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| 2025 TEAM FD LEADVILLE MTB |
My Leadville career can now legally vote, join the military and star in a porn flick. It has reached the age of majority. Eighteen, baby! This one wasn't easy, but really none of 'em are. Heat, hellacious winds, poor air quality, and another year older. A quadfecta of hurt.
I didn't slack off in my training this year, but I certainly didn't return to the intensity or volume of my carefree youthful 40s! I rode consistently starting in January with a Peloton program, skied over 100 days last winter, played ice hockey all winter, and started my outdoor riding in late April. Like the last few years, despite the reduced training, I felt pretty good coming into race-day. I was hoping to get back under 10 hours, but I didn't really care if I didn't. My strategy every year is to just ride within myself and the final result will accurately reflect my fitness.
I started in the orange corral under clear skies and temps in the low 40s. Unfortunately, it was supposed to climb into the mid-70s today with no rain in the forecast. When the sun shines with no clouds, 75 degrees feels like 90 degrees. Not my favorite. The bigger issue at the start was the poor air quality thanks to wildfires in the region. There was a smoky haze in the air and the AQI was well into the unhealthy range. Breathing at over 10,000 feet is tough on a good day. Breathing at over 10,000 feet on a dusty course for 10-ish hours is lung-punishing struggle. What would breathing at over 10,000 feet on a dusty course for 10-ish hours with shitty air quality be like? Let's find out!
I was joined in the corral by fellow Team FD teammate Anders Pokela. We lined up at 6:15 and our corral was off at 6:40. There was nothing unusual about the first 5 miles to the base of St Kevins and the Kevins climb itself went smoothly with no weariness. Anders had jumped out ahead of my, but I decided to keep the first 10 miles to Carter Summit pretty mellow to conserve energy for later. I hit Carter Summit at 57 minutes. This was quite a bit slower than my faster years and even slower than last year, but I was feeling good and planned to pick up the pace on the climb up Hagermans. Most importantly, both tires still had air in them (after last year's flat approaching Carter).
On the glorious descent down Kevins pavement, I slammed some fluids and hit "play" on my Air Shokz. When the road turned back up, I stood on the pedals and decided to test the legs. I started passing riders, including Anders, and kept a strong pace until the rocky climb section of Sugarloaf. I crested Sugarloaf at about 1:45 and figured I was on about a 9:45-9:50 pace. Fun descent down Powerline with no real hold-ups. Some refuel at the new Outward Bound aid station at 2:06. A lonely stretch between Outward Bound and Pipeline where I got stuck in no-man's land between pacelines. Smooth ride through the Pipeline and then an arrival in Twin Lakes at about 3:10 where I was happily greeted by the FD crew led by wife Lisa, daughter Bailey, and buddy Dan Gilbert.
Leaving Twin Lakes, I had a sub-10 finish well in sights and was actually looking forward to tackling the Columbine climb. I felt pretty good for the first 4 or 5 switchbacks and even tried to push myself for another 1mph of speed as I hit switchback #7. Then the bottom fell out. The stretch between #7 and #8 is an endless 1.1 mile slog and I suddenly felt like I was riding in quicksand. My legs were lifeless, I was hot, and I just wanted to get off my bike and walk. I dropped down to granny and just spun my way slowly up to the A-Frame, losing valuable minutes in chunks. I didn't mind the slow hike-a-bike up the rocks as I was happy not to be pedaling. On the bright side, no cramps on this section for the first time in ages.
I reached the Columbine Summit at 5:25 and chugged two cups of Coke. I also had to fix an issue with some rocks in my cleat that were not allowing the cleat to clip into the pedal. A 2:15 ascent of Columbine pretty much killed the chance at sub-10 . . . though at least my midway time was 10 minutes faster than last year. As always, the descent was fun, but I took it fairly cautiously. With no time goals to beat, it wasn't worth a crash to gain a few extra seconds.
Rolled back into Twin Lakes at 6:10 and was happy to join the aid station party for a few minutes of rest. Tried to put on a happy face, but I felt pretty trashed and was NOT looking forward to the next 45 miles.
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| Getting a Great Push from Dan |
On the climb out of Twin Lakes, the winds picked up to ferocious levels, further adding to the misery. Anders passed me on the climb up and I figured that would be the last I saw of him. I was struggling to just turn the pedals.
I continued to slog through Powerline and then strangely started feeling a little better about halfway through. I re-passed Anders a few miles before the old Pipeline Aid station and once I hit Outward Bound, I decided it was time to set a new time-goal for incentive . . . mostly because I just wanted to be done and the faster I could make myself go, the faster I could get off the damn bike. Last year I hit Outward Bound at 7:40 and finished in 10:28. This time I was at 7:33 and randomly chose 10:20 as my new goal.
The start of the Powerline climb was its usual suckfest and the hike-a-bike was a windy hot deathmarch. Once past the hiking, I just kept on slowly pedaling and was more or less able to ride the rest of the way up. I reached the top at about 8:43 and determined that I could come in under 10:20 as long as I didn’t stop to smell the roses . . . all of which were wilting from the heat anyway.
Had a lot of fun bombing down through the rocks on Sugarloaf and I passed a bunch of riders going up pavement Kevins, including another fellow FD buddy, Andreas "Dre" Harl. Dre was a good 15 minutes ahead of me at the halfway point, but was apparently suffering from a virus that was crushing him in the late stages of the race. There was nothing I could do for him, so I just kept moving. I hit Carter Aid at 9:23 and didn't bother stopping as I still had a fairly full bottle of fluids. Had no issues getting through the rollers before the Kevins descent, rode the descent pretty conservatively to be safe, and enjoyed the tailwind on the valley dirt at the bottom.
I crossed Leadville Junction at 9:57 and knew I needed to keep pushing to get under 10:20. Heading up the Boulevard, I had a guy on my wheel for a good mile who finally asked me why I was pushing so hard when we had already missed the 10-hour mark. I told him that "I always like to finish the round with a birdie!" He laughed and then I dropped him. I stood on the pedals for the last little climb up the 6th Street pavement and then enjoyed the fast descent to the finish, crossing the line at 10:18. Got the finishing medal from Merilee along with big bear-hugs from both Ken and Merilee. Another one down and so glad to be done.
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| Spent and Dirty at the Finish |
As an aside, Anders and Dre both finished about 10 minutes behind me. Good for Dre for pushing through his malady to get across the line. A more important aside is that as of the date of this writing, I have raised over $115,000 this year for First Descents and our Team of Leadville racers have raised over $260,000. That brings my 19-year total to over $1.7Million. I have such gratitude for all of my friends and family who have supported this effort over the years. And the best aside of all is that my daughter, Bailey, who now works for First Descents, was in charge of this year's Team FD and actually wrote my fundraising missive this year. So cool considering that her first experience with my racing Leadville was as a 5-year old!
