From Rick Corwine:
"Zero Points is a Perfect Score, Right?"
My rally was pretty simple. There was a mileage award I wanted to bag so I need
big miles and was looking for a sucker bonus that would leave Friday night. The
Rally master obliged with a bonus in Lewistown MT but that was only a bit over
800 miles away and I needed 1793 miles to make my goal. Couple that with the
fact I’d just returned from Hyder through Lewistown. So I plotted a course to
Hells Half Acre 40 miles west of Casper WY, 905 miles one way, perfect. I
planned to ride Friday night to Sioux Falls SD, get a room and about 4 or 5
hours of sleep and take off in the morning for Hells Half Acre. From Sioux Falls
to HHA and back to the start would be 1562 miles. Hmmm I’ve been looking to do a
BBG.
I left the start about 8:30 PM and a soon as I hit I35 south the skies opened
up. So hard that the freeway speeds were down to 40 mph but thankfully it only
lasted a few miles like that. I was in and out of the rain most of the way to
Sioux Falls. I got in around 12:30 AM, a quick shower, check the weather channel
and then lights out.
I awoke at 5:30 AM, packed and headed off for some breakfast. I wanted to eat
before I got my gas and a receipt to start the BBG. This would allow me to eat
“off” the clock at least the BBG portion of my ride. When I went to the gas
station it was closed but with pay the pump open. Swiped my card, pumped my gas,
receipt, yes, see attendant for receipt. Nooooooooo! Damn it! Now my fuel log
bonus is screwed. I zoom over to an ATM and score a receipt that will at least
document the start of the BBG 6:36AM. Finally I’m westbound on I-90. The weather
is still overcast and humid like it could still storm some. The rain holds off
for me and I break through and into a cooler and drier weather pattern. Just
about perfect for a ride. Sunny and 76 degrees! Through the Black Hills then
peel off the interstate at Gillette WY and head south on some nice two lane
roads. I pick up I-25 south to Casper then US-20 west to Hells Half Acre. It’s
closed. But I knew that. So I ride around the jersey barriers and park in front
of the boarded up souvenir shop. I grab my rally towel and Polaroid clicked off
a picture and wrote across the bottom “Lewiston MT, odo 8192, 3:00PM MDT”. Hey
you never know when you might be able to slip one past at the scoring table.
Now all I need to do is get back to Minneapolis. Before I even reach I-90 back
to Gillette I’ve dodged 3 LEOs, what the heck are they doing way out here? I
also manage to miss a bunch of deer and prong horns, all good. A quick sit down
meal in Gillette (a sit down meal for an LD rider is food eaten more than 50
feet from a gas pump) Now it’s just more “sit there, twist that” on I-90 to I-35
then north to the finish.
Things go well, thanks in part to a slight tail wind I can stretch my fuel and
eliminate a gas stop I thought I’d need to make. About 2:30AM I cross the MN/SD
border in and out of some fog. The fog gets worse and worse and in some spots I
need to slow down to around 40-45 mph. I feel the need to relieve myself and pull
off on a lonely exit in southern MN. As soon as I reach the bottom of the exit I
can see that there’s no entrance back onto the freeway! Damn it! I wander around
in the fog on an even more lonely two lane following signage “To East I-90”. I
quickly decide this is fruitless and head back to I-90 and backtrack west to the
last exit and turn around. Now the fog really sucks. Very seldom am I able to
ride faster than 50 mph. I’m thinking this is getting stupid; I’ll either hit
something in this fog or be hit by something. I finally pull off an exit
somewhere thinking that this could be the end of the BBG for me. Just then a car
pulls onto the entrance back onto I-90. Someone to follow! I know this isn’t a
real good solution, I could just follow this guy off a cliff for all I know but
it beats sitting on the side of the road. I follow this car for about 25 miles
until he turns off in Worthington. But now the fog is breaking up and
progressively gets better and better. Whew! Last gas in Albert Lea and head
north on I-35 as the sun begins to rise. Exit 86 for Lakeville and stop at the
quickie-gas, receipt sez 5:58AM, cool. The finish is just around the corner and
I wheel in and park the bike. I get a couple hand shakes and “you made its” from
some of the early arriving volunteers. I find a grassy spot and crash. In the
last 48 hours I’ve only slept a bit over 4 hours and worked an 8 hour day then
rode 1,819 miles. Needless to say I could use a nap.
I got zero points, but it was perfect. It was exactly what I
wanted out of this rally. I got the miles to get my Ray Bentdahl award and I was
able to test myself on a BBG without getting a real good nights sleep before
hand, just the kind of thing I'll need to do at the end of the Butt-Lite this
year. Perfect!