Hardest Road Ride Ever

Mt. Evans.  The Highest paved road in the 48, and quite a shit road at that for riding fast downhill I might add. Matt and I left Denver early to get a start before the traffic of the day and to beat any potential storms in the afternoon.  I dropped off Matt a few miles up the road from the town of Idaho Springs.  I then drove to the gate to start my 14.5 mile journey, his 25 mile journey.  The gate is at 10,750 feet, the summit is at 14,130 (on the road, actual 14,240).  Matt started below 8,000 feet.

The ride took me 2.5 hours to complete, gaining 3,500 feet along the way.  My phone died on the summit before I could get a pic, but here is Matt and I on the way back down.   This was taken back at "Summit Lake" where it was a bit warmer than the top.  We were both shivering on top and the way back down.  We were told it was in the low 40's and a windchill of 23...burr!

A cool chart taken from; http://www.mountevans.com/MountEvansCom/Mount-Evans-Things-Bicycling.HTML

Miles (Grade)	Elevation	Gain		Miles (Grade)	Elevation	Gain
0 (Idaho Springs)	7,586			0 (Entrance Station)	10,750
1  (1.4%)	7,661	75		1 (5.0%)	11,016	266
2 (2,3%)	7,784	123		2 (5.6%)	11,311	295
3 (2.9%)	7,940	156		3 (6.1%)	11,631	320
4 (4.4%)	8,173	233		4 (5.6%)	11,926	295
5 (6.1%)	8,496	323		5 (5.8%)	12,231	305
6 (6.1%)	8,819	323		6 (4.8%)	12,486	255
7 (2.1%)	8,934	115		7 (3.1%)	12,650	164
8 (6.3%)	9,264	330		8 (3.9%)	12,858	206
9 (5.4%)	9,548	284		9 (1.2%)	12,920	62
10 (5.2%)	9,821	273		10 (2.4%)	13,045	125
11 (5.5%)	10,138	317		11 (3.7%)	13,242	197
12 (5.4%)	10,424	286		12 (3.9%)	13,447	205
13 (4.8%)	10,680	256		13 (5.2%)	13,722	275
				14 (5.1%)	13,991	269
Entrance (13,35)	10,750	70		Summit (14,65)	14,127	136

My Map My Ride to when my phone died on top.  I think the Calories burned are just a bit off though...Thinking close to 2,500.

Matt is an animal!  He passed me at my mile #9 and had almost the same overall time that I did for our respective trips.  DAMN!  

Never rode my bike to 14,000 feet before is it was quite fun feeling my lungs exploding at mile #10 and the cold wind in my face at the summit switchbacks mile 12-14.  I will have to do this ride again! just not the downhill, that really sucked.

Overall this has been a good training week in Colorado.  Three road rides, an 11 trail run around Lumpy Ridge, an alpine climb attempt on the Saber in RMNP, some dog walking and some SUP on Lake Estes.  And tomorrow...if the weather holds...The Diamond!  F'yeah!

Life to the Max video

Last March the Life to the Max crew came north and shot some video of Matt G and myself for their program.  It was interesting, as I have never been filmed for anything before and turned out good for their audience.  

Fun ride down the hill

Today I cheated.  I got a ride from town up and over the pass to bike back down the hill.  Fabrizio and Nina dropped me off at 12,000 feet in the light rain.  Nina snapped a fer pics of me biking back down the hill to the house 25 miles later.  Wednesday Matt will come up from Denver and we will bike up this time.

Trail running

1/2 way through our 14 mile trail run in 90 degree heat last weekend.  Getting ready for the Birthday Challenge!

New BD cams

I cannot wait for these awesome little new toys!  6 new Double axle cams from BD called the X4 (just not stoked on the name..."Predator" would have been cool, like I wanted the Fusion tool to be called the Diamondback to keep in the snake theme...)

The three larger cams, the .75, .5 & .4 have Kevlar trigger wires and 2 obvious axles.  The three smaller sizes, have an internal new double axle design to achieve the larger range that BD is known for and have medal trigger wires.  They are color coded in the same scheme that the C4's and C3 have and are all extremely flexible.  I put them up against C4s and they are much narrower and way more flexible.  The stem also has a new swaging process to keep the cam straight when you pull the trigger, which was super nice for a flexible single stem cam like this. 

Not 100% positive on all the details yet as I have a poor memory, but until we all get to place our first one, enjoy the porn.