Click Click

My favorite ride of 2010 was simple. Man and machine versus man and machine. Simple. Fun. Hurt.

We'd climbed the serpentine wall once all ready that day. We'd dallied and waited for the rest of the group the first time. Now, it was man and machine versus altitude, grade, and grind. Click. Everyone that has thrown a leg over a bike and turned a pedal stroke in anger knows that sound. Its the sound of pain about to come your way, the simple, painful, sound of a mere stroke of the silken gear lever. Your hands never seem to understand the fear your legs feel when they caress the gears. Every little movement they make increases the hurt shooting through your body and exiting the pedals.

Click. Dammit, there he goes again. We've hit the gravel. 10,000 feet above sea level is a memory and 11,000 has come and gone. 12,000 is looming. The air is thin for a couple of Iowa Boys. Oxygen depletion makes me think I can hold his wheel. Somehow, I stay on it. The seconds tick by like hours. I don't know if I dare peak to see how hard we're riding. I fall of the pace for a scant second and a gap opens. I find a little more and dig deeper from somewhere else. The road relentlessly turns skyward on us. We're not on singletrack, but the roughness of the road leaves us searching far and wide for smooth lines. He finds one, I take another. We're both breathless from the effort. My legs scream, I can't get any more air. I'm out.

I manage to call out that I'm done. The pace doesn't let up, yet I don't fall off. We just stop accelerating the pace for a moment. My adversary, my friend, my challenger, he's given me mercy. I'm thankful. I wouldn't call it recovery, but reprieve is mine. I pull tight on his wheel. I move along side. We climb in silence, each appreciative of the effort it requires to maintain the pace. Slowly, I pull to take my turn at the front.

Click. Its my turn to repay the pain. I struggle and surge feeling the effort sapping my legs. We struggle against the elevation and grade. It seems like we've been attacking each for hours, when in reality its merely minutes. I feel a small surge in power.

Click. I hit it again. The screws turning ever so slightly tighter. He's still there. Still holding my wheel. I don't have anything left. My head is swimming. There isn't enough oxygen. We've used everything and we're running on deficit. I see the end. The road flattens ever so slightly. I press harder than ever on the pedals. I'm not sure where I'm drawing strength from.

Finally. He calls out that he's done. The end is in sight. We've equally taken out each other. We reach the finish with equal footing. The most vivid ride of the entire year took less than 30 minutes. I put everything I had out there and when I was done it was all I needed. That was it. That was the ride. Thanks.

My own Breck Epic- prologue and day 1

Oh sure the title may be a bit over the top, but my trip to Breckenridge for the first (and hopefully not the last) time was definitely epic and memorable to me. The prologue came in the form of a few guys putting together a week of biking and whatever mischief could be mustered in a rented condo for a week in Breck. One more slot was open and through some sort of cosmic alignment I was able to fill it. Fast forward to the week before we leave and now my grandma is in hospice care and things are looking a bit "iffy". Grandma indeed passes away and I'm to be a pall bearer in her funeral. I'm honored to do it, but it precludes me leaving on Friday night with the rest of the gang. I load my bike and gear with everyone else on Friday and bid them adieu. I secured my transfer out there via Greyhound bus leaving Monday evening after the funeral.

Now I've travelled Greyhound before. Its not the end of the world and certainly not my favorite way to travel, but in all, its good for the cost. The epic portion of my trip started less than 2 hours into the ride out when I realized my money clip with ID, credit cards, and cash were indeed missing. I searched my person, bag, and the bus thoroughly to no avail which left me believing I was pick pocketed most likely before I even left the terminal. I now was down to about 38 cents to my name and still had another 14 hours of bus travel left. I have to say I received a number of encouraging texts and even a call or two offering to help out any way they could. The guys rang and said to get my butt out there and all would be fine as there was more than enough money to buy beer! Thanks for the support!

Midway into the trip, I dubbed the bus home sweet hell:

The rest of the trip was a blur of trying to get some sleep, transferring buses in Denver and then gazing at the scenery was we wound our way towards Frisco where the guys would be waiting. As we rolled into the parking lot around 9:30, I scanned for the truck. Indeed the guys were ready and waiting to ferry me back to the condo for our adventure to begin.

Ride map and info.

By noon we were off and rolling after I had hauled my junk up 3 flights of stairs and scarfed down some real food. Our first foray for the day was to take the Peaks Trail from Breckenridge to Frisco. I'd been forewarned of the altitude issues I'd face of being short on air, energy, and general ability. As we turned up the paved hill to the trail, I found a groove, but noted it was roughly two-thirds of what I thought I should be functioning at. There's no way around altitude! The Peaks trail was a nice beginning with some rocky and rooty sections separated by rough bridges and smooth pine forest tracks. As we descended into Frisco the first and only real jerk of the trip showed his colors by attempting to rip past us on a fast downhill. I heard callouts of left, right, and a bunch of jumbles only to start to turn right to avoid a large puddle as a biker came barreling down on me. I quick dab of the foot into a deep puddle (soaking my whole foot), a few words exchanged, and we were back on our way. The rest of the downhill was a blast and punctuated at the end with some steep step downs that were fun to ride.

The rest of the day is a bit hazy, but definitely gave me a trial by fire. We road the paved trail from Frisco to Copper Mountain. We made a pit stop along the way to fuel up for what we knew was going to be a challenging climb ahead.

Lunch break

Start of Wheeler Trail:

The first sections of trail were pretty ridable and not overly steep. As we started to gain more elevation, we'd hit spots of trail that were too steep or too rock strewn to ride. Eventually, this gave way to more rocks and more steepness. Eventually, we would all hike-a-bike over 50% of the trail. at just over 2.5 miles in length, the average gradient ended up being over 16.5% with most of the last mile or so being over 20% grade. In case you're wondering, that's damn steep! Most of the time I was walking on my toes and the balls of my feet to create enough leverage to push my bike up the slopes. Finally, we made it above tree line only to discover a chilling wind and the threat of rain to be upon us.

Nearing the top, looking back at Chuck (the fluorescent blob):

Kyle and the other Rick were the first to the summit with me dragging up a good 5-10 minutes back. They had found a place to wait out the minutes for the remaining 3 chasers. It took me several minutes to snap a picture of my bike against the sign as the wind was so strong, it continually blew it down.

Final destination- 12,400':

Finally, it was time to descend. I'm not sure why, but I never snapped a picture of the singletrack descent. Either my mind was toast due to lack of oxygen and over exertion or I was too damn scared to think about taking a picture of what I was about to take on. I started the descent gingerly and made it to the fist nasty drop/switchback. At this point in time, I decided, I walk down to a slightly less intimidating portion only to realize my left foot was now stuck to my bike due to losing a screw from my cleats on the hike to the summit. Luckily I was basically stopped and could fall against the mountain side (only a foot or so away). I worked a good 10 minutes or so getting my shoe unlodged from the pedals and now was faced with the fact I couldn't clip back in without fear of being stuck on the bike when I might need to make a hasty exit. Considering the steepness of the trail and my apprehension about riding it in a fully functional mode, it made the decision to walk that chunk a no-brainer. Actually, I think almost all of us walked that portion and a good chunk of the remaining alpine sidehill we had to traverse.

Finally we came to the jeep trail/fire road section of the descent. Still unable to clip/unclip as needed, I mounted up and rode my brakes down the loose rocky section of jeep trail with my left foot resting on the pedal not clipped in and my legs taking the brunt of the force required to keep my foot from slipping off. Indeed, I was cramping up just staying on the bike on the downhill! As we finally came to a more groomed gravel portion of the road, we regrouped. Kyle suggested fixing my cleat with a bottle cage screw and it actually worked. Now I could clip in, however I had to be a bit careful of the now too long screw poking me in the bottom of the foot. I gained speed on this descent, but the rest of the guys flew away in excess of 30 mph on the downhill as we slalomed our way back to Breck.

We were grinning from ear to ear as we hit the edge of town and pedalled off in search of a bike shop to help with some woes including a broken spoke, destroyed shoes, and my cleat issue. On top of that, as we started to crank the pedals, Kurt's crank arm literally detached from the bottom bracket leaving him with quite a befuddled look as it was still clipped to his shoe. Luck must have been smiling as that would have meant almost sure disaster on the downhill we'd done literally minutes before. Luckily it was nothing more than a screw coming loose and we fixed it before heading on our way.

With sushi and a big beer in my belly for dinner, it wasn't long before I was sawing logs and dreaming of what day 2 might hold.