I woke up this morning with a knot in my upper back. It has to be from my neck position, descending off Loveland Pass in the rain yesterday. It is mildly depressing. I know that I haven’t been doing long descents in the mountains for a long time, but I still somehow put the “age label” on it too. Maybe not.

I have been descending a bunch the last few days. Off Independence Pass, the riding over Fremont/Climax Pass both directions and now Loveland. I love descending. Not so much on clincher tires, but I don’t really stress too much about that. I was planning on putting some sew-ups on aluminum rims before I came out here, but didn’t get around to it.

I’ve always been pretty good at descending. My favorite descending days was when I was riding for the Levis Team with Roy Knickman. Roy and I, and sometimes Greg Demgen, would get into descending battles every time we trained in the mountains. One year, before the Coor’s Classic, Bill Cockroft from Mammoth Mountain Ski Area, gave us housing at Alt. 9000 for a month. So, everyday we would start the ride with a big descent down to the town of Mammoth. It is too bad there weren’t Garmins and Strava segments then because we would of set some records that never would have been touched.

Talking about descending and tires, back when the Levis team and La Vie Claire shared riders, I went down to Columbia and did the RCN with Bernard Hinault and Co. We flew into the Medellin Columbia airport. The airport is up on a plateau a few thousand feet about the city. A helicopter wisked Hinault away and the rest of the french guys and us decided to ride into town. It is a crazy descent. Switch back after switch back. Not far down the hill, something was feeling screwy on my bike and then I looked over at Thurlow Rogers’ rear wheel and told him to stop. When we stopped, all our tires had rolled over and we were riding on our sidewalls. The tire glue had melted from braking and the tires were just floating around on liquid glue. Plus, the rims were so hot that you couldn’t touch them. It was nuts. I don’t remember how we fixed that for the race, but, we obviously crawled the rest of the way down that descent.

I had one more memorable experience descending. Another year before the Coor’s race we we training in Breckenridge. I was riding with Eric Heiden, descending down the very same descent I did a couple days ago, down from Climax, Fremont Pass to Copper Mt. I don’t remember exactly how this occurred, but Eric hit a 2 x 4 that was on the road. I looked over and could see daylight under his rear tire. I yelled for him not to brake. He put his hand on my ass and I braked to a stop. He completely toasted both his wheels and if he would have pulled his brakes, he would have fallen instantly for sure. Again, I don’t remember the remedy, probably a foot on the rim, but we did get back to Breckenridge on our own.

Anyway, I’m going to be some more descending the next few days. I hope this knot gets better soon. I hate excuses.

This is my friend Jeff Unruh, from Topeka, climbing up Loveland Pass yesterday.

Sue, Jeff and I at the top of Loveland Pass yesterday.

Jens riding through Leadville a couple days ago on his way to his stage win in Beaver Creek.

I can’t not put this picture of Bromont pointing Prairie Dogs. He looks so regal.

You know it is super cool for US cycling that a race of the caliber of the Pro Challenge comes to Colorado every August now. That being said, I’m not really that much into watching bike races live. Honestly, and a ton of you are going to hate this, I wish they would put in a hard circuit race, maybe even a really hard criterium. At least use the old Morgal-Bismark course where the riders come by 7 or 8 times. The most common comment I hear from non cycling fans is, “Is that it?” Michael Aisner was a visionary with the Red Zinger and Coor’s Classic. The sport has legs on it’s own now, but to keep it growing, the spectators need to be entertained.

Today is the time trial. If I don’t really like watching live bike racing, then you can figure how much I like watching a live time trial. I’m not going to do it. It is amazing with all the climbing in this event that 3 guys can be less than 30 seconds apart in the overall. It should make for a very interesting finish. I’m going to be riding up on the Peak to Peak Hwy. above Boulder when it’s going on.

It is amazing how much better I feel riding at 5500 feet than 9-10K feet. There is lots more air down low. I rode over to Golden and up Look Out Mtn. yesterday with my friend Vincent, who lives in Arvada. I’m getting okay miles in here, but am putting in no intensity. I’m going to St. Louis for the Gateway Cup next Friday-Monday. It is 4 criteriums, so I hope that gets me back up to speed.

Tonight I’m going to meet Trudi at a party at the Grand Hyatt in downtown Denver. It is called Living the Ride and is an event that features Jim Ochowicz and a reunion of the 7-11 team and current BMC team that is racing here. You can click here to get information. I think the tickets are pretty steep at something like 250 bucks, but it is a kind of unique event. It will be nice seeing Andy Hampsten, Davis, Dough and all the other old members of the 7-11 team. When they get together, it is always an interesting time.

Here is Vincent with the city below. He’s always had a pretty unique riding style, but it seems to work well for him.

I’ve been having this problem with my hand for almost a year, so Vincent’s wife, Lisa, who is a physician helped me out. Hopefully it is a permanent cure and not just a band-aid.

This was the scene in Golden a few hours after the start. It was pretty cool, a big screen showing the race with a pretty dramatic backdrop.

I went to dinner in Boulder and walked the Pearl Street Mall. This vending machine was in front of University Bicycles. I’ve known Doug Emerson, the owner, for a really long time. This is a very unique way to supple after hour repair supplies. I’ve never seen it anywhere. It is a great idea in a town like Boulder.

The vending machine has all size spare tubes, quickfils, tools, and blocks. I’d be really interested how much the sell here.

I’m sick of everyone trying to mislead us with sneaky small print. It seems to be common practice where it is advertised one way, and then there is small print telling the rear story. These bottles of water are in my hotel room. One says complimentary and the other has nearly the exact same label and it is $3.95. It reflects a sad state of our society when we have to fool each other for extra pennies.