jppe

My 7th year in a row doing RtR.

Some good climbs including Independence Pass, Fremont Pass (both sides), Tennessee Pass, Battle Mountain, Vail Pass, Ute Pass and Trail Ridge Rd. We also did some short but steep grunts around Horsetooth Reservoir going into Ft Collins on the last day.

I had a terrific climb up Trail Ridge from Grand Lake only to be greeted by winds gusting 40+ mph making it a really twitchy ride. I've never had a bike move uncontrollably like that before. Some riders elected to hoof it......

The Staff does a really terrific job putting this on each year.

nmichell

Thanks for the picures jppe.

I was signed up and ready to go, when a few days before the start my foot swelling up like a balloon. I thought it a a sprain, but rest, ice and elevation didn't help. Finally, I started on anitbiotics and that seemed to make a difference. But meanwhile, I missed the first 2 days of the ride. My wife had rented a condo at Copper, originally to meet me there, but we drove up together on Sunday. My foot still wouldn't fit in my shoes, but with platform pedals and sandals, we did a ride Monday down to Frisco and back. So on Tuesday, I finally did my first ride on Ride the Rockies, the Copper Mountain loop. That was spectacular -- I really loved it. Great ride, great volunteers, fantastic scenery. The ride up Vail Pass at the end was not as great, that was a tough slog, but the aid station at the summit was fun. They had a DJ there playing music and giving away stuff -- while I was in the Port-a-potty he said "First one to bring me some toilet paper gets T-shirt", so hustled out of there and got the free shirt But by the end, I was pretty sure I wasn't going to be able to do three more days, so that turned out to be my only Ride the Rockies day. But I hope to be back next year.

BTW, that ride along Horsetooth Reservoir is one of my favorite training rides.

stardognine

Looks awesome. I'm thinking very seriously about heading to Colorado in the near future. With my health issues, the legal herbs would be really nice. I just don't feel like waiting any more, for other states to catch up, "if" they ever do. Edit: nmichell, awesome tee shirt story.

h2oxtc

Looks like you had some awesome weather. Great photos.

Biker395 

Soooo jealous. Nice pix!

superdex

I was in Vail all last week on vacation; saw a bunch of you guys going by on Tuesday during the Copper Triangle leg. You had spectacular weather for the whole thing, congrats--

berner

I've been on several week-long backpacking trips in Colorado. I love being in the mountains and snow fields even in July and August, and from the passes seeing those mountains as far as the eye can see.

osco53

Nice,, Real Nice Ride Biker Dudes

Fldaves

Very nice!!! My favorite local mechanic( 72 yo)does that and several other long rides out in Colorado every year. Please keep posting pics.

jppe

Sorry to hear about the foot but at least you got a taste of the ride. They had warned us that camping would be severely limited in Copper Mt so we opted for a condo in the Mt Plaza building. Lucky us with the wet night and colder temps.

Pat is the DJ at the rest stop. He's been there every year I've ridden. I really enjoy his music selection........"I can see for miles and miles"........."Rocky Mountain High"........etc.

jppe

Vail is a great place to visit. If you happened to ride one of the Vail buses one of the drivers is a good friend that I met on RtR several years ago. I enjoyed the climb up Vail Pass but hated the Bike Path down into Copper. Too narrow for that amount of traffic especially with some of our folks riding way out of control.

John E

Cue up the John Denver.

Thanks for posting -- looks like a grand adventure. My bucket list includes cycling in New Castle, where both of my maternal grandparents grew up and my great-grandfather co-owned a general store for many years.

nmichell

I thought the bike path up to Vail Summit was too close to the freeway to be much fun, as well as being steep But the bike path down WAS dangerous. I was right behind the cycling medics that were there to help someone who had crashed.

I enjoyed my one day on RtR, as well as staying at Copper Mountain. My foot started really troubling me on June 6th, and I was thinking that it was the 72nd anniversary of D-Day, I can't be feeling sorry for myself just because of a lousy sore foot.

John E

I wish someone who had experienced that would have been able to prevail over CalTrans, which is currently building a two-way (boo-hiss) bike path adjacent to I-5, to connect Sorrento Valley and the commuter rail platform to the UC San Diego campus and environs up on the mesa. It won't be as steep or as long as the Vail Summit path, but I am not looking forward to the head-on collisions.

jppe

I was moving along at a pretty good clip going down the path and some guys came around me completely unannounced. I could have taken all of out had I flinched a little. Ticked me off. It wasn't that far from the end of the path as well. Not a time to race.

Biker395 

Oy, I can visualize that.

There are design standards for bike paths with regard to minimum width for a given slope ... but they are often ignored.

pvillemasher

I've never done the RtR but I've done the Courage Classic ride several times and will again, 23 and 24 July this year. Benefits the Children's Hospital of Colorado. Begin / End in Copper Mountain each day. It was 3 days in the past, this year for the first time it's 2 days, and ~158 miles. Route is up some of the same passes as the RtR. The Courage ride is really well supported, great ride.

jppe

Do you stay in Condos at Copper or camp? There were very limited camping spots in Copper so we opted to stay in a Condo at Mt Plaza for a couple nights.

pvillemasher

I've stayed in hotels, and one year I camped on the Copper property that they allocated for the Courage riders.
This year my wife is volunteering and all volunteers get a room, so I will probably crash with her although I might camp on Copper again just 'cause it's kinda fun and different.


(I just noticed - My avatar is my tent on the lawn at Copper)

outashape

I hoofed the second summit on trail ridge. I was going too slow to keep the bike upright in the wind. I am too old to fall and have an injury because of pride. I rode all the passes the week before the ride. There was 20 feet of snow on trail ridge road the week before and only about 5 feet of snow on the day of the ride. It was a good ride.

TheGMan

I'll be doing the Courage Classic in late July and I believe 1 day the ride is the Copper Triangle. Never rode more than a metric century before, and that was a flat ride at low altitude, 2 days of 80 miles at altitude will be a test for sure.

Spinz

Looks like fun, thanks for sharing. Lp