The 2012 Rico 100 mountain bike race. 1st place overall on a
singlespeed. 96 miles and 14,000’
elevation gain in 12:07 hours. Super
tough race based out of Rico Colorado!
Epic singletrack and some serious hike-a-bike above timberline. Awesome views!
The racers rolled out of Rico early in the morning and
climbed up to the Colorado Trail where we got on some sweet singletrack that
took us over Blackhawk. We rode it all
the way to the Grindstone trail.
Grindstone is a ridable, but technically challenging, steep downhill into
the Bear Creek basin. Then the route took
us down the Bear Creek trail which is a bit rocky and technical but almost all
ridable. At the bottom there was an aid
station. Took me about 8 hours to get to
the aid station. I knew I was in first
there but they were not far back.
From the aid station another monster climb started. I rode up the Taylor Mesa graded road then had
some serious hike-a-bike on the Calico trail with some amazing views. This is when the rain really started coming
down on me. After riding/hiking on a
long section of Calico the route drops down West Fall Creek trail. This trail is usually a fun fast downhill but
the wet condition made it treacherous.
Just before getting to Dunton the route turned onto the Winter trail
which was a mucky mess. Normally a
mostly ridable climb. Today is was so greasy
it was hard to get traction and even ride much.
At the top of the Winter trail I got on a dirt road that was
mostly downhill to the highway then took that back down to Rico with the rain
dumping on me. The finish was at the Enterprise
bar and grill in Rico. A beer and burger
was waiting for me. Nice job to the
other podium finishers: Doug Byerly 2nd and Jeff Hemperley (SS) 3rd.
Great race!
http://coloradoes.wordpress.com/swes-event-list/rico-run/
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| The Rico 100 podium |
