Triple Bypass 2008

Rode the Triple Bypass today. 120 miles, 3 Mountain passes over 11,000 feet. Very tired. Too tired to give details. Stay tuned.

That was all I had energy for the evening after I finally got home about 10:PM. I got home, cracked open a beer and risked falling asleep in the tub for an hour or so.

Everything went pretty well on the ride, except that I never saw any of the guys I was supposed to ride with, until the finish. That's because I started before they did, and then when I got to the first rest stop at the top of Squaw Pass, I waited and watched for 45 minutes for them. It turns out that they all blew through that one and kept going. There was no cell phone coverage up there so I had no idea. After that I was far behind the rest of the day.

No matter though. The weather was perfect all day. The ride up Squaw Pass was was chilly, but calm. My toes were cold the whole way up.

Once at the top, I refueled and used the bathroom, walked around, waited and refueled some more. Finally I got ready to head down "The Dark Side" of Squaw pass. For this I put on all my wind protection: Wind shell, hand and toe shells. I already had on my next to skin silk layer (the one I should have had on the Mt Evans trip) The one item I was missing was the balaclava, that JB had with him, and that I we had arranged for me to get from him when we hooked up at the first rest stop. I decided not to put on the leg warmers, and it turns out I was ok without them.

The ride down The Dark Side of Squaw Pass is cold, and long. Many people complained that after Squaw Pass, their toes and hands were frozen until they got to Loveland pass some 40 miles later. I think I was well prepared, and the cold air didn't penetrate too much as I blasted down the 10 or 15 mile descent.

At the bottom (Idaho Springs) I pealed off and after trying to make phone calls to my buddies, I got going. The section from Idaho Springs climbs gently on the access road that runs parallel to I70 through Dumont to GeorgeTown where the next rest stop was.

Once again, I lingered at the rest stop and refueled, used the bathroom and sunscreened up. About here I got a call from JB who was pulling into Loveland, the next aid station about 20 miles up.

I got going again and continued the steady climb up to Loveland. This section of the ride takes you along I70 (part of it you actually have to ride on the highway). Just as I was about to get onto the highway section, my sister Alice called and we talked for a few minutes. "Oh, ya, you said you were doing a bike ride or something. Is that this weekend?"

A bike ride indeed.




The ride along the highway sucked and occasionally huge trucks would pass by and scare the crap out of me. It seemed like each mile was getting longer now. I got a call from Jim Pefanis who was at Loveland now. I told him I'd haul ass and get there ASAP.

When I finally pulled into Loveland I gave Jim an call, and when he answered, it was obvious that he was riding up the steeps. Between gasps, he said, he'd seem me, down the road.

Since I had missed him again, I wasn't in any big hurry, and so I lingered at the Loveland rest stop. Here there was live music, ham and turkey sandwiches and a table covered with nasty mustard and mayo bottles. Most were empty, and all were crusted over and vile. I found a Grey Poupon, banged it on the table and managed to get a squirt onto my ham and Wonderbread lunch. I can't complain. They did a good job of having plenty of energy food there, and the watermelon was awesome.

It was at this rest stop that I applied some kind of a salve to my crotch. The label identified it as some scary sounding medical name, but the first aid guy (discretely) recommended it. At first I was alarmed when it felt kind of like that "icy hot" stuff and I thought I had made a big mistake. It turns out that whatever that stuff works pretty well for saddle sore. Nuff said.

Next: Loveland Pass, painfully steep. Vail Pass, painfully long.

Mt Evans Hail Storm From Hell

The Triple Bypass is next weekend and a few of us decided we needed a challenge to see if our training had paid off. We decided to ride to the top of Mt. Evans from Evergreen, Colorado. Evergeen is about 7000 feet, Mt Evan's is 14, 277 feet so It's about 35 miles of climbing at altitude and then the same distance again in descent.

Jim Pefanis and I met John Bissert and two of his friends at Bergan Park. We started up the mountain at 7:AM and rode the first leg of the trip up Squaw pass to Echo Lake (11,140ft) . As we rode everyone commented on how perfect the day was and how nice and cool it was.

JB and his buddy Warren rode up a bit faster than we did so we agreed to meet up later. Jim and I rode up to Echo Lake and took a long rest and refilled our water bottles. Echo Lake is the entrance to to the 14 mile road up to Mt. Evans, and there's a $3/per person fee to use the road.

At Echo Lake, we started up the road to Mt. Evans. Jim decided that he would stop after a couple miles and turn around to head down. I couldn't blame him since we all were riding the Triple Bypass in 6 days, and a ride like this so close to the event, was not necessarily a good training strategy. Also, since the weather up around Mt. Evan's had been dark and cloudy all morning, a storm seemed pretty likely.

Jim took off down and I kept riding up the mountain. The air gets pretty cold the higher you go, and I stopped to put on my jacket and head band. As I headed toward the summit, I could see lightning occasionally, and started hearing thunder. A light rain started to fall, but I felt pretty well protected.

As I rode on, I passed some people and got passed by a few others. I was soon at the 6 mile marker and moving pretty fast, but it was also getting pretty cold now and the light rain had increased to a drizzle. I stopped to put on my new REI silk shirt and discovered that it was actually new REI silk long underwear bottoms! I stood there and stared at them stunned, and then stuffed them back in my jersey while muttering something to myself about how if I died of hypothermia, I'd deserve it for being such an idiot.

The lightning and thunder was getting closer and more frequent, and the traffic coming down was seeming more and more urgent. I continued on, but soon decided to just ride to the next mile marker and then turn around.

I got to the 8 mile mark, was stopping to turn around and just then saw JB on his way down. I yelled and he stopped. I told him I was heading down and we agreed to meet at the Echo Lake store. By this time the rain had turned into small hail and the lightning and thunder was pretty alarming. I put on my waterproof mits and got going down.



I passed a couple who were riding pretty slowly. The road at this section was extremely exposed and the ride down has some really unnerving views. The side of the road is basically a cliff, and someone on a bike, about 4 or 5 feet from the road edge would be in some serious hurt if a gust of wind happened to blast them off the edge. The girl was very scared and was asking her friend if they should stop. He answered "Not here! Keep going!".

I passed them by and just about then the hail turned from small mushy pellets into hard icy projectiles. Soon the size of them increased to about the size of large (frozen) grapes, and it turned from a little scary and annoying into an extremely painful and dangerous bombardment. The balls of ice were penetrating the holes in my helmet and were painfully pummeling my arms, shoulders and face.

This was now the worst hail storm I'd ever experienced and I was on a mountain side with no cover, and with lightning and thunder crashing all around. I headed for a spot on the mountain side that was most leeward and tried to protect myself from the painful hail. I managed to get my head and shoulders protected but my legs and back continued to get pounded by the increasingly large and intense balls of ice. I wondered if I was dooming myself to a lightning strike by cowering against the rock to avoid hail damage.

While I cowered, my head was covered but I could watch as the hail violently pummeled and bounced off the road. It accumulated rapidly, and what was a gleaming wet road in a green and rocky mountain side, was now completely white. I watched as my bike slowly began to be covered by the accumulating hail.

As I wondered how long I'd have to endure the bombardment, a ranger truck drove by, stopped, and then backed up quickly. My bike was pretty hard to see now, and I thought it was going to drive over it, but the driver managed to park right next to it. I jumped up and a second later was inside the truck, thanking the ranger for stopping. Inside the truck the hail was unbelievably loud, and we sat for awhile before deciding to turn around and head down. I jumped back out into the bombardment, and put my bike in the back of the truck.



Jockying the ranger truck back and forth to turn around would have been pretty scary any time, but in the hail, with thunder and lightning crashing all around it was absolutely terrifying. I buckled up and hung on white knuckled as the ranger (Harry) managed it with little trouble, and we were on our way down.

I felt unbelievably lucky that the ranger had stopped for me. As we headed down, the hail started to slow, but it was now several inches deep on the road. Nothing with only two wheels could drive in these conditions.

On our way down we passed a lot of motorcycles and a few bikers who had taken cover in the many tourists cars that had also been caught in the storm. It seemed like everyone who had cars was helping out the imperiled bikers.

Harry dropped me off at the Echo Lake store, I enthusiastically thanked her, got my bike out of the back of the ranger truck, and went in. Soon the Echo Lake gift store was packed with travelers trying to get out of the rain. When JB, Warren and Brian showed up, we traded stories of our experience/rescue and watched the rain outside. It wasn't slowing down. Eventually we decided to brave the rain ("Hey, it's only rain!") and head down.

It was a long, wet, cold, nerve racking ride from Echo Lake back down to Evergreen, but after the Hailstorm from Hell, it seemed downright pleasant.

HighGrade, Conifer, Aspen Park, Marshdale, S Turkey Creek Loop

I escaped from work a little early and started up Deer Creek from Wads about 4:45pm.

I rode up Deer Creek then HighGrade to Conifer, Aspen Park, and then turned right (East) onto N Turkey Creek at Marshdale. At Twin Forks where N Turkey Creek goes under 285 I took a right up S. Turkey Creek and then Closed the loop back onto Deer Creek at the Fire Station.

40 miles, About 3 hours. 5500 ft to 8500 or so.

Commute Home from work via Fiddlers Green

I stayed late at work because I had not fixed the vexing problem I'd been working on. All the sudden I figured it out and after getting it all working, I headed out on my bike.

I decided to take a new route along the Englewood Dam and then north toward S. Yosemite/DTC. Along the way, I passed by Fiddler's Green and saw that there were lots of people going to a show. I asked someone who told me "Stevie Wonder". Man, suddenly couldn't think of anything cooler to be doing with the rest of my evening.

I was still on my bike heading up the road, but I belted out some bars of "I wish" ("Sneakin' out the back door, to hang out with those hoodlum friends of mine") while weaving between the cars and the people streaming into the show. I got some sideways looks and I got some smiles, and I thought I souned pretty good. As I rode away, I thought about who I could call to come out with me to the show.

Further as I rode up the DTC, I discovered another music scene going on at the corner of DTC and Belleview. It was the regular Tuesday evening free music thing that happens there, that I am aware of, but never remember to go check out. Kids were everywhere playing and the music sounded a little like some kind of old time Western Swing or something. Everyone looked like they were having a blast and I thought "I had no idea this kind of stuff was happening. Man, I got to get out more. "

I started to roll toward the stage, but the security people told me I couldn't bring my bike in, of course. So I started talking to some people about how cool this was and then reluctantly, started to head home.

While riding, my phone rang. I dangerously reached into my pocket to answer it. It was my old buddy Al, and while negotiating the intersection one handed, I tried to talk him into getting Janet and meeting me down to check out the action. Alas, it's a school night and all us boring regular folks need to be boring. We all agreed we should get together for the 4th instead.

Once I got home, I fed Clark (our goldfish) and I realized that I needed to clean his tank...Since Sunday...! And I didn't have any distilled water. Dang!!

I had to go to the store...

Cool, I'll take my bike. No, it's going to be dark in a few minutes.

So I took the car instead, and hated myself for it. As I walked into Whole Foods, a girl said "I like your shirt!". We got to talking and it turned out she was from Anchorage (Rabbit Creek area) We talked a bit more and said goodby. Later when I though about it, I realized that I'd never even introduced myself or asked her name. Odd to meet someone from back home and I didn't even introduce myself. What a mullet.

At the store I wandered aimlessly looking for the distilled water. While I was at it I got salad stuff, pilfered a handfull of awesome dark chocolate covered walnuts and headed home, but not before stopping into the "Merchant of Vino" to get a bottle of vino. The woman at the store pegged me for a wine ignormous and talked me into something (a shiraz I guess) called "Stump Jump".

Once home I started to make salad, and opened the bottle to let it breathe (right?)

Excuse me? It has a screw top?

Did I look to her like the kind of person who drinks wine from a screw top bottle?

Apparently so. I let it "breathe" and made the salad.

Once done making the awesome salad, I poured a glass and sat down to watch Nova, to write in my blog, and to relax.

Hmm...what was it I was supposed to do? Whoa! I'd better go change Clarke's tank water!