Day 5:
Day 5 was a rest day, so I went to a local coffee house and hung out for some 4-5hrs.
Day 6:
Cherohala is the penultimate day of not only spring break, but of my whole season. Depending on where you start your watch, it’s about 60-75min of climbing, reaching a peak altitude of 5400ft. Afterwards, there is a 20min climb up Stecohah Gap (and a 4mi 1-3% grade up to the climb). Throw in some super-steep rollers, a few extra miles on the end, and you have 100mi day in the mountains.
With about 20 people, the ride started slow. Then really fast. Our 60s pulls were over 500w, with a constant rotation. In the draft it was right at threshold. We stopped at the ranger station 7mi from the climb where we dropped off our warm-weather clothing in a support vehicle.
Then, we hit Cherohala. For me, hard. For the first 20min, I averaged 310w and there were still about 10-12 of us in the group. People slowly started to fade, and 3 went up the road – a cat1 from Kelly Benefit, Stoveken, and Dave Z. Our group started to fade, so only Brian of my GDVC team, Cook, Gehling, and I were left. Cook got dropped, Gehling pulled away, which left Brian and I to finish together at the top.
I averaged 290w up the climb, which was surprisingly good considering my circumstances. Now I just have to drop another 7lbs and I might be a decent cat2.
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