Lo-tuh-juh!

The starting line...

Ok, ok so I finally get to brag about my amazing husband!!! I am a little late and behind others posting about it but I have been super busy with my student teaching so this is better late than never! So anyway back to my amzingly, awesome husband Dave. Ever since Dave volunteered for Lotoja (the bike race from Logan to Jackson Hole being 206 miles in length and to be completed all in one day) a few years back he had made it a goal of his to be one of those bikers to finish the long and treacherous ride. Well this last Saturday, September 6th, he was able to check it off on his list of things he'd like to accomplish! I am so so proud of him. I can't say it enough. As well as completing the race, he surpassed his and all of our expectations. His goal was to just finish the race and before dark in order to place but he, as stated above, surpassed that goal and finished 2 hours before dark. He was going so fast that his support crew (Brittany, Cris and I) missed him at one of his stops and barely made it to his next stop to get him fed. We were stressed the whole way to that last stop because we passed rider after rider and we couldn't find Dave until about 7 miles to the stop. About a mile out from that stop there was a traffic jam and Dave passed us while we were trying to get into the parking lot. It was crazy but we had a lot of laughs about it. There were quite a few mishaps like that the whole day and I just laughed them off. I had to keep saying, "I'll do better next year." It was a really fun experience. Dave left the starting line at 7:37 am and crossed the finish line at 6:37 pm with a time of 11:00:35.029 (thats down to the miliseconds!). His average speed was 19.3 mph. He finished 10th in his class out of 49 and 444 out of about 1200 riders which doesn't seem that super until you know that it was his first bike race EVER and obviously his first time doing the Lotoja, so yes pretty amazing I would say!
This was the last stretch of the race. Only 47 miles to go!

Dave learned the quickly in the race about the advantages of drafting.

So along with the many things that didn't go as planned in the day. I was supposed to receive a text from the timing people when Dave was 5 miles from the finish line. Well I didn't and by the time we heard Dave's name being read riding into the finish line we didn't have enough time to get the video camera going and the picture I took was of a guy standing in the way of my view of Dave so this is the video I got after he crossed the finish line.

Our plan was to camp in Jackson but due to a broken down car that was towed to Idaho Falls we had to migrate to Idaho Falls for the night. I think it was better for Dave and I because we weren't prepared enough for the cold night in Jackson. We are so grateful to all of you who were such great support in Dave's first Lotoja experience. Thanks for all the sacrifices that were made ie. money, cars, yards being postponed, money, oh and money:) and everything else that I failed to list that was sacrificed. We love you all!!!

The Fowers are out!

This was on the drive home and I thought it was so adorable!