IRONMAN 70.3 Coeur d’Alene is a hilly bike course so I am focusing on keeping those climbing legs I grew for St George that worked so well. So, today I got my 2500 yard swim in and drove out to Palomar Mountain.

I haven’t been out there for two years when I was training to climb the major mountains in the Tour de France [Click Here>> France Trip Blog From 2016]  It was as spectacular as I remembered and especially alive from the heavy rains this year.  Everything was still in bloom and green and those views along the route remain inspiring.  The thing I forgot is how quiet it is up there.  Hardly any traffic so it is just the sounds of wildlife, wind, and your tires on the pavement.  Zen.

 

I was additionally pleased to find that last year they paved the lower half of the East Grade which was getting fairly dangerous to ride.  The amount of patching and potholes was making the decent very dangerous.  It now features 7 miles of smooth downhill (and uphill) pavement.

My goal was to cover the East and South grades today.  No trips to the observatory and the fire tower like in my old days where I had to prepare for Alpe D’Huez.  I succeeded and clipped off 38.5 miles, 5,350 feet of climbing with one particularly hard collision with a bumble bee on the final descent.  I was moving fast downhill and he was buzzing fast in the opposite direction when he slipped between the vent of my helmet and smacked into my noggin.  Ouch!

I celebrated with a non-training meal of a bacon cheeseburger at the Round Up BBQ Grill where I parked. The least I could do to help with parking lot maintenance funding where they graciously let cyclists park.