ultimate challenge 2010

the summer is coming to a close and so too should my biking season...but it's not. saturday was my 3rd of 4 events on the summer, but it was no cakewalk.

the ultimate challenge was formerly named the '300 warriors'. then the '1000 warriors'. however, last year there was a tragic accident and the race was revamped and the name changed. there was no official timing this year and starts were staggered to avoid a mass descent in AF canyon.

the course follows the same roads to be ridden by leipheimer, hincapie and bookwalter (among others pros) in next weeks Tour of Utah. it's a fun promotion for the tour and for us wannabe's we get to project ourselves into the queen stage next sunday...

michael and amy were able to shuttle us to park city at 5:45 am because amy's brother paul unexpectedly came into town and watched the girls while they drove.



originally, i'd planned to ride with two docs from work--jorgensen and oliver. jorgensen invited a friend along--shaun--and guenter volunteered as medical support (which really means swag, a free ride for the price of wearing a red fanny pack:) gratefully there were no serious incidents requiring his services!

here we are shivering at 45 degrees waiting for michael and shaun to arrive.



the ride took us out to kamas with a deceptive amount of small, steep pitches. we would stop briefly at each support station to replenish water and food. one of the joys when there's no official time (my garmin gps timer stopped when we stopped:) we dropped down past jordanelle into midway, wended our way across the valley, dropped off jackets and downed a PBJ before heading out past deer creek. i enjoyed talking with guys in the paceline i'd not met before and catching up with the guys from the group whom i usually only see in passing during a busy ER shift.

the descent into provo canyon began with construction and tight lanes, but widened just before the ascent into sundance canyon.

at the start of the sundance canyon i laid down a bit of a tempo increase which left our group at 4 for the rest of the ride. towards the top of the climb shaun put in a huge acceleration where brian and i followed him. unbeknownst to us he was climbing to talk with a friend he'd seen up ahead. he is a strong racer (finished 4th in his division at tour of park city) and the accelerations took a bit too much glycogen from my muscles' stores. brian and i reached the top together and ate at the top before regrouping with michael and shaun for the descent. in retrospect, this acceleration was one that took more out of my legs than i would have liked and made the climb to snowbird the brutal event that it became.

the canyon road had been swept with very few rocks but lots of cars parked near camping sites. it was a fast, safe, fun descent. we entered alpine near mile 73 where a surprise group was sitting with signs and cheering at the round about.

amy, paul (her brother) and the kids rode from here along the rest of the route cheering us on at different intervals. they were such good sports and it was a lot of fun to have them along. bekah was usually nearest the window as they would drive by her face would light up as she would wave and cheer from her car seat. ella probably enjoyed the process least as we found on arriving home that she had a fever. poor girl.

climbing out a draper there are some very steep descents and i thought i lost the guys ahead of me (that's why the pros use radios?) i guess just brian was ahead of me and shaun and michael were behind me. regardless, when i reached the final support station at the base of little cottonwood i didn't see the guys at the tent and decided to go on without stopping. this was a mistake. i only had two half water bottles left in 95 degree weather. i thought, 'it's only 6 miles, how hard could it be?' i've ridden little cottonwood before at good tempo with a high cadence. that was my vision of how i would finish this race. however, the climb starts at mile 94 and rarely drops below 8-11% grade. my cadence fell as my muscles cried and burned. at mile 97 i was out of water and downed my last two hammer goo packets. amy had been leap frogging me as i climbed and i figured i couldn't stop with the kids watching! i stopped at the car and paul thankfully filled my water bottle. she had purchased cafe rio so i wolfed down several bites.

you can see me making my wobbly way to the car here...

i was wolfing down pork barbacoa burrito when michael, shaun and brian came up from behind me. i then realized they had stopped at the final support tent and had been behind me.

i hopped back on my bike for the final 3 miles. the food seemed to have lifted my reserve as my garmin says i lifted a full 1 mph thereafter.

regardless, it felt good to reach the top. i'd hung with the guys from work and had enjoyed a great day with them in the saddle.



good times.

i worked 9p-3a that night (a shift i picked up last minute in trade for gma's birthday next week.) as i waited for a VQ scan to finalize disposition last night and the hour drew near 5 am i realized i'd been up 24 hours. i couldn't decide if the aching in my muscles was myalgias from a virus contracted from ella or from the ride. regardless i was glad to collapse into bed this morning...

and last but not least (can you tell we just purchased a macbook with imovie?) in video format..: