29 June 2019
With the Gray Creek pass and Rocky Mountains ahead of us, we’ve been putting some hill endurance in the legs.
We’ve always watched the road cyclists who train by riding up one (or all) of Vancouver’s triple crown mountains (Cypress, Grouse and Seymour) with a mix of admiration and disdain (because why would anyone want to do that?). And Cypress was something we would never do.
But there we were on Saturday morning, the only two idiots on mountain bikes slogging up the 10.5km of climb at varying gradients around 8-10%. It’s not fun on the way up and the only relief spots were a stop at the lookout to admire our beautiful city laid out below, and a couple of families of deer wandering by.
It’s not fun on the way down either. It’s damn cold when your only work is trying to control your speed. Numb fingers hovering over the brakes, numb butt from the climb and numb brain from trying not to think about what a wipeout would look like.
Cypress done. A few more days of hill sessions on the shorter, steeper hills from the beach to our house and then we are ready for the gruelling next leg from Christina Lake to Cranbrook BC next week. But maybe we can fit in a ride up Seymour before we go …
Trans Canada Epic 