Hood River Ride

Saturday we drove out to Hood River after the 2000 meter group swim and rode from Hood River to The Dalles and back and then some more. Last week was the last long week before the ironman, so after the 2000 swim I had 9500 for the week, so I told coach if we do 500 more we'd have 10,000 meters for the week, so we swam 500 more. For the ride we parked the van at the Full Sail Brewery in Hood River and rode from there. We had a group of 7 and rode through Hood River and up onto the Mosier tunnels trail which is a 5 mile or so paved bike and pedestrian trail that used to be part of the old Historic Highway in the Gorge. Passed lots of people on the trail and had some good views of the Gorge and then into the town of Mosier. From there we rode on the road as it climbed up to Rowena Crest which has a lookout point and hiking trails. We stopped and took pictures and then for the wild hairpin turns descent. At one point 7 or 8 motorcycles roared past inches away from us on very sharp turns and they must have been doing at least 80MPH or so it seemed. Then a long flat part to the town of The Dalles. From there we took a road I'd never been on that goes back to Mosier a different way. Now I know why I've never been on it. The road is simply called Seven Mile Hill road- can you guess why? Holy cow was that hard! Seven miles later we came to a sign that said summit, 1802 feet and we started by the river at 0 feet. What made it hard was the very, very strong headwind. We were going 6 miles per hour up the hill and then it would switchback and the wind would be blocked and we could go 8-10 MPH for a tiny bit, so it was a bad hill, but not the worst until you add the wind. Then the very steep, should have been fast, descent. I got in the aeros and took the lead and on the first curve the wind hit me and I was out of the aeros and fighting Gigi like she was a bucking bronco. After that I went down the hill with my brakes on and very slowly. I guess that's why the Hood River area is the wind surfing capital of the world. At Mosier we stopped for ice cream at a store that has a Porche collection inside. That's where the top picture is taken of some of the bikes. We took the tunnel trail back to Hood River and then 4 of us rode some more, but it was climbing anyway we went, so we only did 20 more miles and got back to Full Sail with only 60 miles, but tons of saddle time because of the climbing. Had to go in Full Sail for lunch and brews.
Totals for last week were 10,000 meters swimming, 162 miles bike and 28 miles running. Now for three weeks of tapering, with Hood to Coast relay run this weekend being our last long run equivalent. My first leg is leg 4 around 8PM on Friday and is 7.8 miles long.