Day 37 -- Crawfordsville, IN to Indianapolis, IN

Miles: 69.01
Total Miles: 2798.86
Time: 4:34
Average Speed: 15.1 mph
Max Speed: 33.7 mph
Flats Today: 0
Total Flats: 14
Elevation Gain: 1185 ft
Weather: Low wind around 90 degrees
Today was crazy with all of the things we had to do and all of the pictures we had to take. It was the second most number of pictures that we've taken in one day on this trip. We took 67 pictures today, and some people might wonder what's in Indiana to take that many pictures of, and they'll soon find out. We woke up at 6:00, ate breakfast at the hotel at 6:30, loaded at 7:30, then began our adventure. It started out like a normal day except we were riding with Phil in the front of the pack. We rode with the fast guys all the way to the first sag stop, then immediately upon arrival, we rushed to the bathroom. After that we quickly ate some food, then we got out of the sag stop... first. We were the first one's out of the sag stop for the first time EVER. We usually stay about 20 minutes longer than everyone, but since we knew that today had a bunch of stuff to do, we changed our ways. We rode about 3 miles past the sag stop and came to the bicycle factory. Wade actually raced Phil to one of the lights, and I think Wade won. The factory turned out to be more of a airplane parts factory, but there was a section of bicycles. It wasn't much, but the bikes were all custom made and very nice. We took some photos, then moved on.

We road very fast with Phil for the next 10 miles all the way into a park. Just before the park was the Indianapolis Colts' training facility. We didn't take any pictures, but we realized that the team was probably there while we passed by. The staff gave us 5 dollars to get into the park, and we road through it to the other side as part of our route. It was a very nice park with a lot of shade, which felt great because of the hot day. Wade got some pictures while he was riding, but we didn't stop to take any photos. After the park, we were already into Indianapolis, but it was just the edge, and our hotel was downtown. We rode about 3 miles through town, then we came upon an experience of a lifetime. We rode along side of the Indianapolis Speedway, and it went on forever. Once we finally reached the other side of it, there was an information desk and we found out where to go to see the track. They directed us to a museum that didn't really have anything to see. All of the other riders went into the museum, but we decided not to.

We road past the museum and continued onto a path that brought us back behind the bleachers and right up next to the press box. We knew we weren't supposed to be back there, but we kept on going. We found some other path that brought us in front of the bleachers and right up to the track. We had already taken about 20 pictures by this time, but it just kept getting better. Once we got past a few bleachers, we turned around and got some great pictures of the length of the straight-away. We kept going around a path and it followed right next to pit row, then it curved around the infield and got close to the banked turns. At one point there was a fence that was only about 4 feet tall that we could have easily lifted our bikes over and rode on the real track, but we decided we were already breaking the rules enough. We kept riding around the curvy road through the infield, then it went into the garage section by some semi-trucks. The trucks were already there for the Brickyard 400, so we took some pictures near some of the NASCAR trucks. Once we got out of the garage area, we headed back to the museum. When we were about 100 yards from the museum, one of the officials spotted us, stopped us, and told us we weren't allowed back there... We were so busted. The guy wasn't angry, and we played dumb, which was easy for Wade, so he didn't really make a big deal about it.

About 5 miles further along our route, we came to a Velodrome. For those of you who don't know, a velodrome is a small circular race track just for bicycles. It's banked at a 28 percent grade for really fast riding on the curves, and the center part of the track is more flat for slower riders. We got to ride on the velodrome for as long as we wanted, and as high onto the curves as we wanted. I obviously rode on the slow rider bottom section, but Wade went all out and went really fast so he could get up on the highest part of the banks. I eventually made my way up a little bit higher, but it was hard work to stay up there because you had to keep a really fast pace in order to not fall down the slope. We had Adella take pictures of us and a video of us riding. I doubt we'll be able to get the video on the blog, but the pictures turned out pretty good.

After that we rode the next couple miles to our hotel, but we had to stop at the NCAA hall of fame and the NCAA headquarters to take a picture there. Once we were done with those, we got to ride along the river. The river walk was very nice and it had some funny statues to take photos by, so we did. We didn't get too lost on our way through there, and we eventually found our hotel. When we got the the hotel, we met Joan and Marla. It was the first time we had seen them since we left in June, so it was very special to see them again. I missed them both a lot, and out of all of the exciting things today, that was the best.