Stage 6 - Vail to Beaver Creek

The last day...

Of course with any long journey there are mixed emotions going into the final day.  There is excitement and relief, but also sadness that the event will be over, we will be leaving our new friends and will have to go back to our regular lives and not be just running and eating all day everyday!

Stage 6 would have us leaving Vail Mountain, starting straight uphill for a short bit, then running on roads, yes roads for about 3 miles, crossing over route 70 and switchbacking up some mountain.  Then we would come back down, cross the highway again, and head back up the other side to the top of Beaver Creek before the final descent into the beautiful Beaver Creek Resort and our soft hotel bed that awaited!!

After the uphill start we got into a pretty good groove on the roads.  We didn't go crazy early because this stage had the most elevation gain of all six stage with 5100 ft!

As you can see from the elevation graph, there was a lot of work to be done, so this 3 miles of road didn't have to be rushed.  Going into this stage I don't remember the legs being horribly tired or anything, I think they were past that point and were just running on there own.  I do belive that Jackie and I got stronger as the week went on and stage 6 was no execption as we both felt pretty damn good throughout the stage.  We climbed well on the first climb and the second...the last climb was a bitch and Jackie finally showed that she was human and wasn't pulling me up the hills anymore.  Once we popped out of the trees and onto the access road for that last final descent, it was a great relief that we knew we had accomplished our goal and in the final stage I felt like we were actually racing as we had some back and forth action with a few treams, including two in our division that we were able to beat out and finish in 8th for the day in 4:28:00, finishing one spot behind our good friends Keri and AJ Wheeler.

Once finshed we rounded up our suitcases etc and waited for Thor and Jay to come down the mountain, and we didn't have to wait long as they saved their best day for last and rocked the stage in a solid 5:02:23.  After they celebrated a bit with their wives we headed into the Beaver Creek Chophouse and had a celebratory beer.  Thor wanted a photo of this and as he whipped out his camera someone was walking by, so he asked her to take a photo, however it wasn't just somebody it was Tracy Garneau!  She was happy to help and we got a great photo of us enjoying a local Colorado brew.

After trading stories everyone went their separate ways to check in to our hotels and get ready for the after parties...that story in the next post!

Final Results!

Start of Stage 6

Running through Vail

Across the highway

Running through the trees

They don't mess around with trail marking here...that marker is 5 ft long!

Heading up the last climb

Stage 5 Red Cliff to Vail

Stage 5!  Stage 5 for me was like running the next to last interval of a workout, you say to yourself this is the last hard one, because you can always get through the last one.  In this case however the last two intervals were 23+ miles each!  So as close as were to the end we had two long days ahead of us, a lot could go wrong!

Today's stage started where we finished on day 4.  We were in Mango's to stay warm, as the morning temps were in the 40's.  We started on the same gradual downhill road that we finished on the day before, but in the opposite direction which meant it was now a gradual uphill.

After what we felt was a strong showing in Stage 4, we had some confidence starting this stage.  We moved further up in the starting chute, and since we were on a wide dirt road, and we are mostly road runners, this start suited us well even if it was uphill!  This gradual uphill was about 9 miles long.  After that we jumped onto some single track for a little more climbing but by 10 or so we reached the max elevation which was over 11,000 ft.  We stayed up there winding through the trails on the top of Vail Ski Mountain until about 15 miles where we started the long descent to the finish.  These were mostly mountian bike trails that were twisting and turning with some steep slightly rocky downhills, not east coast rocky though!.

I would say the last 8 miles you could see where the finish was below but you kept winding back and forth down the mountain, in and out of tree covered areas, which made it feel like you would never reach the bottom.  With about a mile to go, you ran into a much more wooded area than we had been running in, and it was rocky and rooty until you came out of this random spot onto an access road where you could open it up down to the finish.  We continued with our late race push and finished stronger in the Mixed Open Division with a 9th place in 4:20:41, over an hour behind Rickey Gates and Anna Frost!

Tonight we would stay in Vail and it just so happened that the US Pro Cycling Challenge was starting their 3rd stage about a half mile from where we had finished.  We headed over there to see some of the riders pass by, and since this was their time trial we were able to see some of the fastest riders start their 10 mile "sprint".

Since this was our last night in camp, the dinner was a little more over the top.  They had steak, chicken, salads, corn on the cob, grilled veggies, baked potatoes, and a whole bunch of other items I can't remember!  It made for easy fueling for the next day.  After dinner, it was same ol' same ol'; awards, photos, video, and off to bed we went, to rest up for stage 6!

Good morning sun...almost.

Welcome to Vail

Vail is down there somewhere

Creek of the day

Cadel Evans

Gourmet Cowboy