Good afternoon all. Today I am writing from a most beautiful cabin at Nova Guides somewhere past Red Cliff, Colorado. Technically I think we are in Camp Hale, which as some of you will know, is where the famed 10th Mountain division of the US Army originally trained for high alpine activities during WWII. It certainly is a pretty spot to train for war.
There are still some old ammo depots and bunker type places lying around the area, but they are more of an interesting attraction than distraction.
Our run today started in a very cold Leadville. If you’d happened to have been driving through Leadville this morning you would have seen all of us runners running along Main Street and out to the highway that leads to Tennessee Pass.
Eventually we turned onto a jeep road and began the biggest climb of the day. It wasn’t too bad, but it certainly got the heart pumping. After about 5 miles we began a descent to mile 8 on more jeep roads.
After some running along a disused paved road we turned onto another jeep road and began another climb. This climb was not particularly steep, but it was a little long. The climb led us to the ski resort called Ski Cooper (no relation to Copper Mountain, much to some tourists’ dismay).
We made a brief stop at the aid station located at Ski Cooper and headed out to finish the last 10 miles of the stage. It was at this point that M pulled out her phone to take pictures as the views were nice. Discovering that her phone was turned off, M turned it on to find that rarest of backcountry beasts, cell service. She also discovered a text message response from the world’s greatest crew chief, sister Sarah! Sarah was responding to M’s earlier request for Larkburger for dinner.
M immediately called Sarah and confirmed that yes, we would like a delivery of burgers and fries for dinner this evening!
After this positive update, our pace picked up a bit because we knew that not only would we be staying in a warm cabin, but we would also be having an awesome dinner.
The last part of the stage was mostly single track with some rolling hills. The trails in this section were very nice trails running through a lovely forest.
After a 3 mile gravel road finish, we were finally done with the day’s 24 miles.
Fortunately we were able to check into our cabin earlier than expected. It was quite a luxury to take a shower in our own bathroom.
Of course it was even nicer when Sarah showed up with our Larkburger order! We had a great dinner with Sarah and we can’t thank her enough for the help she’s given us these last 2 races.
Hoping you all are well and reporting from a cabin nicer than our house, me.