Fat Cyclist TriathAlon

Jolene and I had a great time at the Fat Cyclist TriathAlon. (I'm pretty sure the extra "A" was added by Elden to poke a little fun at the many Utahns who say it that way.)

We left home a little later than expected and ran into a parade in Pleasant Grove that slowed us down. We arrived late, but just in time to jump into the group photo and leave with the group for the mountain bike ride.



I've never gone up Hog Hollow, and while it's an old dirt road and not single-track, it has some charm. It's a long climb with a moderate grade. The fast guys went off the front and I rode with Bob and then Mark at a decent pace. Elden had to take a call at the bottom, and sure enough he caught up to me. For a while I thought it was Mark pushing the pace, but then turned to see it was Elden. As Elden passed I gave him a pinch - payback.

At the top we headed east to climb up to Jacob's Ladder. I've done this climb 2-3 times now. There a hillside where three trail split and the rejoin near the top. I decided to be a little daring and took the middle "harder" trail. It worked me a bit, but I made it. The group stopped at "the saddle" so riders could decide if they wanted to continue on to Jacob's Ladder or go down "the chute" to Sliding Rock.



Jolene and I did Jacob's Ladder, but it was more loose and rutted than that last time I rode it. I told Jolene it's was a spicy decent, but she could handle it. But with the worsened condition of the trail, I hoped she wasn't going to be mad at me for my mild opinion of the trail. She made it down OK and had a smile on her face - I was glad. She rode with Lyna, Bob's wife, and they seemed to have fun together.



Ghost Falls was next after Jacob's Ladder. Some took the flowy new trail (cut a few weeks ago), other took the steeper old trail. The shade was welcome as it was a hot day (in the 90s).



Next was Clark's trail and I was finally able to ride it in my middle ring this year. After my success doing it on my road bike on Thursday in that tall gear, it would have been shameful to go back to the small ring. But it still hurt.

At the top we had to climb back up the same way we went to Jacob's Ladder, and I was already feeling pretty smoked. Mark and I decided to just roll easy in the small ring. But we did take the right "hardest" route up the hill. We still had some moxy left.

At the saddle we regrouped and then descended "the chute". Mark and I were a bit nervous about this downhill since Elden noted that every single one of the guys he rides with has crashed on this descent at least once. So we hung off the back so we could go slow. Mark rolled it fine, and he's only been riding mountain bikes for 3 years. I rode it all without putting a foot down, except when I had to stop for a rider in front of me. But it's a treacherous, rutted out, old dirt road and I could see how just one small slip or mistake and you're going down.

At the end of the chute we had a short uphill to Sliding Rock. I was so looking forward to cooling off in the stream here. This was the second event of the triathAlon. There's a natural slide down the granite rock where the stream flows into a pool below. This event was judged so I brought a costume to enhance my performance (does that make me a doper?). On my first slide I buckled at the waist when I hot the water and cracked my tail bone on a rock on the bottom (it's still hurting a day later), so I learned to stay flat. Dug was true to his word and went down head first (several times) and even convinced Elden to do it. Here are some photos of the event:











After the water event, we biked back to Elden's house for brats (bratwurst). Fish is a fantastic cook and he boiled and grilled those brats to perfection. We enjoyed the brats on a slice of Kenny's home/hand-made bread - delicious. Jeff had some tunes going and we all relaxed, ate, talked and enjoyed ourself.

Elden raffled off some goodies and I won a nice Gary Fisher 29er jersey that I gave to Jolene to go with here 29er Gary Fisher Sugar. She later won some Fat Cyclist socks and gave them to me.



Thanks, Elden, for creating and hosting - we had a great time!

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