Monday, April 6, 2009

Snowing in Boulder? Great riding options in south western Utah


Hey Everyone,

Check out the brevet schedule in southern Utah! Lonnie Wolff of the Southern Utah Brevet club has organized a wonderful selection of routes to pick from. Contact him directly to sign up at lonnie@oldairhead.com.


Here is their schedule for the next couple of months:


May 2 Pine Valley Mountain 300K St George

May 30 Hurricane 400K Hurricane Utah

June 20 Bryce Canyon 200K Panguitch, Utah


BTW - all the rides have great scenery and here are a couple pictures from their recent 200K of which I was a guest. (If you read the SUBrevet Blog, yes, I am the lame one that started more than an hour late because I spaced out the time change from Nevada to Utah. I had no idea there was a time change since it was only two hours away! Doh!)



Lonny wrote in his recent newsletter that “Brevet” is a French word that means “strong, crazy people who like to ride in the rain while the warm sun is shining at home.” Well I lucked out on this ride because it was warm enough and sunny in Utah while it was snowy in Boulder. Of course, I did get a little reminder of back home because during the later part of the day as there was a super strong headwind. (Sound familiar?) Literally a blast from the past. I think I clocked all of 5 mph for probably an hour in that section.


Below are some sand dunes. These sort of reminded me of all the snow banks I rode by this winter.


In summary the ride started in St. George, Utah and went to Zion National Park via numerous back roads, some marked, some not. Since I started late I was using an old cue sheet and so I managed to log some extra miles at the beginning and also I got lost near the finish. (I missed a key turn that was also part of an off ramp from the highway. I decided to pass on riding up the off ramp so I ended up riding down a dirt road on the west side of the highway when I should have been on the paved road on the east side of the highway.) Dirt roads don't really phase me but unfortunately the road did disappear after a ways and then I had to pitch my bike over a barbed-wire fence and climb it myself so I could finish by riding on the highway to the next control. I made it over the fence without ripping a hole in my shorts so I consider that leg of the ride a success.


Lots of traffic too. NOT! (The road in Zion was just closed to cars - nice!)



Nice views the entire day.



Visit http://www.subrevet.org/ for more details on riding in southern Utah.

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