Monday, May 13, 2013

I'm glad to announce that RAAM shouldn't have any road construction to muddle through in the Bloomington area, finally!  The only concern I see is aggravated motorists on the IN 45-46 four lane bypass around the Indiana University Campus.  The reason being is that there is now a 10 foot bike/pedestrian asphalt path beside it. So, riders and crew may get yelled at to use that!  But, it's summer time and most of the university traffic will be non-existent.  

YoHo's General Store in Solsberry (IN-43) is back in business in a huge way.  In the past the dilapidated general store was just a meeting place for all the farmers in the area.  Mr. Yoho always had gatorade, cokes, and candy bars around for his clients and all the area bicyclists.  He also had YooHoo drink, naturally, and a visitor could gather a lot of history based on some of the remaining sale items hanging around from forty to fifty years ago.  Mr. Yoho passed away about a year ago, and the Cook Foundation, a major philanthropy organization of Southern Indiana, has completely renovated it, while still trying to keep its old charm.

Mr. Yoho always talked fondly of "those bikers racing across the USA with crews of doctors and nurses measuring stuff on the racers."  I'm not sure of what he thought of seeing Jure Robic's Slovenian Army crew with their traditional music blaring, very similar to scenes from the movie Red Dawn  (Sidenote: Robic bypassed Solsberry illegally in the most controversial RAAM ever).  Nevertheless,  RAAM gave him lots of stories to tell all his old cronies around the pot belly stove the past few years before his death. 

I'm still at CVS at 510 South College Mall Rd, so the time station will still be there awaiting all the RAAM riders.  Our goal as always is be available for the racers and crews from the first participant to the last participant.  And, the world famous leader board will be here, too.

Dave Tanner won't be crewing this year but will be assisting me at Time Station #39.  Also, we have a blog: ts38bloomingtonin.blogspot.com