Highlander

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Ahh the Highlander. So 100 miles, 11,000 ft of climbing just wasn't enough for us. So we decided to add an extra 60 miles and 5,000ft or so of climbing.

Friday Night was the Alpe D'Gannet TT. It was pure pain. I haven't done any real climbing or race like efforts in a few weeks. But I'll take my 2nd place (age group) and 4th place overall finish. My time was 21:48. For the 3rd year in a row climber Chayne Hoag won again with a time of 19:53 this year. I suffered bad on the climb, put too much effort into the run-in before hand and just had a hard time getting a rythmn after the 18% section. It's tough to tell if its an improvement over last year (1 minute or so) but I also flatted last year and got a wheel change at the top of the climb.

Highlander Ride: Casey, Jeremy, Hanggi, Mark and I rolled out of the Hollow at 6:30 am. I pretty much got no sleep as I was jacked up from the TT the night before and then we were up super early for the ride. Hanggi pulled off in Naples to head to work and we rolled on to catch up with Dave. We headed out tackled the climbs and had some fun. With our late start and screwing around we ended up being the last riders pretty much on the road. About 105-110 miles or so in Casey and I dropped the hammer to get to the next sag station as it was getting ready to close. 10 miles of race effort after 110 miles of riding was a tall order, but we just made it in time to pass the word on that there were a few riders behind. Shortly after that Jeremy, decided to roll in with Dave and Mark, Casey and I had another 40 miles to ride. We missed the post ride feeding frenzy at Bristol, so we decided just to grab some caffeine and food and 'take er easy home'. Something about us implying we are going to relax, gets us all fired up and we ended up pretty much flying at full-tilt up every climb on the way home. After we climbed the Prattsburgh Pass and descended into town it was dark with some miles still to ride. Luckily our escorts (Wendy and Val)arrived and gave us a boost home.

Needless to say I was pretty drained afterwards. I suppose if I woulda got pulled over on the way home I probably woulda failed a DWI test.
~J

There are photos of the Highlander Here

I've also added a Photo Gallery Page; Enjoy!