What a superfun mountain bike ride I had today!

I've been overanxious about the Wine Country Century coming up next weekend, because, well, I've been running a lot and not riding much at all. So I thought I'd cram for the test this weekend. Stupid, I know. I'm mostly trying to get my butt used to sitting on the saddle again.

So yesterday I did a moderate 40+ mile road ride, flatted, and got sunburned in that space that only gets exposed when you are wearing a sleeveless jersey and are leaning forward. I had planned to do another long road ride today, but when I called my riding buddy in the am, I declared it a mountain biking day. I just really didn't want to ride on the pavement. I mumbled something about a "long easy-ish ride".

Well, it wasn't technical, but it qualifies as "epic" in my book (I'm not a very talented mountain biker). 20.13 miles, 4,136' of climbing, average grade of 11% (which explains why I feel so tired this evening). And it was hot (for Park City at this time of year), though I only almost melted down once. We started out on one of the standard trails and ran into a guy that was high on life and very chatty. He told us about a new trail, just opened this year, unmarked but open to ride. So we found it and went for it. The climbs were long but not really tough, so we chugged along. And the descents were a blast. What a great ride! But for meeting this guy, we would have ridden right by it and had to battle with the gagillion other people out on the more familiar trails.