Yesterday, Vince, Ryan and myself departed on a proposed ride that sounded….well, it sounded like we weren’t actually going to finish it. 131 miles: riding the gateway group ride that leaves Saturday mornings at 10am over the top of Carter Lake, down the backside and heading north to Hwy 34 - Big Thompson Canyon. From there we would ride up to Estes Park (elev. 7,522) through Drake (elev. 7,700). Grab an espresso in Estes and a quick bite, then head down St. Vrain Canyon to the Peak to Peak Hwy south, which would take us through Raymond and on to the small town of Ward at 9,450 ft. Total climbing? Who knows, best bring some food though.
The morning started off pretty standard issue. The group ride gobbled up small packs of riders as we rolled down Hwy 36. AND I think it wasn’t until we were heading into Lyons that we were honked at - amazing. Taylor Kneuven and I rolled up to the front after passing through Lyons onto Hwy 66 heading East. Enjoying a nice chat about how Brad is strong headed (he better win multiple events down in NM at the collegiate opener for the Rocky Mountain conference by the way). We caught the Horizon Dairy (formerly known as Wild Oats) team ride and they assimilated into the all-consuming blob known as the Gateway ride. This created a blob of epic proportions - I’d say 90 riders in total. As we kept tempo on the front in a mild crosswind, the group started to stretch into the traffic lane on 66, which made the day for passing vehicles testing the stamina of their horns. It only got worse as we got closer to Carter Lake…
The organization and discipline of the ride usually goes to hell when we turn left off of 66 away from Hygiene. While attempting to coordinate a left turn of 90 riders across a hwy, the blob consumed the entire road for a half minute. More of the same as we headed towards Carter Lake. Except today Tyler said I had a nice pedal stroke - how great is that. Back to the ride…
Over the top of Carter we picked up Fred from VeloNews and Mike from Jelly Belly and headed north to 34, then East up to Estes. The ride through Drake was one of the most peaceful I’ve had in a while. Nice conversation, very little wind, almost no traffic, plenty of laughs and a nice pace. Fred has tons of energy and keeps us laughing while Mike is swerving around banging into whoever he’s riding next to at the time. He says he’s doing it on purpose, but we all know he has rum mixed with the coke in his bottles.
We get over the pass into Estes with a solid headwind. I dropped my Clif Bar wrapper and it was blown back down the climb 200 meters, “Hold on guys, I’ll get it.” (Note to self: picking up a blowing wrapper going downhill with one foot clipped in is really difficult. Don’t drop wrappers)
It was balmy in Estes at about 4.5 hours into our ride when we stopped at Kind Coffee. Burrito, small americano, and 2 gatorades should do the trick. Fred bails on the route from Estes to Ward and heads down 36 while Mike stops in the middle of a turn lane on main street, phone in hand, calling Fred to see where he is as a car honks at him. Mike is actually a good rider, I’m just giving him crap - hey it was funny.
Hamity takes us up some random residential street that’s like a 14% grade to nowhere. Thanks. I can already tell I’m entering the valley of the shadow of death after stopping and destroying a veggie burrito, which is still digesting. Mike turns around to go catch Fred when he sees it’s 30 miles to Ward from Estes of mostly climbing at 7-8,000 ft elevation, citing his training plan doesn’t call for that much riding. Probably a good decision. Soon after, I went to the dark side. Like Froto (sp?) putting the ring on his finger - everything turning dark and on fire. Hamity and Vince are riding about 30 meters up the road in front of me and I’m convinced the bearing in my currently non-functioning powertap has gone bad - resulting in significant friction, the true reason I’m going slow up this climb. But no, I was just going slow. I even had Hamity try riding my bike around when we stopped to pee - “Ya man, no problems here.” Oh ok.
I finally pulled off the ring about 15 minutes into the climb from the junction of Peak to Peak and St. Vrain canyon towards Ward. I told myself 5 times that I needed to turn around because my body just couldn’t do it. I physically could - not - ride - to - Ward. As the euro’s say in a bad accent, “It is not possible.” Instead of turning around and going down to Lyons, I just started pounding my too-sweet gatorade from the coffee shop. Amazing. Soon I was feeling good and setting pace for the three of us on peak to peak - where did this come from? Not sure, but I like it. Vince was in the hurt locker on the last 15-20 minutes to Ward. Mild headwind with the sun cresting the mountains to the west added a sense of urgency to our pace. And yes, we made it to Ward. I even went for a city limit sprint and decided to stop pedaling about 50m from the sign when my legs were going to fall off.
We stopped at the pipe in Ward to fill up bottles and descend to the backside of Lee Hill. Half way up, I was blown away to see an old lady climbing that hill. It has to be 16% in places and she was just motoring along - white hair, helmet mirror and all. After I passed her, I wanted to say that I was really impressed she was going over that hill, but then debated if that would make her feel old. So I just said, “Ah that’s a tough little bugger.” Too bad I don’t have a sweet Aussie accent to make that comment worthwhile…
We made it into Boulder and got home with around 6h 50min on the clock and 126 miles. I think it may have been the longest ride on the bike (not racing) that I’ve done. Ever. I’m feeling it this morning, that’s for sure. And hey, there is 3-6″ of snow on the ground now and it was 75 yesterday. Very motivating to get on the rollers after a 4500 calorie ride yesterday. Speaking of which, my home brewed french press coffee is starting to wear off, so I should probably get it on. I think I’ve got some romantic movie from Netflix to watch by myself on the rollers today. A Good Year, not really sure what it’s about, but hopefully it keeps me entertained for the next two hours. And if you read this far, thanks. It’s been a long one and I couldn’t have done it without you.
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Now playing: Nelly Furtado - All Good Things (Come To An End) (Kaskade Remix)
via FoxyTunes
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