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2004 Buffalo Run Ride Report 

Saturday - Going to the Rally 

Sunday - Rider's Meeting and Rally

The most frustrating part of this rally is usually the planning stage since it takes so long to map the points. This time the most frustrating thing for us was our physical condition. The Monday before the rally we had just returned from a 11 day trip. We worked all week and had  wedding stuff for a friend Thursday and Friday night. With little sleep rest stockpiled it made the 4am wakeup call tough. Our concentration and coordination were off from the start. it took us over 2hrs to enter in bonuses that would've normally have taken a little over an hour. Still we had hope. With a 1000mile 15000point route plan we took off in the rain. 

Not long after jumping on the freeway Carrie started getting tired. We needed to pull off. As Carrie slept for an hour I tried modifying the route in the gps. This is painfully slow on the streetpilot but I didnt have much else to do. I can never sleep during rallys. I shortened the route to 800miles and it was still in the 13,000+point range. Still pretty good. 

As we made our way to the first bonus south of Sioux Falls, we realized we were just not going to have fun on this rally given our condition. The weather wasn't that great and our moods were in the toilet. The lack of sleep had caught up with us and we judged we could not run this rally safely. We decided to take it easy and get back to Milbank by dark and sleep until Rally checkin. There were plenty of points for rest bonuses and we'd pick up everything we could in between. 

We killed plenty of time dodging storms and Tornado's through South Eastern South Dakota. We stopped and had a sit in meal at a Taco John and spent some time at a winery. Definitely not a rally pace. After another bonus at a mound we hit the freeway gas station to pick up some trinkets off a scavenger hunt style bonus list. We got most of them except and elusive bottle of Black Dog Ale. 

As we left we met a guy in his 50's riding a Kawasaki zx6 with Florida plates. He said he was trying to escape the hurricanes and was headed to Seattle. He asked if he was headed the right way. Yup, just take a left in Sioux Falls. He commented on how the scenery was pretty boring here. I told him he had about 800miles of this to come. He frowned. He followed us to Sioux Falls and I pointed to I90 west. He waved and was off.

We hit Brookings for gas and to find the elusive Black dog Ale bonus. Surely this town would have a liquor store. It did but was closed. Still many gas stations carry beer. We stopped at 4 looking for it. No one had heard of it. (it turns out it hasn't been made in years). Afterwards we went to Webster for a Courthouse photo stop. The storm clouds had rolled in and made getting the Polaroid picture difficult. These cameras are terrible in low light and we didn't want to drive on the sidewalk to get a better shot. Still it was recognizable. 

After our last bonus stop we headed back to Milbank for some sleep. We arrive around 8:30pm and had 3hrs of sleep before checking in. We both slept like logs. After checkin at 12am we spent a few hours telling lies about how hard we road. Hootis arrived with 7minutes to spare but a couple of miles short of 1000miles. Incredibly he took off to get the last miles in and arrived with a minute left.  Our buddy Paul Sundet had planned a similar route but in reverse. He had trouble in the rain on a gravel road and dumped his bike. He made it back but DNF'd by 15minutes.
       

The Results:

In the morning we returned to City limits for scoring and Breakfast. The GLMC folks fed us well on this rally. Carrie and I scored pretty well considering our general lack of miles. If we had been able to complete one of our first 2 planned routes we might have taken home all the marbles but it was not to be. Still we came home with some 3rd place wood. 
 

The Aftermath:

The ride home was uneventful. We played tag with Critter, Deb and Mike Nimz. Mike's back was bothering him so we pulled over at a Dairy Queen for his benefit *cough*. Sure enough they stopped. It was painful routing my Goldwing to a Dairy Queen. How stereotypical.

See Chris Berg's ride report here.

Final Results: GLMC Buffalo Run 2004

Team Newbie Rally Stats  
Miles: 539 Points:2165 Moving Avg:65.6 mph  Overall Average 57.8mph Moving Time: 8:13 Stop Time: 1:06

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Copyright ©1998-2004, Ron Hanson. All rights reserved
Last edited 10/06/2004