Tucson Camp - Day 2

After a "easy" warm up day we got things going on our second day in Tucson with a ride to and over Gates Pass. We eased your way through the city on city streets and finally began the short 5 mile climb up to Gates Pass. This is a pretty easy grade for the first few miles then gets a little steep just prior to the summit (gate). I was in the second pack about 2 minutes behind the leaders up the climb.

After a short regroup we headed down the backside of gates pass which is a short steep technical descent before flattening with some rollers. My group headed continued on for a loop of about 10 miles. Everyone else was on tri bikes and things got rolling in the paceline which was smokin fast. The group was rolling along at about 30 miles an hour. I was at the back of of the group trying to hang on but it didn't last long. I was feeling the effects of my sinus infection still. I ended up a couple minutes back at the end but still holding 25-27 mph on my own.

The group I was in were no slouches. It included Sam McGlone (2nd at Kona this year) and TJ Tollakson who was 3rd at Ironman Louisville in 8:46 and 30th in Kona in 9:03 with a 4:44 bike split at the front. Sam was leading this group and this little woman can fly, really impressive.

We then needed to go back up to the top of the pass which wasn't long but it was steep most of the climb was over 20% grade with the last section topping out at 26%. We finished off the ride back down to Tucson and through the city streets including cutting through the University of Arizona.

After a little downtime and refueling we headed out for a short 45 minute run as we're going long the following day. It was a great little run and I had the opportunity to run and chat with Peter Reid which was really cool. I'll post separately about our chat later.

No pictures to post as I forgot my cable for my camera. More updates to come from Tucson.