A.M. - Long run. Two times around on the Little Cottonwood Rd/Wasatch Blvd triangle route. Once in the normal direction, once in reverse. Up nice and early today to beat the heat. Cooler and less wind than last week. 6:54 ave/mi.
P.M. - 68.5 mile bike ride up Emigration and East Canyon to the Big Mountain summitt. First time that I've biked up Big Mountain although I've driven it a million times going boating to East Canyon Reservoir with the family. It was a bit harder than I anticipated, but definitely a good ride and one I hope to continue doing. It was kind of an eventful ride. I got a flat on Wasatch (about 7 miles into the ride). I fixed it and rode to Millcreek Bicycles where they gave me a tube, adjusted my pedal tension, and got my tire pressure where it needed to be. It's so nice to have a good bike shop on the route! The climbs up Little and Big Mountain were good (although, as mentioned, Big Mountain was a little tough). I saw a few other cyclists, but not as many as I would have normally expected, probably because of warm weather. On the last hairpin of the Big Mountain climb I caught up to a cool dude named Ben. We chatted at the top for a bit and I learned that he's a LOTOJA vet and has done it several times. He'll be doing it again this year as a Cat 5, which is the lowest racing category and also the one I'll be in. He is also doing the Ultimate Challenge in August which I'm also planning to do. So hopefully our paths will cross again. He shared some of his bike racing/LOTOJA wisdom which I'm grateful for and will gladly take whenever people are willing to share it with me. He was riding from Cottonwood Heights, so we ended up riding most of the way home together and we made one stop to fill our water. We rode mostly at an easy pace, but we pushed it a little in a few spots. On Wasatch Blvd on the way home at about 5500 S. there were a ton of cops, firetrucks, and ambulances, and a helicopter and they had Wasatch completely blocked off and wouldn't let us through. I don't know what the deal was, I've haven't bothered to see if its on the news, but maybe some bad car wreck or someone was stuck on the mountain or something like that. Needless to say, we were forced to back track to 4500 S. and then down to 2300 E. Ben and I parted ways at the Cotton Bottom intersection and I took 2300 E. and Highland home. Ride was good, but took quite a while to do. Sad thing is, it was a good bread-and-butter ride, but not long enough to constitute the type of "long ride" I need to be doing for my LOTOJA training. Somehow I'm going to have to figure how and when to work those rides into my training schedule. | 