Stage 4 – Aqueduct

This stage would take us over to Keystone in some fairly flowy more fun terrain, then treat us to a pretty long fairly gradual climb back up to the top of some mountain, with a big descent off of it, then a relatively short climb before hitting the flow trail descent back to the finish. I was feeling a little better about things after the tighter finish on Guyot but still not great. The week was also starting to wear on me a little bit but there was work to be done and looking at the elevation profile of this stage it looked like it could be a good one for me. Fairly gradual climbs and some good descents, without much flat.

I still tried to take the approach early of not going too hard and not necessarily trying to make sure I was right on the wheel of all of the others but just keeping them in sight. Once again this worked out well, as we got into the meat of the first climb I was right in the middle of it and when the others got off to walk I found myself with a little more left to be able to make the pass.

As we rolled through the flowy stuff, one of the other SS guys went around, I was fairly certain I could bring him back later so I wasn’t all that concerned. There were a couple of steeper climbs and some fun short descents, I made sure to eat and drink according to plan and kept on rolling. Jordan Carr, the SS who finished right behind me on Day 1 hadn’t ridden Day 3 after an injury on Day 2 but decided to give it a go on day 4, apparently had some more energy and after riding together for a while he decided it was time to go and dropped me like I had been standing still.

I still had Dahn and Dan behind me with Regus right in front of me as we got to aid 1. Change of bottles and a reminder to eat some more and we were starting the big long climb. The first bit of it was gravel road, then onto some doubletrack. As I expected Dahn rolled up pretty quickly on the gravel road, I made sure to just stay with him. I felt like if I could stay with him over the top that the end of the stage suited me a little bit more. So we picked up the pace and rolled together for a while. He ended up opening up a little gap as we got on the doubletrack but not too big.

As we started down the other side the descent had some teeth, which I felt was a good thing for me. So much fun was had ripping down this thing that felt like it kept going on and on. Finally when it popped out on the road I saw Dahn just up ahead. Whatever gap he had was pretty much closed down on that descent.

Aid 2 and a few more rolling sections before we started up the last little grunty climb. We got into one steep section and I saw Dahn step off to start walking. While I wanted to follow suit I figured this was my shot, so I stayed on and made the grinding pass. Only to step off a minute or two later. However it was enough to get over the top first. As soon as I was off the climb I put my foot on the gas to open up any gap I could.

A few minutes later I was walking up another section and caught a glimpse of Dahn at the bottom. A little too close, so I hopped back on and rode through a few sections I really wanted to walk. I took another look and couldn’t see him. The next section was fairly rolling with some pretty punchy rollers, I made sure to keep on the gas through these and opened up what I felt was a pretty good gap. As we got closer to the final downhill section I saw the 3/4th place womens Rider, Evelyn Dong, having followed her through a few other descents I was happy to see her.

She entered the singletrack in front and I happily got in behind her. This last section is a bermy flowy section that is a lot of fun but not my strength. I’m much better off following someone through it than riding on my own. So I got a bike length or two behind her and we were off.

I crossed the line as the 2nd SS with Dahn not too far behind, but Dan Durland didn’t come in for a little while. So I made up some time on the 3rd place GC, all and all it was a really nice bounce back day. I felt good pretty much all day and had good results, and felt like I had a plan/stuck to it.

On to Wheeler….