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.