TJ Woodruff ONLINE

I made it up to the top of Mount Lemmon today. Above 9,000 feet it was cool with temps in the upper 30s. Even with the right gear the first half of the descent was quite chilly. The sight of Tucson so far below begs daunting thoughts of how long the ride back down will be – I always hit E on the descent, never while climbing. This was the first time that I’ve been up past the ski area and these last couple miles of climbing really are the hardest since the grade is quite a bit steeper than on the Catalina Hwy. Door to door the ride was just over five hours with 6000 feet climbing or so – definitely enough to have me feeling spent! I’ll be back for more of this ride, but not any time too soon… I had planned to ride to Summerhaven initially, but I ran into Andy Schultz who was descending as I was mid way up the mountain. He asked if I was going to the top and I said that I was before we parted ways. Motivation can come from many sources, but I knew Summerhaven wasn’t ‘the top’ so I had to do it right this time.

Thanksgiving was quiet but nice as Chloe, Brian and I did the Big Square ride mid day and followed it up with a full on Thanksgiving spread for dinner. Since Brian is a vegetarian, the Turkey was substituted with Tofurky. It tasted pretty good, and my real favorites of stuffing, cranberries, and potatoes made up for any lacking tradition without real Turkey. After a long ride, anything tastes good I suppose.

No CX races over the weekend made for a relaxing occasion. Saturday was spent getting the apartment really dialed in. I bought my first ever power tool, a drill, along with some masonry bits so that I could get some stuff hung from the walls. I also solved the bike storage situation with some ceiling hooks. The BMC’s make for some artsy decor for sure! It turned out as a good way to clear up space and showcase the bikes all at the same time. Now just a few things and the basement will be set too. And I found the bedskirt that matches my comforter finally after many attempts. Maybe this will keep the dust bunnies out from under there?

This weekend will be a double header with a AZ Cross race in Phoenix on Saturday followed by a Tucson CX race on Sunday. This ought to be a good tune up weekend before the State Championship which will be next Saturday. Hopefully the turnout is good once again this weekend. Rumor has it that there’ll be a UCI Cross race in Phoenix for 2008. That’ll be awesome if it all comes together. That’s all for now,  -TJ

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 27th, 2007 at 8:51 pm and is filed under Off the Bike Report, Training Report. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.