"Mark J." writes:

On 7/11/2020 8:07 AM, jbeattie wrote:
On Saturday, July 11, 2020 at 6:13:14 AM UTC-7, Mark Cleary wrote:
Has anyone here done this and what gears did you use? I just have
no clue what is needed for a regular reasonably fit cyclist.

Deacon Mark

I used to ride with a guy who won the Mt. Evans Hill Climb five
times, Mike Engleman. When we rode together, he rode a 39/21 low.

A quick search of the interweb shows reasonably fit sport riders
using compact 34/28-30. The average gradient is moderate, although
there are some steep sections. I'd be more concerned about heat and
altitude. You're starting at 7,000 and ending at 14,000. I've
ridden Rocky Mountain passes fully loaded on a touring bike as high
as 12,000 (with a low of 36/28), but I was at altitude for a week or
weeks before that, and those passes had very moderate grades. Doing
weekend trips to Salt Lake and starting at 5,000 feet and riding up
to 10,000 (Mirror Lake), I'm panting and sweating coming from balmy
sea level Portland. You'll be used to the heat coming from the
Midwest, but you'll need to acclimate to the altitude. You can get
off the plane and start climbing, but if you do that, I would
recommend going slowly, taking some Tylenol in advance and tons of
water. Altitude sickness sucks. Its like a migraine and the
flu. Maybe get some little CO2 canisters filled with O2.

-- Jay Beattie.


What Jay said, and drink more than you think you need; coming from the
humid midwest and riding in the dry Colorado air, you won't realize
just how much you are sweating, it evaporates so quickly.

That's absolutely true -- you may not actually even *be* sweating, water
just transpires directly through your skin into the vapor phase. Cooling
but dehydrating.