Hill Climb

Campers still haven't arrived here in Las Cruces so I'm still riding solo. Today I decided to challenge myself a bit with a hill climbing workout. Last year Khai (otherwise known as the undisputed King, and Mayor for Life of Dumbassville) and I tacked this mountain climb to the end of a 35 mile spin and ended up scaring an old lady shitless when we had to "borrow" water out of her outdoor faucet...we tried to knock!

Anyway, the ride is extremely deceiving because it is uphill for 9 miles, but 7 of those are false flats. So it is easy to get frustrated with your slow pace if you aren't aware that you are actually climbing. To make things a bit more challenging, Paulo told me to do the steepest 2 miles twice.

So here are some pics of my early morning ride:

Approaching the mountain:



Closer...



Views from the top:



Can't go any farther!



Las Cruces from above:


And here is the ride as recorded from my Garmin (red is my heart rate, grey is elevation)



Then Smartass and I headed over to the pool for some rest and relaxing before my 3k swim workout. As I was trying to complain about how hard the climb was, he gave me a quick message:



After the swim we vegged for a couple hours before our 5.25 mile trail run through the desert sand. And then it was time for Paulo, Jonathan, and I to meet up with Danny and Jacqui for Quiznos! The meal of choice for world class coaches:



That's it for today. Tonight Khai hopefully arrives after missing his flight this morning and being stuck on standby all day. Then tomorrow night we head out to El Paso to pick up a bunch of athletes, including Sergio Marques, otherwise known as the fastest runner in Ironman. Should start getting crazy now. I hear there is an 80 mile ride in my near future up a different mountain. Good times.