Two Century Rides

If you read my last post about my October 2010 goal, you noticed that I have ridden an unusually high number of miles for so late in the season.  That is because in October and in November I rode my first two century rides.  October 9th was the Viva Bike Vegas, and November 6th was the Tri States Gran Fondo.

The RTCSNV Viva Bike Vegas is a 115 mile loop that starts in Downtown Vegas, goes down to Lake Mead and over the brand new hoover dam bypass bridge, through Boulder City, up to Red Rock Canyon, then back down to Downtown Vegas.  It also climbed somewhere around 6100 ft.  As per my usual blog postings,  here is a map and elevation profile, both pulled from the event's website:

 K Jo and I headed down to Vegas that weekend looking forward to some fun.  Oct 10th is our anniversary and I can't think of a better way to celebrate seven years of marriage than by spending seven hours in the saddle.  My morning started early as the ride started at 6:30.  We stayed at the Golden Nugget Casino which was only a mile from the start line.  I left around 6:15 to get there in plenty of time for the start.  When I did get to the start, it was PACKED.  I would have guessed that there were more than a thousand cyclist there, but upon looking at the timing results, I saw that only 582 people finished, so it was probably less than that.  The start was very slow as we had to get all those people out of the gate.  I arrived somewhere around 6:20 and had to find someone to let me borrow their pump to air up my tires, so I was in the back of the pack.  We slowly made our way north, then east.  As the miles started to tick by, the group thinned a little, especially on the hills.  Around mile nine, we were climbing a hill and I saw a guy wearing a BYU jersey so I sauntered over and started talking football. Turns out this guy's name is Randy and he was riding with two other guys, Joel and Bryant.  I found that all three grew up in Utah, but Joel and Randy now live in Vegas.  Bryant lives in Utah, but he had just recently moved from Vegas to Kaysville.  Bryant and Joel had been friends for years, and Randy goes to church with Joel.  They were all really nice guys and it was nice to have someone to talk to for the remaining 105 miles, at one point, Joel told Randy, "Hey we ought to run 26 miles after we're done to make this an Ironman event."  to which I said, "you guys get your swim on this morning?  I did... and by this morning, I mean last night... and by swim I mean shower..."  I got a couple of chuckles from the surrounding riders.  We hit the first aid station at mile 18, refueled, emptied our bladders, and took a couple of pics.  

Me and Bryant at the first aid station

 We then headed up and down the hills, mostly down, until we hit the second aid station at about mile 35.  We then made the long descent to the Black Canyon of the Colorado to cross the newly completed Mike O'Callaghan - Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge otherwise known as the Hover Dam Bypass Bridge.  We were all excited to be in a group of people to be the first to cross the bridge... It was pretty anticlimactic.  We get on the bridge and hey! It's a road... I did get some good pictures though.  

Hoover Dam from the Bypass Bridge

Me in my bones jersey on the bypass bridge.

Once we were done at the bridge, we passed through Boulder City, but not before ascending a good hard hill where we ran into one of Zazoosh's fantatstic photographers.  

From L to R: some random girl, Bryant, Me, Joel, and Randy with Lake Mead in the background.

Just outside Boulder City, we hit the local bike path. Just after emerging from the bike path, we reached the halfway point where we scarfed down some lunch.  At lunch, Bryant called his wife and told her to meet him at one of the aid stations up ahead.   We went up and down the gentle rollers at a fantastic pace to reach her, and ended up dropping Joel and Randy off the back.  As we passed an aid station I asked Bryant if he wanted to stop and wait for Joel and Randy.  He was in a hurry to see his wife and kids, so he said no... big mistake... If you look carefully at the elevation profile, you will see that from mile 71 to about mile 91 is a long steady climb.  We skipped the aid station somewhere around mile 60 and both ended up running out of water just as we started to climb, and just as it started to heat up.  I started to get a little delirious and seriously thought about calling K Jo to come get only to remember that I had the keys to the car.  Then I thought about hitting one of the in roads to get to downtown Vegas, but I pressed on.  Bryant got ahead of me and I could see him bumming water off a girl.  I met up with a guy also named Chris who has been riding since I was in diapers.  I think he could tell I was struggling, cause he kept talking to me. Mercifully, we saw a SAG wagon around mile 80 and we were graced with ice cold water which got us into the town of Blue Diamond where we stopped for at least 20 minutes to recover and wait for Joel and Randy.  we left Blue Diamond and crested the final climb where we were treated to a fast descent into Vegas.  One more aid station at the top of a short climb put us 11 miles out.  Bryant and I got behind the wheel of this tiny girl who pulled us to the finish line.  I think her name was Erika, but she gots some skills!  My total riding time was somewhere around 6:52:00, total time from start to finish including aid stations was 8:56:56. After the finish, we waited around for Joel and Randy to finish, snapped some more pics, then I rode the one mile back to the hotel where I met K Jo, finished off her room service and vegged on the bed for the rest of the day.  Later that night we saw a show, went to bed and  headed home for the long drive on Sunday morning.  It was a great weekend. 

The Tri-states Gran Fondo is... well... just that.  A Gran Fondo (long distance event) through three states: Nevada, Arizona and Utah.  

Again, with the map and elevation profile... this time, the event website combined the two:

This ride was somewhat capricious on my part.  K Jo found it online, and having become facebook friends with Joel and Bryant, I decided to tell them about it too.  Joel had plans on the weekend of Nov 6th, but Bryant rearranged some things and said he would be there, so I decided to sign up about two weeks before it was to take place.  The start for this ride was at 7:30, so not such a harsh morning.  Bryant and I met in the parking lot of the Virgin River Casino where we were both staying and rode the half mile to the start line. 

Me and Bryant at the start line.

The course undulates up and down for the first 7-10 miles then starts to climb.  There were only 125 people signed up for this ride, and I was in the lead group of about 30 for the first 7 miles or so.  Eventually, their pace got too fast, and I dropped off hoping to save myself for the next 105 miles.  As I was riding, I caught and passed a man named Jose.  He eventually caught up to me again and we started chatting and I found out that he is from Orange Co California. He was nice enough to snap a few pics of me.

Jose catches me with the Arizona desert scenery in the background.

Eventually, we both caught up to Bryant who was riding with a guy named Dave.  As it turns out, Dave Bern is the person who came up with the idea for LoToJa.  A VERY popular 206 mile ride that climbs over three mountain passes (9000+) feet from Logan, UT to Jackson Hole in WY.  We all chatted about riding and our lives while I snapped a few shots of Bryant

Bryant climbing the subtle incline up to Utah Hill. 

Eventually, the four of us made it to the bottom of Utah Hill at around mile 17.  Utah hill (from the south side) climbs over 2300 feet (most century rides don't climb that much in 100 miles) for 10.6 miles at an average grade of 4%.  Not normally a tough climb, but enough to get you heart pumping and your sweat flowing especially knowing that you still have more than 80 miles to go when you reach the top.  At the top was our first aid station where we filled up, packed some food in our pockets and started the very fast 1400 ft descent down the north side of Utah Hill.  About seven and a half mile later we took a very hard left to start the loop portion of this lollipop route.  The 58 mile loop had some very short, very steep climbs (some reaching grades of 15% we were told) but once those were over, we were able to rest while we descended or just moved our legs in the flats.  The loop passed by Gunlock Reservoir, where we had a few hard climbs where we reached aid station number two in Veyo.  I called K Jo and again refilled then we took a hard right onto SR-18 (be patient, I will get around to riding the whole thing someday) and descended passed Snow Canyon.  With four of us, we went a little faster than I would have if I were on my own.  One of us would hit the front while the other three got to rest for a few minutes in his draft.  We made good time and before we knew it, we made another right onto Snow Canyon Parkway.  After a few mile of this, we passed through the town of Ivins and just after mile 72, pulled into the third aid station.  I did the outstretched camera thing with Bryant and all four of us took a much needed break. 

This aid station was great because they had ice cold cans of Coke and Mt Dew.  You wouldn't think that a carbonated beverage would be very appetizing on a long ride like this, but I gotta tell you, the ice cold combination of sugar and caffeine really really hit the spot.  After a few miles, we finally closed the loop and made it to the bottom of the north side of Utah hill at mile 77.  Now it was up to us to climb back up the 1400 feet in 7.6 miles to the top and the final aid station.  Dave was the first to fall off, but not before Bryant pulled ahead.  I started to fall back to ride with Dave and realized that he had ridden LoToJa's 206 miles and 9000+ feet of climbing 25 times in the past 27 years, I figured he would be okay, so I soldiered on.  I caught Jose and we rode together for a little while, but eventually felt like setting my own pace and pulled ahead.  The climb probably took the better part of an hour but we all finally pulled into that last aid station for more refills, more Coke and now V8.  The salt was oh so delicious after sweating so much.  The final 27 miles were sure to be a breeze as it was mostly all downhill.  Dave pulled ahead of us to snap some photos for Cycling Utah, a local cycling magazine.  We all hit the bottom of Utah hill and started to draft off each other until Bryant and a guy named Bruce that had joined us in Veyo pulled ahead.  Eventually, Dave fell off again and Jose pulled ahead of me.  At around mile 100, the road went up and down for the last 12 miles.  With about 4 miles to go, Dave caught me and we rode to the finish line together, but not before being stopped at a stop light not 100 yards from the finish line...  So anticlimactic... We pulled into the finish together as Bryant took a picture.  Riding time for this ride: 6:57:00.  Total time including aid stations: 7:54:14. 

Dave and I cross the finish line.

We hung up our bikes, and I called K Jo who showed up with ice cold Red Bull (so amazing after a long hard ride) and got a picture of the five of us under the finish banner.

Dave, Jose, Bruce, Bryant and me after 112 miles and 7700 ft of climbing.

We all ate and talked about the ride while we ate sandwhiches and K Jo got a picture of me in my new hat.

All in all, this was also a great ride.  I fell asleep around 8:30 that night from sheer exhaustion and K Jo and I arose early the next morning to head home.  It was another great weekend.  Thanks for reading.