Look back to April: I called my parents to tell them we are planning to ride Lotoja. “I’d like to see you do that!” says my father. I took my parents up on the offer to provide our support for the race.
All summer we rode our bikes like crazed maniacs. The rides steadily became longer and more mountainous. Once we even rode to Afton, Wyoming, pre-riding all three mountain passes for the race, carrying 50 lbs of gear. We spent the night in a motel and then rode back the next day. They say that whatever does not kill you makes you stronger. They might be right.
September 6th, 5:30am: We arrived at the beginning point of the race. The fun category left at 6:00am. It was dark and cold. It was still dark and cold when we left. We were wearing vests, arm warmers, knee warmers and I had a jacket as well. There were people and bikes everywhere. I started to feel claustrophobic as the bikes crowded in around us.6:00am: We’re off, escorted by police on motorbikes. It was a neutral start until we got out of the city of Logan. Most people around us seemed to be lost in the dark. This is our home turf however. Ben even knew where the bad potholes were and avoided them in the dark. Tandems punch a big hole in the air, so we constantly had someone drafting off us. My nose was running like a faucet, and I really needed to farmer blow. I warned the person sucking our wheel that I was going to blow a snot rocket and let ‘er fly. Serves ‘em right. It’s the price you pay for drafting someone you don’t even know.
We were riding well, making good time, and almost to Preston as the sun came up over the mountains. My toes were freezing. I had promised my poor little toes that they would warm up by Preston if they would only keep pedaling. It looks like I lied to myself. The sun was only providing the barest amount of warmth this early.
Preston was the first stop. Mom and Dad were there waiting for us with water bottles and food. They were easy to spot among all the people. Dad was wearing his blue zip-up sweat-shirt which is definitely not typical for this crowd. In addition, the gray beard really sets him apart! Thanks to our fantastic crew we were only at the stop for two minutes before we headed off to Montpelier via Strawberry Pass.
It was still cold as we left Preston, but I knew that riding Strawberry Pass would cure any chill left. There was a big hill outside of Preston, then down into the Bear River Valley, before making a right hand turn and climbing 22 miles to the summit. As we were riding up the hill we started to be passed by the Cat 1-2’s who left after us. They passed us like we were standing still. All the
way up the mountain, racers zoomed past. It was fun to see all the people, so after a small bit of discouragement I shook it off and enjoyed watching the race while in the race. Every once in awhile, someone passed us who we knew and we exchanged greetings. The day was warming up, slowly, and was becoming a very nice day for a ride. I knew 18 miles from the turn was a sneaky false summit. We had a little downhill stretch before returning to an uphill grind, to the top at the 22 mile marker. We ride a heavy tandem and we just don’t go up very fast. However, we do make up for it quite a bit on the way down.Once we reached the summit it was a lot of fun to rocket down the other side of the mountain. Our top speed was 52 mph. Finally, it was our turn to pass people like they were standing still. As I looked back, I noticed we had grown a huge tail of cyclists. There's nothing like drafting a tandem. We had a tail all the way into Montpelier.
We easily found my parents again in the mob of people waiting for their cyclists. After a quick load-up of food and water we were off to Afton. This was the hardest part of the ride for me. This leg included Geneva Summit and Salt River Summit. I was lagging in energy and motivation. Once we came down Salt River we were really moving, but still I couldn't quite kick it into high gear.
Once we got to Afton, Ben called for a bit of a break off the bike to eat our sandwiches and drink our mini-Cokes. This was a lifesaver! I have never eaten a more amazing sandwich in all my life! As you can see, I looked pretty bad.
We finished our break and took off for Alpine. This was our best leg. The sandwiches and cokes worked like MAGIC! We were super speedy! We started off with a tail of drafters, but they couldn't keep up with us and we lost them one by one. They must not have known about the sandwiches.
Mom and Dad met us in Alpine with our last hand off of food and water. We quickly ate another sandwich and drank another coke and took off. The road was hilly, but not mountainous. We rode hard, but the length of the day was starting to wear on us. We reached Hoback Junction looking good, but after that it became very hard to continue. It had been fun up to this point, now it was just work. As we were nearing the finish line I realized that if we wanted to make it in under 12:30 we would have to pick it up a bit. I don't know where the energy to increase our speed came from, but we finished in 12:29. I felt GREAT about this!
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