More Tucson

Mt. Lemmon had me nervous as everyone I asked would sort of sigh and say they were not sure if they were going to ride all the way to the top or they would talk about the cold descent and snow found at the cookie cabin. Since this was my first time in Tucson and I have no idea when I would be back, my mission was to go to the top. The top is at 25 miles from the base. We met early on Friday morning with a HUGE group ride for the TriFest weekend. We probably had about 75 people when we left the store, no joke. Riders, Riders, everywhere. I felt pretty safe in the traffic on the way out to Mount Lemmon...

Here is a video of the ride up and down taken from a helmet. It's nice because it is sped up so you can see the sights. When we got to the base we were at about 16 miles in so I knew by the end of this thing it would be my longest ride ever. Yay! We reconvened at the bottom and then it was every person for themselves! It was fun riding there and up because I got to talk to multiple different people along the climb. You literally start out at mile 0 and it is only so comforting knowing you need to get to 25 to make it to the top and the amaze cookie cabin, where you can chow down after your hard work.

The first 4 miles had me with major doubts as all of a sudden I was feeling the sun big time and huffing and puffing in my smallest gear. The grade did lessen a bit after this so I was able to catch my breath and my confidence to some degree. This was no Tates Creek Ferry Climb...It was fun to see the elevation signs going 3,000....4,000...5,000 on the way up, all the way to 8,200 ft! I stopped about mile 11 where TriSports had a water/food station set up and got some super salty Gatorade and kept chugging away.

None of these pictures are that great cause I only took a few on the way down and some when I was driving on Mt. Lemmon.

Once at the top I bought a hot chocolate and had some of a friends cookie before heading down! I tried to explain to some of my teammates that I would be slow on the way down. They didn't believe me till they had to wait for a while at the bottom. I am a major weeny when it comes to descending.

This hot chocolate doesn't look that great but it was. Esp after the climb since it got cold up there!

By the end I had 83 miles in the bank! Pretty solid for me! We had to quickly shower, stuff our faces and then head out to a trail run at Star Pass with the team. This was such a great place to run. The trails were amazing although a bit rocky but I ended up doing this on one of the non-rocky parts!

Which wasn't that bad, more of just a nuisance than anything else as I am left handed. My friend Steve said he had a feeling someone was going to bite it on the trails...I was just doing the team a good service! My reward after this run and long day: Starbucks iced goodness of course! I headed there with some friends then to rest up before our team dinner. Good day!