This week was filled with personal disappointment as I only really got in one solid ride on Saturday – a 100 miler up High Grade, to Evergreen, N on Kerr Gultch and down Lookout Mountain Road, back home via the Clear Creek Trail to South Platte Trail.
I could cite quite a few excuses, but it comes down to laziness. I didn’t mean to weekend-warrior it, but I filled my days with too many late starts to get in anything I’m proud of. Something to continue to work on. Happy to put a century on the board, and a tough one at that, but to meet my (as yet publicized) personal goals, I need to be doing two rides like this a week, plus other activities. Perhaps I’m too harsh with myself and my personal commitment to the bicycle.
Total Weekly Mileage: 156 miles
The ride itself was fun and when I get a chance, I’ll post up a map and elevation profile, as it’s a route worth repeating, as it does fill that magic, “100 miles” from a route that starts in Downtown Denver and features some good climbing. High Grade Road is a foray off of Deer Creek Road, which is what I did last weekend. High Grade is well, steeper and quite a bit longer, dropping you off again at HW 285, but much farther SW, near the town of Conifer. Luckily, you do not have to (nor would you really want to) take HW 285 back, as there is Co. Rd. 73, which is a solid road to ride on. Taking it N, it’ll give a nice declination and a well-deserved rest after High Grade. High Grade itself is a good challenge to take before taking Squaw Pass to Echo Lake at elevation 10,600 feet and the start of the Mt. Evans Highway, if one was to train to reach that.
At the junction of Co. Rd. 73 and the Evergreen Parkway/Co. Rd. 74, I decided to take 74 West to Kittredge and hang a left onto Kerr Gultch Road, which is a classic route back to HW. 40 and again down Lookout Mountain Rd and a swift loss of elevation back out of the Front Range.
Wanting to get some more mileage in, I decided to simply take the Clear Creek Trail to the South Platte Trail, which meet up in the middle of nowhere, without any real reason, instead of making a sensible choice of networking near downtown Denver. The positive to me is that it added up a few 10-15 miles to my ride and I pulled into downtown Denver and Biker Jim’s to treat myself to a fancy hotdog lunch.
So, not making any of my goals for this week makes me a little hesitant about making any goals for this next week. I foolishly left some gear at the start of Deer Creek Canyon, so I may just scoot back up there to see if I can’t retrieve it, but that’s something I should have also done today, but again, sleep got the best of me.
Mentally, I was pretty wiped from the ride and spent the rest of the day lounging around. Physically today (Sunday) I don’t feel terribly sore, so my legs are probably slightly ahead of my, well, head. I’m not sure how to mentally prepare for long rides, except perhaps how I can keep from getting exhausted that way with time.
