June | 2013 | Steve Tilford

I woke up yesterday feeling bad. And it got worse. I finally have to admit that I’m sick. It all started a couple days ago when I was on a longer ride and a bug flew into my ear. I wasn’t exactly positive whether it left. The rest of the ride the thing felt like it was still in there. When I got home, my throat on that side was scratchy and sore-ish. I really didn’t have any way to see if the buy was there. I gently tried to rinse my ear out, but nothing came out. Then, the big storm came through and I wasn’t feeling that well when I woke up at 3 am.

Flash forward to now and I’m totally clogged up. A super head cold, sinus infection or something. It felt like allergies initially, plus the bug, now I have to concede that I’m just sick. It’s a drag.

I was planning on going down to Oklahoma City and racing today and tomorrow. But, I’d think that those races aren’t happening. I don’t know if you watched the weather channel yesterday, but that town got walloped for hours yesterday by a giant thunderstorm. Tornadoes, heavy rain, hail, you name it, they got it. And it kept going for hours. Just heard from Facebook that the OKC Pro-Am is happening. Man, that is impressive.

I did go to the doctor and get some sub lingual drops for allergies. I tried these years ago and they didn’t work, but I’m game for trying just about anything at this point. I’m pretty positive that allergies play a big part on whether I can train and race bikes at my best, so I need to try to keep on top of them.

I thinking about driving to Emporia to watch the finish of the Dirty Kanza 200 mile gravel race. I think someone will ride less than 12 hours this year, so I’d have to leave early afternoon. I know a ton of people riding, many from out of state, so it would be fun. I’ll just have to remember not to shake anyone’s hands.

Riding-wise, I felt like shit yesterday. I’m just going to go out and ride an hour and a half, everyday, easy, until I feel better. It has never worked out that resting or just sitting around helps me feel better any quicker. Hopefully it will pass quick and I can have something for Tulsa Tough next weekend.

Allergy drops for the first couple weeks. It is diluted and then gets stronger as you use more.

I’d been eating a bunch of honey recently. I think it is false advertising on the bottom of the container.

This is the radar over OKC most of the even/night yesterday.

This pile of hail was still in my front yard at noon yesterday.

I took this photo in Oklahoma, driving back from Austin a few weeks ago.

This was on the Weather Channel last night. Guess they didn’t get out of the way of the tornado.

I rode for a couple hours yesterday and then drove the hour down to the finish of the Dirty Kanza. It has become a famous 200 mile gravel road race, through the Flint Hills of Kansas. We got down there with about an hour to spare before Dan Hughes, the winner, came rolling in. Dan owns Sunflower Bicycle Shop in Lawrence and has won this event 4 times now, I believe.

I was surprised how fresh Dan looked when he got to the finish. Let me tell you, it was super windy, probably more so out on some of those Flint Hills, and after riding a little over 12 hours, I would look like hell I assume.

This race has been going on for over a decade. Jim Cummins and Joel Dyke started it and it has grown ever since. The downtown mainstreet of Emporia Kansas was closed down after 4 pm and then the street party began.

Anyway, I just went down to experience some of the flavor of the event, plus support a great local event. I didn’t hang around long enough to see Tom Schuler and Lindsey finish on the high dollar, carbon, Calfee tandem or Keith Walberg roll in. Plus, many others. I wanted to, but have been feeling pretty shitty for two days now, so headed home to hang with the sicky, Bromont. He is super slow and tired from surgery and all the weird surroundings at the vet school.

I’ve been taking sudafed to keep my sinuses from draining into my lungs. It works, but makes my head all dry and feel weird. I didn’t feel nearly as bad riding yesterday as two days ago, so maybe this will just be a bump.

Here are some photos from the evening.