and onto the wasatch back

Sunday morning, the air in the Salt Lake valley smelled like a campfire - from the area/California wildfire smoke - so we were glad to throw our MTBs on the truck and drive over to Park City.  It had been more than a month (!!!) since we had been on our MTBs; I hoped I remembered how.

P, taking a corner

Because we planned to watch the end of the Tour of Utah, we met P at the Park City high school parking lot, then rode the bike path out of town to the Quinn's trail head.  The air was pretty warm but every now and again we got a cool-ish breeze.  The trails were extremely dusty since there hasn't been any appreciable rain in I-don't-know-how-long.  There weren't many cars at the trail head, however, and we saw very few people out on the trails.

A, same corner but slower

To ease back into things, we took it relatively easy, not making P climb too much his first time out with us.  We did do PorcUclimb (still my new favorite) and Down Dog, and the top half of Rambler's Sweet Sixteen switchbacks, and did the long downhill on Rusty Shovel, among others.  It felt good to get back on my MTB although I do need to get new treads; I've never replaced my front tire and even my rear tire, which has been replaced once, is getting thin.

A breakaway right at the start of Stage 6

When we started back to town, we managed to time it just right to see the Tour of Utah riders heading out.  There was a neutral start in town and then, just before they neared where we were, the neutral zone ended.  By the time they hit that first corner, they were flying: a couple of riders out front already and the rest of the peloton whooshing by.

... and then here come the rest of them

After they had ridden out of sight, we rode back to our trucks, got cleaned up and had a quick lunch.  We jumped the free Park City shuttle and rode it into the old town.  Although we knew we were hours away from the finish, the crowds still seemed diminished from years past.  We whiled away the time at the bar in the No Name, talking to the bartender and keeping an eye on the bike race on our phones.  With just minutes to spare, we paid up and stepped back outside - where we were surprised to find that it had rained, dropping the air temperature by a good fifteen degrees, which was lovely -and up to the barricades. 

We watched Sepp Kuss, the Stage winner and the overall ToU winner, come charging up the hill to the finish line, less than ten seconds ahead of the next riders.  Then, after the rest of the riders came through, we grabbed another shuttle back to our trucks, using the time to make plans with P for the next weekend.  No bike race, true, but surely we can find something to do.