Our Wednesday ride through the Colorado Rockies was awesome in many respects but we also had a few mishaps. This is the queen stage (meaning hardest) of the entire 2012 GTD event with over 11,000 feet of climb across 134 miles. The high points of the ride are trips over Vail pass and the Continental Divide at Loveland Pass (elevation 11,990). To be sure, this is an absolutely stunning day of scenery. In order to make sure everyone had a shot at the Divide, the plan was to put John, Ricky and Rob loose as Flight A to tackle Vail Pass with the hope of saving the rest of the team for the climb up the Continental Divide. On a brief decent on the Vail Pass climb, Ricky came into a corner a little hot and lost control, landing hard on his left shoulder. He was able to ride to the summit, but needed to call it a day there. At the top of Vail Pass, Flight B joined us for the technical descent. About 1/3 of the way down, Rob hit a grove and got a pinch flat that caused him to crash also. Fortunately there was only minor bike and body damage and Rob was able to finish the day. With the exception of Ricky, the entire team was able to summit Loveland Pass. Well done all!!
All this excitement forced us to run past our finish time by 30 minutes, but given the challenges of the day and the difficulty of the terrain, this was still a great accomplishment for the team. Even better, both Rob and Ricky are planning to ride on Day 5.
Day 4 Summary
Route – Gypsum, CO – Golden, CO
Miles – 134.7
Vertical – 11,141’
Average Pace – 16.8 mph
Events – Rocky Mountain Hospital for Children visit, 1PM
Weather (Eagle, CO) – Mostly sunny, low 55F, high 86F, wind SW 10 – 15 mph
Thanks for reading,
John
