Weekend Close

by Robbie

Thursday (Ward-Nederland):
I know, Thursday isn't the weekend... but it is if you live in Boulder, it's like having two Fridays. Anyway, I went for a ride by myself up Lefthand Canyon to Ward, to the Peak to Peak highway, to Nederland, and then back down Boulder Canyon. Usually this ride can be done without wiping you out for two days, but I intended on it being difficult. As soon as I got onto hwy 36 I picked up the pace considerably and gradually increased my effort up to the peak to peak highway. I can feel some amount of form coming back after now almost two years of no training. I finally started to feel a little bit of that weightless feeling you get while climbing with good fitness. I only saw two other riders on my way up, I suppose there was an aversion to climbing straight towards billowing black clouds. I stopped at the spring to fill a bottle and made my way to Nederland. When I got onto the P2P hwy I started feeling pretty drained. I'm thinking it was due to the altitude. A cold rain sprinkled for about 20 minutes and then cleared up. The roads were soaked and there were a few puddles as I made my way, which made me think that I missed the worst of it. As soon as I got to Nederland I got a second wind that carried me all the way down Boulder Canyon. Soreness of note: my back. I haven't spent much time huddled in my drop bars, but I pedaled my guts out in them all the way to Boulder. My back was sore until Saturday or so. Good ride, good views, ominous yet comfortable weather, one of those rides that reminded me why I do all this in the first place.

Friday (Dirt Roads-Hygiene):
I was feeling pretty drained in the morning, but I met Jon Turner for a short ride anyway. We headed North on 36 and then turned east onto Nelson. Nelson is one of my favorite roads for riding fast. The wind seems to always be favorable and it varies between slightly downhill to downhill the whole way with two power climbs (if that, more like mole hills). We turned left onto 50-something st, that dirt road on that one sweeping corner. We took the dirt to St. Vrain and then headed east and turned left onto that other dirt road that winds down to Hygiene Rd. It was a good recovery ride especially because Jon was riding a 52-17 single speed, which kept me from gearing up until my legs hurt. On the way south on 75th Jon's left crank began to feel funny, and yes, it was definitely acting funny. His cranks are from the 70's or so and require a socket wrench for tightening, I think my mini-tool only goes up to an 8mm hex. We took it easy and stopped occasionally to tighten his crank by hand until we got to the Niwot bike shop. I was just there about two weeks ago when Chris' rear wheel, also from the 70's or 80's, exploded going over some railroad tracks. The mechanics must think I purposefully take people out on bikes that are rigged to explode. Anyway, we made it back to Boulder... I still felt pretty wasted from the ride on Thursday.

Saturday (Jamestown-Oxford Rd):
This ride was intended to be fairly moderate, still recovering from Thursday and trying to stay loose for Sunday's ride. Spencer and I rode up to Jamestown at conversation-pace. We road back down to 36, headed towards Boulder and then turned east onto Oxford Road, which is a nice long dirt road. It was still damp from an overnight rain which was perfect for traction. After not seeing any cars or really anything for a long time we saw a supermodel stretching in the middle of the road. I'd say that it was a mirage but our stories are the same. Then we road back to Boulder on 63rd. A good moderately difficult ride.

Sunday (Lyons-Raymond-Brainard Lake-Ward):
A good day of suffering. As I'm sitting here typing I still feel pretty messed up, my hands are actually kind of shaky. I met Sean Van Horn, Erez Falkenstein, Mike Cubison, and Spencer Sator at N. Spruce Confections at 9am. We headed north on 36 at a faster pace than I was expecting to begin with. For example, we made it to Lyons in 31 minutes, with a headwind, according to Mike's watch. Then we headed over to hwy 7/N. St. Vrain. The pace remained high and only got faster with time and altitude. Not before long Spencer moved to the back and told us to go ahead, we were going to wait at the top. Then Sean and Erez took off at a pretty freakish speed. By the time I decided to respond to their acceleration it was too late, but I tried anyway. I'm pretty sure Mike just wasn't in the mood for this racing crap so he hung back. In the meantime I pedaled until I got the chills. I even moved up to my big ring but my distance between the Sean and Erez didn't seem to be closing, it just stayed the same. Tired of being in chase-mode, instead of hang-mode, I stood up and tried to close the gap all at once. Bad idea, instead of closing the gap I just blew up. It took a long time to recover. I threw it back into a reasonable gear, like 39-23 and spun lightly until Mike caught back up. We turned left onto Riverside Dr, my first time ever, and certainly not my last. It is now one of my favorite roads of all time. No traffic, Euro-narrow, wooden bridges, a creek, log cabins, and old cracked wood signs. Raspberries are in season and were growing along the roads. I didn't really have any desire to ride hard, I just wanted to look around at all the pretty things--no wonder they call it Peaceful Valley. We caught up at the Raymond general store, where Sean was sprawled out on the ground, trying to cope with the pain of a huge effort. We filled our water bottles and ate a snack and then got back on the road. We were hoping to meet up with Spencer again but he missed the turn to Raymond and turned around when he got to the peak to peak hwy, which means he came back down before we rejoined with hwy 7, or he was still behind as we thought we were chasing him up the peak to peak. The pace remained really, really fast. I was definitely in the hurt but still hanging. We rode to the top of Ward, where Mike and Erez headed down and Sean and I headed up to Brainard lake. I ate my second and last Clif Bar on the way up. Sean and I agreed to keep it in the 39-25 but inevitably we picked up the pace a bit. We got to the Brainard Lake park entrance and they wanted a dollar from each of us, but neither of us had any money. We asked if they would just let us pass through, "pretty please," but they wouldn't budge. Bastards. So we turned around feeling slightly impotenterated by our lack of money. The descent was cold and black clouds were overhead. We passed through Ward and continued to pedal our guts out down Lefthand. I made a big effort to catch a car but it was my last; I didn't catch the car and my legs stopped working. We turned up Olde Stage and put in one more effort. Sean pedaled away in what was his dozenth huge effort of the day. I tried to hang but had no chance. I slipped back and struggled in my 39-25. We reconvened at the top and made no effort to descend quickly. I was feeling pretty toasted by the end of the ride, burnt toast. On a final note: why the hell is there a stop sign for the decent down to Lee Hill Rd, and not one coming up? This makes no damn sense, it makes no sense for drivers and cyclists to slam their brakes on down a 10% grade when people coming up will come to a stop if they just ease up on the gas, or pedals for a couple seconds. whatever.