The most amusing thing was trying to find somewhere to eat Saturday morning in Logan. I’m used to Village Inn and IHOP being open 24/7. I was pretty ticked off when at 4:00 a.m. there was nothing open. Went back to the hotel slept for another hour and then tried again at 5:00. At this point I realized it was useless and settled on some pancakes from the golden arches.
After breakfast, getting dressed, getting the car packed up, and giving Vinny’s wife my bag for the Montpelier feed zone, (I wasn’t sure with the support route detour if the wife could make from Preston in time) it was time to head to the start. I found the Bikeman guys and we got staged for the start. Unlike most road races it appeared that no one wanted to lead the group out. I can understand that, who wants to the do a lot of work at the beginning of a 206 mile race. At 6:48 we received the word to go.
The first few miles through Logan were pretty mellow. T-bone and Bikeman Dave did the pulling and about 10 minutes in to the race some of the guys must of thought the pace was too slow because they came up and pushed the tempo a little harder. After wandering through the Cache Valley fog the sun finally started to break as we pushed toward the Idaho border.
It was about this time that things became amusing. We caught the Cat 4 group that went out 3 minutes ahead of us. They were going pretty slow. I didn’t want to get separated from the Bikeman guys so I made sure that I stayed within sight of Dave and Troy. I could here some of the 4’s talking smack about how we were going to burn out at this pace and we would get caught on the climbs. About this time an official comes driving up through the pack. She leans out her window and talks to a few guys and then drives on ahead. We come around a bend and see the official blocking an intersection and get out of her truck, wave her hands, and yell stop. The pack starts to slow down and she yells out anyone with a 5 number can proceed. This must have really pissed off the 4’s but I didn’t stick around to find out. I knew that there would be a push to split the pack apart and I was right. Things then pretty much settled down after this until the Preston feed zone.
The Preston feed zone was a frenzy as I was told it would be. I grabbed my bag and was proceeding to start grabbing stuff out of it and this guy in front of me decides to do a U-turn. Luckily I missed him and was able to get through the feed zone without incident.
The first small climb out of Preston took its toll on the pack. As I rotated through the pack I could tell our numbers had dwindled quit a bit. As we hit more rolling climbs on our way to Strawberry Summit, we would loose more and more riders. As we stopped for a bathroom break and there were only 10 or so of us in the group. We continued to push a hard pace as we started up the climb to Strawberry Summit. It didn’t take long for the rest of the pack to get torn apart, T-bone and a couple of other guys continued to push a hard pace up the climb and soon I noticed that Bikeman Dave had started to fall behind. Not long after I got tossed off the group. I continued my pace and as I saw the false summit I decided to put my vest on since it was still cool. As I was putting my right arm through the vest someone was trying to pass on my right. They didn’t say anything as they passed so I don’t feel too bad about punching him in the face. I did apologize though. As I spent way too much time fiddling with gear, Bikeman Dave caught me and we crested the summit together. As luck would have it (and Dave was mister lucky) we had a big group catch us just as we were heading down the summit. Dave and I made sure to grab on to the back of this group and they pulled us all the way into Montpelier and the third feed zone. Everything went well and Dave and I started up to Geneva summit. As we approached the top, Dave pushed the tempo a little and unfortunately I didn’t respond. I figured the climb up Salt River Pass would be brutal and wanted to save most of my climbing legs for it. As mister lucky hit the summit another large group came by and took him with it. As I started down I realized in horror that I might be riding the next section alone.
As I hit the intersection and started north on 89 a group of tandems came by with a group I immediately jumped on the back of the group and road with them until the feed zone at the bottom of Salt River Pass. At this point I decided I needed another bathroom break, and a quick stretch. I left the feed zone with a group and proceeded up Salt River pass.
The climb really wasn’t very bad. I spun up the climb as it wasn’t steep enough to warrant getting out of the saddle except to stretch the legs, which I did a couple of times but was always able to settle back into an high cadence, and passed quite a few people. I tried taking a pretty quick master to the top but he wouldn’t let me have it and I quickly descended the mountains into Star Valley. I tried working with some people here and there on the way into Afton and people would fall off and more would join and finally a big group came flying by with Vinnie in tow. I jumped on the back and road the line into the Afton and picked up a feed.
Mistake #2 was dropping my Cliff Chews and then just about turning around to pick them up. While this indecision was going on the group left the drop zone and picked up the pace. In a panic I started sprinting to catch the back of the group and Vinnie being the nice guy he was came back to help but the pace was too quick. We slowed down and watched the group ride away. A few minutes later a tandem and another rider came flying by and we jumped on the back of them. They slowed down to fuel up and even offered us some crackers. Minutes later they turned up the pace and with the energy I spent trying to sprint back to the first group out of Afton. I kept yo-yoing off the back and eventually got tossed off. Vinnie stayed with the group and I soon found myself looking at riding the next long stretch of road alone.
At this point I had a bit of a break down. It seemed like every group I tried to latch onto just dumped me off and I had nothing left in my legs. I decided at this point just to ease into Alpine and thoughts of quitting started to enter my mind. I left Etna a couple of guys that had been with the tandem group I rode with just before Salt River came by at an easy pace and I was able to sit in as they graciously pulled me into Alpine. At this point I was actually feeling better. I stopped and talked to the wife and she suggested I take the Advil that I had from the last feed so I did and as I was getting ready to leave I noticed one of the tandem riders I had been with before was getting ready to leave the feed zone. What luck! I jumped on the line and they started to pull us out of Alpine up the road toward Jackson.
As we hit the last feed zone we had a pretty good group of 5 of us. Up to this point the tandem had been doing all the work and they looked liked they were starting to feel it so after the feed zone we started taking pulls. Things went smooth as we approached Jackson I got a little nervous as we picked up a couple of guys that were in my category and I wasn’t sure how much sprint I had in me but we managed to bounce them off. As we hit the left turn light in Jackson the pack got split. I had made a mistake in taking a pull too close to the light and was at the back of the pack. I missed the light along with two guys from Vegas and one guy from my category that I had seen off and on all day. I was really starting to get nervous about this as we only had a few miles left to the finish. As we started west toward Teton Village I took some really hard pulls and was able to bounce the guy in my category off the back. I took a couple of more hard pulls and once the guy was out of sight I let the Vegas guys go and just took an easy pace into the finish.
1 comment:
What an experience. I didn't know you were still in touch with the Bikeman gang. I think I could handle something along the lines of a Logan to Smithfield or at the very least a Logan to La Tienda on the border.
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