DM & SB Training Ride: 35 Miles and a Mountain!

Scotty and I set out this morning to conquer South Mountain for the second time in about a month. Rather than driving out, we met up at the Civic Space Park in downtown Phoenix and rode to South Mountain Park before beginning our ascent to the tv towers at the summit. The weather was nice, but even at our 6:45am start time, it was well into the 70s and started warming up fast.

We had a pretty steady ride out to the base of the mountain and took a pause at the foot of the first long climb. There were A LOT of other cyclists out this morning, so we had lots of friendly company along the route. We started our climb right behind a couple other cyclists, which helped moderate our pace a little bit. We had a really consistent speed climbing - until we hit the last mile and a half or so. The final stretch is quite steep in spots and it's no secret to my friends how much I really hate the very last half mile. Today, though, I was able to take that hate and turn it into some butt kicking power to crank up the final hill.

We took a quick breather at the top of the mountain. Both of us probably look like hell, but we had a great ride to the top.

We caught our breath pretty quickly, got our celebratory "we kicked this mountain's butt" photos and set back toward home.

On the way back home, Scotty blew another flat. We got it changed pretty quickly and were back on our way. Great ride today, excellent workout. Here's the elevation profile for today's ride:

ONE MORE TRAINING RIDE BEFORE AIDS LIFECYCLE! AND ONE WEEK TO THE RIDE!