The perfect ending

Distance: 105km

We successfully pulled ourselves out of bed to get an early start and enjoyed riding in the relative cool temperature for a couple of hours.

Despite the flat terrain and good condition of the road (most of the time) I was finding it hard to keep up with Sam. He seemed to fly along the roads while I felt like I worked for each kilometre we travelled.

The heat seems to be getting worse each day, which is apparently what happens as the Thais wait for the wet season to begin. Songkran marks the start of the wet season so we've been told to expect it at any time. For now though, we continue to push on through the heat, drinking copious amounts of water and electrolytes as well as the occasional soft drink.

When we arrived in Khon Kaen in the mid afternoon we were both exhausted from riding in the heat. The first hotel we spotted, we stopped at, and decided to stay even though it was a bit more expensive, almost double ($26) of what we'd been paying on average. We justified it though because it had a pool, breakfast, was clean and quiet, and had English TV channels - and lots of them!

As I was flicking channels I came across coverage of a womens bike race in Belgium, and we excitedly realised that they were showing the race Cadel was going to try and win that day. We went and got some food and came back ready to watch the race.

We were so tired, but it was great to sit in the air-con comfort and watch Cadel beat Contador to convincingly win the race. I realised that if Cadel can find the strength going up that insanely steep hill, I can push on a bit harder in the coming days.