Granite – Tempting as it may be to end her week-long bike ride at her home in Frisco, Sharon Crawford vowed to pass right on by Saturday and complete the 405-mile Ride the Rockies bicycle tour in grand style.
“Would I leave my bike there and drive up to Breckenridge? That would be cheating myself the last 8 or so miles across the finish line,” the 60-year-old tour veteran said from a roadside aid station Friday. “Of course I want to ride into Breck. That’s the completion point. To have it end in your own county … it’s like you’re riding in triumph. You’ve done it.”
Her plan was to cross the finish line, celebrate briefly and then ride back down to Frisco before returning with her car to pick up her baggage and – she hopes – a new bike that traditionally is given away.
But as the end of this year’s seven-day tour approached, Crawford insisted there were no shortcuts that appealed to her.
“There’s always a challenge to it, to do it every day, to complete it, to not get wiped out, and then get up the next day and do it again,” she said.
While riders such as Crawford can’t seem to get enough of the tour, others conceded they’d had plenty.
“It’s always a sense of relief more than accomplishment. It’s always good to get it over,” said a leg-weary Don Russell, 56, of Longmont. “I don’t think I’ve ever been one of those guys who say, ‘Aw, gee, I wish it could go for another week.’ And this year has been particularly hard with no rest days and seven consecutive days of riding. It’s been tough for me.”
After participating for 17 of the tour’s 20 years, Russell laments getting older and slower.
“You can make it at 20 mph or you can make it at 3 mph, and the 3 mph is a little bit tough for me this year. It’s a little humiliating,” Russell said. “Seventeen years ago I was somebody on this ride, and now I’m a nobody.”
Of course, Ride the Rockies is not a race but merely an athletic exhibition for the 2,000 or so riders, and enjoying the scenery along the way is one of the biggest reasons many participate.
On Friday, riders spun through the Arkansas River valley for 59 scenic miles from Salida to Leadville, passing a string of dramatic 14,000-foot peaks and spacious ranches where horses grazed in grass up to their bellies.
For Saturday, the last major climb of the tour was to take riders over Fremont Pass and then down Ten-Mile Creek to Copper Mountain and Frisco before heading up those last few miles to a celebration in Breckenridge.
Cyclist Carol Williams, 43, of Boulder considers herself in both camps in the had- enough/never-enough debate.
“It’s kind of fun. I’d love to keep going. But I’ll be happy to sleep in my own bed,” she said, looking forward to crossing the finish line. “My legs are OK. My rear end is a little sore.”
RIDE NOTES
Fatherly duty next for tour director
While almost everyone looks forward to wrapping up the 405-mile Ride the Rockies bicycle tour, probably no one is more eager than tour director Paul Balaguer, who will get back home in time for a big to-do Sunday.
His daughter, Anna, is celebrating her eighth birthday, and Balaguer, who oversees every detail of the 20-year-old tour, has some major party prepar ations before he can finally relax.
Considering all the issues he faces organizing the annual bicycle tour, the party should be a proverbial piece of cake.
“I’ve got to be with a bunch of 8-year-olds!” he said with mock exasperation.
