Wednesday July 17:  Buffalo, New York to Canandaigua, New York
Distance:  89.8 miles
Total time:  8 hours 30 minutes
Riding time:  6 hours 34 minutes

Remember all those days when I talked about the glorious weather, the Run in the Sun, and an hour of rain over 40 cycling days?  And I always prefaced my remarks by saying that I knew we'd eventually be punished.  Today we were punished.

The day started dark and dreary, and there was a certain sense of foreboding as we got ready to leave the hotel.  The sky looked like this.

Everyone went about their morning preparations silently, and paying close attention to stowing rain gear.  Here are Jamie, Leonard and Michael as they prepare to roll out.

Here is Jake putting air in Doug's tires.

And here is Ray pumping up his tires.  Hey Ray, that flower arrangement is beautiful but it's going to be very awkward to cycle with it.

Sure enough the rains came at about the 20 mile mark, and lingered off and on, but mostly on, until about 70 miles.  The rain itself is one thing.  It makes the road slippery, and more dangerous; it limits visibility of both cyclists and motorists, making cycling more dangerous; and it's uncomfortable.  We had to decide whether to wear rain gear or not.  If you don't, you're soaked through with the rain.  If you do, the rain gear makes you sweat profusely.  I chose to wear the gear and sweat.

But the worst part of the rain on this day is that it caused a profusion of punctures.  The group had about 30 - more than double our previous record - and I had five.  Zach from Spokane was the day's leader with six.  How does rain cause flat tires?  Normally as you bike down a dry road, most rocks, pebbles and other small obstacles don't stick to your tires.  But when the tire is wet, and the small obstacles are wet, they stick to the tire.  As the tire rotates over the road, the small objects work their nefarious way into the tire and eventually through the tire and into the tube.  Puncture.

Each group suffered about equally from flat tires today.  We Three Amigos had eight, including my five.  Stopping to fix them probably cost us about 75 minutes.  In addition I had chain issues and gearing issues, and others also had minor mechanical problems.  All in all, probably our most frustrating day on the road, if not the most challenging physically.   This picture gives you an idea of what it was like out there.  Note the wet road, stream of water, soaked rider, and prostrate bicycles.  That was our day today.

As usual, the high point of the day was stopping for a civilized lunch.  Here is Michael in his signature pose, holding a root beer float.  This was his first of the day, at least that I'm aware of.   That's Zach in green - Zach of the six punctures, and Jamie to the left of the picture.

We picked up a new rider in Buffalo - Ned from Charleston, South Carolina.  Tomorrow I'll rub his helmet for luck - on his first ride today he was one of only three riders who didn't get a single flat tire.  Well begun Ned.

We passed another important milestone today.  We've covered about 3,380 miles so far, meaning that we  have fewer than 500 miles to go.  Six more days of cycling until we dip our wheels in the Atlantic Ocean.  Tomorrow is a relatively short day, about 70 miles, so if the weather cooperates it will be a good day to recovery from today's rain and puncture pain.