Jun 10
30
Day 3 Brixen- St. Vigil
Day 3
Finally a short day only 88km of riding, we should be done this in about 3-3.5 hours right? Right.
http://connect.garmin.com/activity/38744808
I think the data speaks for itself that this was a very humbling, but yet beautiful, day. We learned 2 very important lessons today: 1. Mike and hills steeper than 10% don’t get along very well. 2. We are not the gods of cycling that aren’t riding on the Tour that we thought we were.
Today was a good start from Brixen right into our first climb of 32km. Yes that’s right we climbed 32km. The nice thing was that it was in the shade for the most part and the heat didn’t pose as big a problem as it had the first couple of days. The climb itself was gorgeous as the road took us through farmers fields, around a mountain, and then back around again. We stuck a lot clsoer together today and re-grouped everybody together at the first water station. There were five of us together here, Mike, and I, Lisa (Kelowna), Ellen (Kelowna), and Tanya (Abu Dhabi, via NFLD, via Vancouver). Tanya is a bit hesitant on the downhills so we told her to try to keep our lines and stay on our wheels as long as she could. She did great! When we got to the bottom of this descent we were all together, but that was quickly short lived as Mike put the diesel engine to work and pulled across the valley floor and then along into this copse of trees that was an absolute blast to ride through. There were steep pitches of maybe 10m in there but it was shaded and felt like mountain biking along a paved pathway. I wish we had gotten a picture of the four of us in a pace line. There was another descent after this and Mike got away from us, as usual, and waited at the aid station. Ellen and I stayed together while Lisa ate a banana and brought up the rear. Ellen and I had a near miss on a blind left hand corner as a rider passed by her and tried to take the inside line from me. He missed us both thankfully.
When we met up with Mike we started the last climb of the day the Furklepass (this should have a different F-word name) where we saw, yet again, 18% grades. The real killer was a section of switchbacks at 11% that lasted about 4km. Not good for the spirits. This was getting tough on Mike and his back along with my knees. The only saving grace was that there would be another great downhill. When we finally reached the summit we re-grouped yet again and started the descent. Mike was off the front again and I didn’t see him until I got into town. I was not too far off his time but witnessed my first ever downhill blunder as the rider in front of me slowed down to take a shicane and completely overshot the last corner and went right up the embankment. The good thing was that we had been slowed down by course officials enough that he wasn’t hurt and bounced back on the road quite quickly. The rest of the descent into town was wicked! I felt like I had dialed my nutrition in again as I got close to 1700 calories in and didn’t have the same cramping issues form previous days.
