Colorado Koppenberg

Yesterday was one of Colorado's "classic" bike races. The Koppenberg is famous in Europe, so of course Colorado had to make one of their own. It was a 5.5 mile loop with about 70% dirt and 30% road. The crucial part of the race was the Koppenberg climb, which was a very short, but steep climb maxing out at 17% grade.

This was my first weekend back home after being on the road racing every weekend since San Dimas back in March. I really wanted to do this race because my teammate Drew is the defending champ, and I wanted to go support him. I was worried about the body being tired after a hard block of racing, but the real scare was the altitude. I have not been back in CO long enough to adapt to the altitude, so I knew we were going to be in for a lung buster.

The race started fast and our plan was to be the first 3 going into the climb, to be safe and make the split if one happened. The race was fast and hard on the front to the base of the climb, but we got in good position. It was a good thing, because there was a crash right away that took out a lot of guys. Drew got into a small break over the top on the first lap, but was brought back on the road. A counter attack went and I was unable to respond right away and they got a gap quick. Conor got to the front and killed himself to bring them back before the climb again. The rest of the race played out about the same all day, dropping riders one by one on the climb. Then about halfway through, a big lighting storm rolled in and made things interesting, For some reason someone thought it would be a smart idea to lay hay down on the climb that morning to “absorb” the wet mud thinking it would make it easier to climb. But when the hay got wet it became VERY slick! The climb turned into an ice rink and guys were falling all over the place making it very difficult to ride, so we had to run the climb multiple times. Gage Hecht has some mad skills and was able to ride the climb when the whole field had to run, and got a gap quick and held it to the finish line. Meanwhile, everyone else was having troubles trying to clip back in on the top of the climb because our pedals were full of mud.

It was very interesting trying to clean out your cleat while racing over dirt. Drew Christopher had the best way to deal with that, a shoe hand up!!! I have never seen a shoe hand up before in the middle of the race, but while guys were cursing their cleats and pedals, Drew was sliding into a new pair of Bont shoes and able to ride back to the front. Once Drew was back in and there was one lap to go, there was a 4 man break with the guys who were able to ride the climb or able to clip back in right away. I went to the front to bring the gap back down rotating with a few guys to the base of the climb. The last time up the climb you could ride up it if you stayed on the left hand side. I had a guy cut me off at the base of the climb and there was no way around him so I had to go much slower up the hill. By that time the leaders had a 5-10 second gap on me and there was no brining them back. Drew finished a strong 3rd on the day and this was his third year being on the podium for this race.

5280 Elite was on site and captured some really good photos and video. Photos provided by 5280 and stay tuned for the video.

I am currently still coughing up a lung.... damn altitude

Thanks for reading,

Ginger 1