Trans Iowa V10: Thoughts On The Roads

From this year's course.

One of my main concerns now is how the roads are coming out after this brutal Winter weather we've experienced. I must say that so far, the conditions have exceeded my expectations.

Three weeks ago we had maximum snow cover and we were experiencing the worst sub-zero temperatures of the season. Now- only three weeks later- the snow is almost completely melted. That in itself is pretty amazing.While things are looking great from that standpoint, there still is something else that will shape the outcome that has not happened as of yet.

That is the frost, which hasn't "come out" yet.

For those of you that may not understand, when Winter comes, it freezes the ground at the surface and for some depth below that. Generally speaking, that is usually about 4-5 feet down on any average Winter. However; it is estimated that the "frost" depths this year are twice that of normal. That will take  a while for the heat and energy of the Sun to "draw it out" of the ground. When it does this, we may see some spectacular road damage occur.

Minor frost damage as evidenced in the center of this road

Imagine a detachment of subterranean B-17's bombing the roads from underneath, and you might begin to understand "frost boils" and "frost heaves". These anomalies occur as frost is trying to melt, and water is pushed upward to the surface. This sometimes "boils" the ground into a fluffy texture, or it may manifest itself as a pocket of oozing mud. We had severe cases of this during T.I.v4 and again on T.I.v6.

Right now the roads look primo, and are fast and riding great. I've had reports of some county maintenance in the form of dump truck loads of fresh gravel. Holding out hope, if we do not see a tremendous amount of frost damage, and/or the weather holds out, and doesn't prevent maintenance, we may see an early start to the fresh gravel season. That would be a better situation than last year, which was pretty much smack dab in the midst of fresh gravel being put out.

Of course, this was the weekend when we had first planned to check the cues, but due to circumstances, and wanting to wait out the frost, we postponed it until our second choice, April 12th.  Hopefully by then we can see what sort of roads we will have on tap for T.I.V10.