Mike's Bike Ride

Hi again, I'm still doing little posts about our vacation.
One thing Mike said he really wanted to do in Utah was to cycle the "Zabriskie Route" as much as he could. He did a good job...NO, a GREAT job! He rode his bike almost every day we were in Utah averaging 30-40 miles a day. That may or may not seem like a lot to you, but keep in mind, we live in Tennessee...LOW elevation...Utah??? Not so low!!! In fact, Utah's lowest point doesn't match up to Tennessee's highest point!



Mike trained hard the whole time we were in Utah. He was up early and out the door, gone for a few hours and then home to spend time with family. His "ride" was to be a roundtrip from his mom's house, up Provo Canyon to Timpanogos and down through Highland. (He altered the route a little but kept the same mileage)He worked so hard! He got sick the day before his ride was scheduled, but recovered pretty well. Me and My father-in-law were supposed to be has SAG (support and gear) team following him with water refills, food, and whatever else he needed. He got all settled started up his BIM tracker and headed off down the street.



The plan was for him to get a slight headstart. Then we'd follow up behind him. We gave him more than a slight headstart... :(
He had made it to the base of the mountain as we were pulling out of the driveway. I don't think either one of us had anticipated him making such good time on his bike. Because we were so far behind him, he had to ride a few laps around a local school until we got there for him to refuel and refill his water bottles.
I felt so bad knowing that he was waiting for me. I sped down the freeway...a little higher than the posted speed limit!
From the school we let him leave ahead of us, knowing we would pass him before the turn off to head towards Sundance and Timp, and that he shouldn't need us before then. I let my father-in-law take the wheel at that point so he could drive up the mountain....somehow we missed our turn to go up the mountain, and ended up in Heber! It wasn't all together a bad thing...because He called us just before he got to Sundance to tell us that he just couldn't go any farther, and needed us to come get him. At this point we were just getting back to where we had missed our turn so we headed up the narrow and very windy road. While we were driving up he came zooming past us! So we had to find a place wide enough to allow us to turn around and load him and his bike. He said he "hit the wall" as far as his muscles were concerned, and that it wasn't the altitude that was the problem. All in all...he looked at it as a success. To read about his ride in his words, click the link to look at his Cycling Blog under our links.