NHRA News: New Years Day leaves Baze and Dunn feeling stronger (1/1/2004)

New Years Day leaves Baze and Dunn feeling stronger

By Rob Geiger, NHRA.com
1/1/2004

The aches and pains of 500-plus miles on a bicycle seem to be melting away as Whit Bazemore and Mike Dunn continue the Gator Hell Week bike trip across Central and South Florida. With five of eight consecutive days of 100-mile rides in the books, both men report that they're feeling good and have every intention of finishing the event.

Thursday's leg was highlighted by a small but ambitious group of NHRA drag racing fans who found Bazemore and Dunn along the route to offer them words of support.

As scheduled, Thursday's ride took the cyclists from the beach to Disneyworld. They departed Daytona Beach Shores and stayed on the Atlantic seaboard to New Smyrna Beach before heading southwest to Sanford for lunch beside scenic Lake Monroe. After refueling, the pack once again encountered elevation changes with some small hills and the backside of Sugarloaf Mountain, which again took its toll on the riders. After a few grueling climbs it was all downhill to the Orlando suburb of Winter Garden where they'll rest for the evening.

Some fans boosted Dunn (left) and Bazemore's morale with this impromptu paint job on their car.

This leg was just a few tenths under 100 miles at 99.6 miles, which pushes their five-day total to an amazing 514 miles.

As they have throughout the journey, Bazemore and Dunn have reported in to NHRA.com so readers can follow their progress.

Baze and Dunn's Hell Week: Day 5
Bazemore: We're feeling really good. Today, the bike was my friend. The last 30-40 miles of yesterday's ride got us over the hump, so to speak, and we've been strong ever since.

We rode with two really good riders today, Nick Gerlich and Dave Beugler, and they kept us on a really fast paceline the whole day. We stayed between 20-25 mph the entire time so it was fast for us. We also had a little tailwind, which was nice, and we stayed with them because it felt good.

Olympic gold medalest Marty Nothstein got a view of Bazemore's "office" at the Reading event.

Seeing Sugarloaf Mountain again was tough. I didn't change my gearing and it was a struggle. It's not very long but it is steep. I'd like to come back next week after resting and do that hill five times and I'd feel a lot better about how I handled it then I do right now. We had 486 miles in our legs when we got there today. That's a lot.

I did have some personal motivation knowing it was January 1st. My buddy Marty [Nothstein, U.S. Olympic gold medalist in cycling] told me the other day that he always rides a century [100 miles] on New Years Day so that he'd be with us in spirit. The thing is he lives in Reading, Pa., so I asked him what he does if it's snowing. He said he'd still do it on his [indoor] trainer. That was motivating us a little today. I thought about him and knew he was with us. Of course, riding 100 miles is nothing to him.

NHRA fan Bob Cole took this photo of Bazemore and Dunn, third and fourth in line, respectively, as they cruised by Lake Monroe with a small group of riders.

The ride is brutal. It's all about pain and suffering. A deal like this is about two extremes. When you're riding well and enjoying yourself and your body feels good it's one of the best feelings you'll ever have. But when you're suffering and having a bad day on the bike and you look down and you still have 40 miles to go, it's one of the most unpleasant things in the world.

We had some really great fans find us today and that was awesome. About 20 miles in we had a brief stop and we came across this couple who were waiting on us. They had "Matco" and "ESPN" written in shoe polish on the back of their car. Then on the other side they had "John Force Racing" with a slash through it. Then at lunch this other guy showed up and had a burger with us. How cool is that?

We encourage everyone on the route to come on out and give us a shout. The encouragement really helps.

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