RMCC Challenge Series Triple Crown

This year we started the first Triple Crown three stage series (612 miles and 44000 vertical feet).  The lowest cumulative time for the three stages (Denver-Aspen, Death Ride, Grand Loop) determines the Colorado Triple Crown winner.

Congratulations to Mark Lowe with a winning 2009 time of 37 hours 40 minutes, second place Dick Wiss at 2:58 behind, and third place Ray Rupel at 3:10, fourth place Patrick Nourse at 7:23.

Congratulations to all four for completing the Triple Crown in one year!

After a two year absence due to road construction the 2009 Grand Loop was staged on Saturday August 1st.  It is indeed a grand ride at 200 miles with 14,500 vertical feet of climbing!

Congratulations to overall and men’s first to finish Mark Lowe.  He completed the ride in 11 hours 49 minutes, a new course record!  Congratulations also to women’s first to finish and fourth overall Andrea Koenig (14 hours 11 minutes).

This course starts in Golden, heads up to Estes Park and goes over Trail Ridge Road and then back over Berthoud Pass.  In setting this new record Mark broke the record set in 2001 by Tashi Dennis by 22 minutes.

Also congratulations to the other six entrants who all had excellent times in one of the hardest events RMCC offers.

The 2009 Colorado Death Ride was staged on Saturday July 4th (225 miles and 15500 vert. Feet--the toughest one day RMCC ride).  Congratulations to overall and men's first to finish Mark Lowe (13hr 55min) and women’s first to finish and 4th overall Andrea Koenig (15hr 32min).  Also congratulations to all eight entrants who achieved the fastest overall group speed (14.62 mph) ever for this RMCC event.

This year’s Death Ride (a.k.a San Juan Skyway) was the first RMCC produced in 10 years.  The lapse was due to the extra long drive to Durango and the unsafe (for climbing) road from Placerville to the Telluride junction.  Now that the town of Ridgway has good services we moved the start point there and reversed the course to run it clockwise.  This made for a huge improvement and the ride was a resounding success!  The total drive time was reduced by 3 hours and the dangerous climb is now a fast decent.  The other advantage is that the prevailing winds are more now more favorable.

The ride started at 2AM with clear skies and mild temperatures.  As we crossed over Red Mountain Pass at 4AM we could see the Milky Way.  The riders crested Molas Pass at dawn.  As they descended Coal Bank Pass a downslope tail wind picked up and continued all the way into Durango, and all of the riders were in by 7:30.  At this point it became clear that we were going to have some great times.  Doing this section (81 miles and about 7000 vertical feet) in less than 6 hours is a good time and makes for a great start of this long ride--if you can hold it.

It started to heat up as they turned west to climb Hesperus Hill and onto Dolores (at 127 miles) with 3000 more vertical feet.  Most riders were into Dolores in just over 81/2 hours.  It was now certain we were going to have some great times!

They just did a 200K in 8.5 hours with 10000 vertical feet and were about to start the equivalent of an Elephant Rock century.  We have some great riders in RMCC!

As the riders leave Dolores the first unfavorable condition appears--no tailwind going up the Dolores river valley.  As the locals say this doesn’t happen at this time of day!  Coming into Rico all riders are at a low point.  The gradual, undulating climbing has gotten to them and they now face steeper climbs on the way to the fifth check point at the Telluride junction.

From Dolores to Telluride they do done another 61 miles and 3500 vert. ft.  Spirits seemed up at this point because as the veterans say “you start smelling the BARN”.  36 miles later and 2000 more feet riders arrive at the Ridgway finish with big tired smiles and say to to Charlie Henderson, "Boy that really is a tough and monster ride--the toughest I’ve ever done".  Charlie simply responds, "That’s why we call it THE DEATH RIDE!"

Congratulations to all you again!

Congratulations to overall and Men’s 1st to finish Mark Lowe (11hr 56min) and women’s 1st to finish and 6th overall Diane Benoit (12hr 40min).  Also Congratulations to all 20 entrants (2nd largest since RMCC used to run this as a public ride) who braved very challenging conditions to ride the longest running RMCC event.

This year’s Aspen ride had some of the most challenging conditions in many years.  From the start (Mineral and Santa Fe) to the top of Kenosha Pass, winds were basically but with very damp conditions.  Fog hung in the valleys and on the lower peaks.  Temperatures were in the upper 40s and low 50s and in the 40s crossing Kenosha Pass.  This first section is 58 miles and about 7000 vertical feet, which always makes for a hard start to a long ride. 

The winds in South Park (after dropping off of Kenosha) can make or break a rider on this ride.  This year they broke the riders with head winds increasing in strength and became severe by the time the reached Fairplay.  Thirty-seven more miles of strong head winds to Buena Vista make the ride even more brutal. 

The first six riders through Buena Vista picked up this wind as a strong tail wind to propel them up northwest to Twin Lakes.  But as many of us veterans say, "Crap happens off the back," meaning that the remaining riders got a severe cross wind instead.  There was more headwind as the riders headed west toward Twin Lakes and the beginning of Independence Pass.

The worst was yet to come, however!  Again the riders that cleared the top of Independence Pass by 3:00 PM were in good shape with mild temperatures and overcast skies.  But the rest would have hell to pay.

The weather changed dramatically with rain and hail on the lower parts of the pass to a full on snow blizzard on the upper parts of the pass.  We want to give credit to three riders that used common sense to protect themselves--Keith Pryor and John Hayden who got caught descending on the West side and abandoned in Aspen because of possible hypothermia and Kenneth McCollum at the top because he felt it unsafe to go on.  The three of you did all the hard part of the ride (Good Job!).  Two others hid in a cave on the west side to escape the storms furry and then finished.

The last two Debra Banks and Janet Taffet got hit 2 miles before the top. Debra tells it all:  "Had an epic ride.  Clawed up Indy pass in a downpour—it turned to snow 2 miles from top.  Full on white-out, blizzard conditions with wind gusts that stopped you in your tracks.  Warmed up in the car on top. Put on ALL Clothes including a down jacket!!  For the descent. Got to Woody Creek Tavern w/10 minutes to spare!  AWESOME!!!".

Congratulations to all of this year's participants!