I calculate we still have time left to make the 50CC goal and have a rest in Pensacola as planned if we keep up our current pace.  Things are still looking good.  It is a grand adventure!

A half hour or so back on the freeway after our fuel stop and we stop moving.  Everything is jammed up. Pissing rain. Windy. Cold. Stopped.  I’m guessing a wreck somewhere ahead.  We wait an hour, then another one.  I chat with people who are interested in what we are up to and we all wait till the LEOs and the meat wagon drivers sort out the mess.  Finally we get diverted around it and get back into the ride but the weather is nasty and we are almost into a no margin ride as the result.  30 minutes more and we encounter another margin consuming stoppage.  I pull over and calculate we now cannot make the goal of Jacksonville by 0700 in the morning with two remaining fuel stops if we travel at legal speeds.  Going faster in these conditions, in the night when tired, would be risky.  I had no idea where the weather stopped being an issue as my radio was drowned but it seemed it was headed for Jacksonville too.  I decided we should quit if the traffic didn’t pick up soon.  It didn’t.  I was pissed.

On reflection I concluded Al and I might have been in that fatal accident that blocked the freeway for so long if we hadn’t stopped for food when we did.  The second stop was caused by an elderly couple’s car that caught fire and completely burned.  We met them at the motel we stopped at.  They told us a bearing replacement job had been done poorly and grease had leaked onto the brakes and ignited.  After that the brake fluid caught fire and it was game over for them.  More of a tragedy than not making it across country in under 50 hours and I ask if we can help them out.  The offer is declined.

On the Weather Channel I saw what we had been through.  It rained 5.9 inches in Houston and the storm cell was huge and indeed headed for Florida.

Al and I will get it done in another attempt maybe this year.  Great ride regardless!