Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Stage 6: GOLD DUST - 27.9 miles and 3,379 ft. of elevation…it's all gold dust.

BINGO…..Stage 6 and Breck Epic 2015 complete.  That was a friendly stage in comparison to the other days….I think we were only on our bikes for about 2 and a half hours or so.  The pic on the right is one of a few of the coed duo teams we raced with.  We had a blast getting to know some of the amazing competition out there and making great connections!

  The outfits confirm the "let's just have some fun" attitude that was in the air today.  My personal favorite outfit of the day was Peter Butt's neon tiger kit…amazing, (if anyone knows where I can find one of those I am very interested).  And this guy is no joke on a bike, he's consistently placed in the top 10 this week.  I asked Mike McCormack if I could sport the Cogma Cupcake dress (my favorite) instead of the leader jersey and his response was to have fun and wear what you want.   Thanks Mike because as much as I love the blue jersey I think I look better in a skirt…and when you look good you feel good, and when you feel good, you do good.  Dax tried on my other Cogma Bridgette dress last night to wear, but it was a little too tight.  If we could have gotten our hands on a large he would have been in a dress as well.  Probably better that he wasn't because I swear he would have looked better than I do in a dress.  One of our good friend's Rachel Scott is pictured below with me.  She started this race with another girl as a duo women's team and her teammate had to pull out due to health issues.  I am psyched for Rachel to have pushed on as a solo women competitor, this stage race is no easy task on your own, especially when you went into it thinking you would be a team.  Nice work Rachel!

They started us in category waves today…bad idea. And for some reason our category was the last to go.  So we hopped onto single track in a congo line (see below, the shit show of people pushing their bikes everywhere).  If you have done a big race I am sure you understand the frustration levels that erupt as you all patiently try not to rub too much tire of the person in front of you, knowing you are all in the same boat; with nowhere to pass and someone in the front of the congo line with too much ego or too clueless to just pull over.  So what did I do to ease the situation…tell a couple of my favorite jokes..elephant in a safeway bag and dirty cinderella.  A couple of the guys around us came up to me at the end and said thanks for the comic relief.  It helped passed the time and, for Dax and I, we had little stress going into today feeling strong and having a 30 minute lead overall.  You can actually see one member of the team that beat us yesterday in the corner of this photo. They tried to hang with us for the early part of the day.  Originally Dax and I said we should just hang on their wheel and try to win in the end, you know, play it safe.  But as that duo tried to pass us on the road Dax and I decided we would just race our race and took off.  Dax did an amazing job of being my little tugboat today, we cooked up the dirt roads together.  

Thanks Des Mujer and Oskar Blues for your support at the final summit…beer always tastes the best at the final climb of a race!

Happy finishing faces…Dax and I couldn't have been happier.  We won today and won overall for the week.  It was a surreal feeling to finish today after an incredible challenge and experience with a win as icing on the cake!! Our buddy Nick Gould had quite an impressive finish today as well and we were all psyched to have made it through the adventure of two stage races together over the course of the past three weeks! Thanks Natalie for the post race photo shots!! 

I had to get a photo of these two.  Coach Miller and Dax love to call this the "divorcycle".  But damn if these two didn't prove that name wrong this week.  They did the entire stage race on a tandem bike and were kissing and hugging at the finish today.  Not only did they ride most of the Wheeler stage yesterday, they finished in the top third of all riders!! I am humbled and impressed. 

One final leg soak, even though we aren't racing tomorrow, Dax and I just love it.  It's always amusing for us because people walk the bridge and stare at us in the river like we are some sort of wildlife.  Why would they be standing in the river in this 50/60 degree weather with rain clouds looming?  

Another "Merica" shot…but it gets better….

Mounted on the "Merica" truck is a bulldog mounting a jaguar - ha!

That's all for now…we are ready to celebrate over a few cocktails with friends and attend the final banquet.  I may add some photos later if there is some entertaining shenanigans that come out of the eve. Thanks for reading and supporting us through this week!!

THE 7TH STAGE:……..ouch. This was the hardest stage to recover from…but so fun.

We started the eve with our favorite drink of choice these days..the manhattan. 

And we are so thankful to all the volunteers who make the race happen and are so happy to be out there supporting!! You people rock!

Kelly Boniface, our good friend from Steamboat ended up in 4th this year again.  That's so impressive considering the competition out there - way to go champ!

Dax and I were pretty pumped to get our "World champ" jerseys and frames for our photo! Good crew of couples up there!

Ffej Knar, Hollywood, and I celebrating the close to a great week!

And after a long night a libations we got up the next morning and as efficiently as we could made our way back to Steamboat to support our friends grunting out the Steamboat Stinger race! 

Emily Lawrence and Craig Jones completing their first race together - they had a great race and made matching shirts, so cute.  Cookie crushed doing single speed two laps, Kate and Craig came in an impressive 3rd place including a mechanical, Gretchen had a crash but was killin it (damn beer) with Vince, and Jody let Jeff take a break and had a fill-in ride with her for a successful morning as well! 

To help fight off Breck Epic withdrawals we hung with Larry Grossman, the incredible announcer for both Breck Epic and Steamboat Stinger.  

The fun continues with the Pro Tour Challenge coming through Steamboat again.  Bike polo was a huge success, we were on team S*$% show with the cogma crew and to no surprise Dax crushed as a rookie out there…our team placed 2nd in the tournament.  

Our Cogma designers and strong team players!

Team S$*&# Show - game faces on.  

Mikey, on Team Diva…killin it on the court. 

The Coffey's showed up and grabbed this great action shot for me…my favorite part of the outfit was the Kask helmet, so many compliments on that in addition to the "cupcake" comga dress of course!

Amazing shot of the final game…thank you Helen Brown for organizing and for the photo. 

I love my friends, this town and the positive spirit and energy that everyone brings to this place we all call home. I feel lucky to be part of this place. 

And when I thought I have no more energy, I need to rest, Cheffy, Jody, Snook, Jenn, and Ben kept the fun rolling for one more morning with the manic crew.  Just before the pro tour challenge rolled out of town we rallied up rabbit ears with costumes, fixings for mimosas and met up with friends to support the riders up the challenging climb out of Steamboat.  The manic crew had speakers, tents, food, drinks, and unmatched positive intensity that brought a moment of relief to the riders as they neared the top of the pass.  That wraps up a killer two weeks or riding bikes and being part of an incredible community. 

Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Stage 5: Wheeler - time trial start (awesome) - 22.8 miles and 5,139 ft of elevation. 

What is so cool about a parking lot photo? This captures the moment where the "pump up" magic happens.  Dax and I have gotten into the routine of parking in the "F" lot, queuing up our favorite songs,  "Move Bitch" - Ludacris (thanks Nate Bird) and "My Band" - D-12 to get us fired up for the race.  Nothing like listening to Ludacris while putting on chamois butter and a heart rate monitor.  This spot is also conveniently located by the river access that we promptly visit after each stage.  

Time trial start today…groups of 10 sent off every minute.  Brilliant. 

You know how most people overuse or misuse the word EPIC?… I would have to argue that Breck Epic does neither and is absolutely deserving and defining of the word epic.  In fact I had to look it up on urban dictionary and add what I found to my post because it is hilarious: 

TOP DEFINITION

   

epic 

the most overused word ever, next to fail. for even more asshole points, use them together to form "epic fail." 
everything is epic now. epic car. epic haircut. epic movie. epic album. epic shut the fuck up. 
saying "epic win" doesn't make you sound any better, either. and for fucks sake, don't ever say it in person.

 Every day I say, "now that ride was more epic than yesterday".  But truly today was quite possibly one of the most epic days I have ever had on a mountain bike, in a really great way.  It was my favorite stage of the entire week.  We started off climbing and continued to climb for a large chunk of the morning, relentlessly.  But we did not just climb in granny gear…there were extended mandatory "hike-a-bike" sections.  We ended up at the top of peak five, after summiting Wheeler pass, on the Colorado trail surrounded by the most pristine wilderness, snow patches, and Ffej (the one man show today) who had gotten up with us this morning to ride up to the pass with oreos, cokes, and beers. That's a good friend.  Today made me seriously consider wanting to tackle the Colorado trail ride someday.  The scenery is stunning and I was feeling so lucky to be out there sharing this experience with my best friend.  A highlight of the week for me.  Literally felt like riding on top of the world!  I think at we peaked out at about 12.600 feet of elevation on the ride today.

Huge kudos to Ffej Knar (Jeff Rank), who has stepped up as not only our host, Vomit Hill doughnut provider, Top of peak 5 beer greeter (with lots of other goodies displayed in the photo).  We can not forget to also give a shout out to all the welcoming smiles at the top of Wheeler pass with Skittles (thanks Jonathan Davis with Elevated Legs) and bacon (thanks Devon and Daniel).  And of course our sweet support Ava (wife of Mike who is killing it in the 50+ division) who got snicker feeds into both Dax and my mouth while we rode past her. We were both impressed. It makes our day to see happy familiar faces out there everyday while we are suffering!  

One of my favorite shots from Ffej of our friend Nick Gould, who was also up in Canada at Singletrack 6.  It was truly an experience of a lifetime today!

And the long awaited and well earned downhill.  Coach Massey giving me some tips before we begin the descent…this is not his first rodeo.

The descent was technical, demanding, amazingly scenic, fast, and most importantly upright! At least the majority of it was.  Fun factor ran high today as Dax and I let it rip on the downhill with some caution in mind.  Wheeler stage 5..biggest success no injuries.  Nemesis defeated for Dax Massey.  Two years ago he punctured a lung on this stage.  A year ago to date he dislocated his shoulder on this stage and today he stomped it. 

Every night we have awards and course descriptions.  I had to throw in a photo in honor of Mike McCormack (the race director) because he is so damn funny.  He has done a really great job of organizing the race and keeping it light hearted with comedy every eve.  

We came in second today by a about 45 seconds.  It was a time trial start so the 2nd place team started 3 minutes behind us today.  When we finished they came through the finish line about a couple minutes behind, but we weren't timing so we weren't sure who had won until awards tonight.  Despite letting the stage win slip through our fingers we were happy; we had such an adventure today, stopped for beer, laughed with each other, and finished injury free.  

We still maintain our blue leaders jersey with about a 30 minute lead overall.  Please send good energy for us in the final stage tomorrow.  We are looking forward to the 7th stage just as much…maybe a tad more than the 6th stage.  

Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Stage 4: The Aqueduct; 41.3 miles and 6,282 ft. of elevation

Ok.  This is epic.  And quite possibly one of the hardest mental races I have done on my bike.  It is not a race of technical/singletrack skill, but rather a race testing the wits, experience, preparedness, and ability to endure on top of having skill.  (which I am clearly lacking in a couple areas) Stage 4 made me cry.  For real, I cried.  The word was out last night that this stage would hurt.  I think it became obvious to everyone that this might be a tough stage when reading through the course description and the second climb of the day is appropriately named Vomit Hill…oh, but that is only the second climb of four considerable climbs of the day.   I actually liked Vomit hill, but that seems to be the trend for me; I don't mind the early climbs, it's the punch in the gut climbs at mile 35 that crush me. 

 There are still highlights of the day though…one highlight, as always, are the incredibly talented and fun people you meet and get to connect with in a different way than you might with most of your good friends.  This picture features Sara Sheets and Evelyn Dong both leaders in their categories of open women single speed and open pro women respectively.  Kelly and I got to ride a portion of our race together today prior to vomit hill and it was so fun to chat and cruise some fun descents together.   I really love having other inspiring girls out there.  

And probably my favorite highlight of the day…. beer and doughnuts aid station at the top of Vomit Hill thanks to Ffej, Coach Miller, Karen Jarchow, and Devon.  Ffej, Jarchow, and Devon are getting some great photos/video and I am so thankful to our dedicated beer supplier Coach Miller for picking up the can of Ranier as I finished the last couple swigs of what Dax left for me.  Ffej was all excited about the doughnuts and so was I, although I only saw a photo of them…I think I was too focused on the beer in the moment.  These supporters ROCK…definitely needed on days like today!

So I cried today. It was after the 3rd significant climb of Keystone Gulch Rd to West Ridge trail.  I was giving the climb everything I had at this point and once we got onto single track it was rolling and I fumbled.  Dax was behind me as well as a couple other dudes.  I jammed up about 3 people, but I was exhausted and just couldn't muster up the energy to push through the little rock uphill portion.  So I apologized, hopped off my bike and immediately could sense Dax was frustrated with me…well after the race he explained he was frustrated with the guys on our wheel, but it came out on me in the moment.  And I couldn't handle that so I just cried and said I am doing the best I can.  I know he didn't mean it, but you are so vulnerable during these races, they can result in some unravelling due to the level of endurance required.  I also understand that his position to follow me all day is just as hard as my position of pushing myself as hard as I can all day.  He could rip through what I am riding so fast and ride his own clean line, but he is patient and supportive for hours on end.  Regardless, we kissed and made up by the end of the race.  

Great results for Kelly Boniface today - she not only finished in third today for the stage, but she managed to work her way into third for the week overall!! That is super exciting and I think she has podium on the brain after finishing 4th last year.  I love this podium of women - all incredibly talented and deserving spots!

Dax and I continued to widen our gap with another win today.  I think we are now about 30 some minutes ahead of second and third.  But we are still working our tails off every day, riding as hard as we can and keeping ourselves humble. 

And our carborocket provider found himself on the podium today.  He just began the second round of the three day option called the epicurious.  So psyched for Brad Keyes with carborocket…way to work the event and then show up to crush!

I had to throw a shout out to Coach and the "Radio" Cam because Coach supported with beer today and then rolled on to Boulder for some Yeti work, which allowed for some time to catch up with the Radio over a beer.  Coach and Cam were part of our 24 hour Old Pueblo "Team Fun" and it was f@#$ing fun! 

Finally, a finishing photo that sums up how we wrap up every night here at the trailer.  Manhattans and ice cream, Phish food to be exact.  It is our secret to success and happiness.  Highly recommend.  Please, if you are reading this, cross your fingers for a safe and mechanical free day for us tomorrow.  The Wheeler stage is Dax's nemesis.  He ended his race 2 years ago with a punctured lung and earned a dislocated shoulder last year although he was still able to pull off an overall win by finishing the 6th stage despite his injury. 

Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Breck Epic 2015 - Breckenridge, CO 9600 ft. in elevation

Stage 3: The Circumnavigation of Mt. Guyot: 35.6 miles, 6,264 ft of elevation gain.

Stage 3 might have gotten the best of me.  It was my favorite stage of the week until the last climb, which Coach Miller best described as "punch yourself in the nuts and then half way up punch yourself in the nuts again even harder".  (note to all blog readers, avoid riding your bike up American Gulch road at all costs).  This seems to be the trend of the Breck Epic…ride some super sick, sweet, high alpine trails and then get humbled, crushed, and/or demoralized as you climb your way back home.  Today Mike McCormack decided to set a zone where all blue jersey leaders get to start ahead of the rest of the pack, which is pretty sweet for us because we don't have to get to the start line 30 minutes ahead of the start time. (which doesn't really matter because Dax likes to just back into the start line regardless) 

Highlights of the day include breathtaking views at the top of French Gulch trail/French pass, which also happen to be the location of the skittles aid station, hosted by our beloved Jonathan Davis (who sells the Elevated Legs that are a HUGE part of our successful recovery - thank you!!), and beer tasting (or chugging depending on your status) hosted by our incredible Carborocket rep (who has also been a huge supporter for our race fueling - thanks!) Brad Keyes.  Another highlight was riding down another section of the Colorado trail which was fast and demanding with some decent technical riding required. It's also always fun to see friends and volunteers along the trail that make this race possible and way more fun…featured below are some of our favorites, Kyle Stamp and Karen Jarchow.  There were rumors that these two were going to race the co-ed duo at Breck Epic this year and they would either be crushing us or making us work even harder than we already are every day! Thanks for being out there you two!

And look at these two.  Coach Miller and Zeke.  This is the look of a 3 day finisher, an accomplished Epicurious rider.  These boys were making us all jealous of being done.  Today they wrapped up some strong finishes in the 3- day race.  I think they both thought they did not have a great day, but they are still impressive in my eyes and I think they had some good laughs throughout the day.  

The boys - looking thrilled. 

Some more finishing shots - it's great to have another girlfriend from Steamboat out there riding and I told Kelly today that I was throughly impressed that she does this race on her own..and not only does it, she nails it.  That takes some tough mental fitness.  I don't know how I would fare without Dax, nor do I know that I would want to ride without him now that I have been so spoiled.  I had to get off my bike twice to push up the last bit of the last climb.  Dax kept telling me we could almost see the top, but I just  needed to put my head on the bars and hike my bike.  I told him I might cry and this might be the bottom of the pain cave.  I just love having someone out there as support and to suffer with. 

Yes! We all finished close enough together today/the weather cooperated(ish), so we got to enjoy one more river soak session with the crew before Coach and Zeke heckle us tomorrow and avoid the cold river on a typical 50 degree afternoon. This picture does a great job capturing those who are done (beers and feet/maybe ankles in the water) and those who are halfway done (no beer in hand and fully immersed to gain all benefits possible to sustain the next 3 days).    

And a podium shot.  We won today by an even wider gap.  Happy about that.  Hoping for continued good luck.  There is a pretty great battle going on between 2nd and 3rd at this point.  I do not have a podium shot of Kelly because she came in 4th today, but she is only 3 minutes away from 3rd overall and I have a feeling she can taste it and she will be revisiting that podium this week!

You are never quite done during a stage race, you finish, immediately begin recovery, refuel, rest for a minute, attend awards and race route announcements, wash bikes, refuel again, make your manhattans and repeat.  We are thankful for the bike wash station - nice work WD - 40 bike! We want Dax's sexy new Domahidy titanium bike to continue to look good and ride even better - well designed Steve Domahidy!

The Trailer boys…so Dax and I might not be done, but they are…so what do Coach and Zeke want to do? Come to the Ffej's trailer, play some games, drink some Ranier, and have a few good laughs…helping us not take ourselves too seriously.  This is one funny group of boys…in fact I can hear them all being stupid and laughing as I write this.  It's time though. Sleep is on the docket - another BIG day tomorrow - apparently the QUEEN stage.