Saturday, Rosey and I went mountain biking in Diamond Fork Canyon. We survived about8 miles straight uphill on a rocky mountain trail. We probably would have kept plowing through to Hobble creek canyon but we were both running low on water and didn't want to take any chances. Here is the elevation profile from my GPS:
As if that wasn't enough, on Sunday I decided to tackle Indian Pass on Hwy 191 connecting Price and Duchesne. The inspiration for this ride came last weekend as we were riding the Harley through this very spot. I thought it would make an awesome bike ride... and it did.
The only problem is that it's difficult to gauge exactly how steep a road is when riding in a motorized vehicle. I gained nearly 2000 feet of elevation in the first 7.5 miles of riding. That was rough. My favorite part of the climb was looking at the faces of the passing motorists wondering why the hell I was voluntarily climbing a hill like that.
Once I reached the summit at 9100 ft, it was pretty much all downhill for the next 28 miles. My top speed was a little over 40 miles per hour coming down the steepest section of the mountain. I do wear a helmet on whenever I anticipate speeds like that. Although I was thinking today as I was descending, that at 40 miles per hour, I don't think that my bicycle helmet would really help that much.
My original plan had been to have lunch in Duchesne and then ride back to where I started. Only I hadn't counted on having regain so much elevation coming back from Duchesne. I had imagined that the road was mostly flat after the initial ascent/descent from Indian Pass. Between the mountain biking I had done on Saturday and the climbing that I had already done that morning, my legs were pretty much fried.
I started back to the car but only got about half-way before Rosey met me with the car. I was so happy that she decided to come along and hike while I biked, because I'm not sure that I would have made it back up that mountain :)
Here is the elevation profile of the Indian Pass ride:
4 comments:
WOW!
Hmph! Tina stole my comment! But I'm going to say it anway: WOW!
and -
Thank Goodness for Rosey! :)
Nice job! In regards to your helmet not helping much, I had a similar thought last year coming down off of the Baraboo Bluffs.
I hit 46mph on the decent and found myself toe to toe with traffic. You get some great looks when they realize you are keeping up with them at those speeds. It was then that it occurred to me as I watched the guard rail flying by the side of me, that if I was to crash and burn the only thing my helmet would do was keep my head looking pretty.
Kind of a scary thought that has kept me from hitting that speed again. I think for the LOTOJA I will be investing in a good set of breaks ;)
On another note... We finally have biking weather this week, and I of course screwed up my knee playing in a hockey tourney Saturday. Doc says nothing strenuous for a week. And if the pain persists past a week I need to speak with an orthopedic surgeon. Yikes!
...and as long as bike and body hold out, keep doing it !!
Go For It !
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