Road climb of the season

Since moving to the SLC area, I've been working my way through becoming a climber on my road bike, as there are so many steep grades to tackle here. There are four major canyons in the vicinity of where we live, and up until this week, I'd tackled three of them- Emigration, Millcreek, and Big Cottonwood Canyons. The only one left was Little Cottonwood Canyon, which is a ten mile climb that features over 4,000 feet of elevation gain, the same amount of gain that Big Cottonwood holds (but BCC is 15 miles up- so you see how steep LCC is). I figured it wouldn't happen this year, as winter temps are creeping in and the canyons are becoming too cold and slippery for roadies, but the past couple days held record high temps. I had no excuse. I called up Kelly, and although he informed me of how much this idea was going to hurt to make a reality (he'd ridden LCC before), he was actually quick to jump onboard for the painful trip up. I got pretty excited as I drove towards the hulking granite forms that make up the scenery around LCC- they were jeering me on. We actually started our ride from the mouth of BCC, a bit north of the LCC canyon mouth, so as to get a bit of a warm up before hitting the steeps. The climb started really well, and Kelly and I both thought we were tearing it up in good form. But then the steep stuff kicked in. Still doable though. We were both in lowest gear, grinding away endlessly with a super sluggish cadence (felt like singlespeeding on the knees- don't do it everyday). Kelly of course pulled out from me, considering he was pushing a higher gear on his Specialized Tarmac Comp which sports a double front ring, and I was on my steel Lemond Buenos Aires with a triple, allowing me to ride a slower speed with the same cadence. Well, after several miles of the ultra steep with no breaks, both of us started to crack, right about at Snowbird ski resort (very close to the top). I had a Clif Bar in my pocket, and went straight to chewing. I had a goal of getting to the top without ever putting a foot down, so it took me about ten minutes to eat the bar while riding and breathing so hard (I made my goal). The Clif Bar saved me after about ten minutes. It's crazy to actually feel the effect of great quick nutrition after bringing yourself to depletion. Kelly was not fairing so well, as he left his ride food in his car. Whoops. He was still way out ahead of me, but apparently had to get off his bike twice for fear of blacking out. Yikes! He's got an intense degree of determination that most people don't have, however, and made it to the top anyway. I was quite impressed. I met him there shortly thereafter, and we rested for a bit, getting ready for the descent. It took an hour and fifty minutes from our starting point to the top. After we pulled ourselves back together after the exhausting climb, we started down, which only took fifteen minutes to the bottom! Faster than I've ever gone on a bike! 48.6 mph with the brakes on at one point! The road is really smooth and flows great, with lots of stable cornering through the whole descent. If you can make it up the climb, the trip down is a whole lot of fun. But be way careful, those kind of speeds can do you in if you take chances. Ride smart! Anyhow, we pulled it all off and it was a great cap on the big mountain road ride for the season. I think my favorite moment was while reading some of the road grafitti (there's a big event ride earlier in the year, and they paint on the road). Halfway up, someone painted: Quit whining: Go big or go home! :) Nice. You'd think reading that would be a smack in the face in the midst of a painful climb, but it actually put a huge smile on my face. I think I'm ready to settle my grudge with the La Sal mountain loop in Moab. :) Anyhow, here's a shot of the bottom of LCC looking out to the Salt Lake Valley. It does nothing to show the steepness of the top, but I didn't have time to grab a picture during the effort.