Hillside Grinder

Grinding up Hillside. The road is in primo condition.

I had a mid week day off and took advantage and rode the cross bike down HWY 145 to Hillside to see how far I could get before the snow turned me around. I was able to get up to 10,700 feet and 13.5 miles up hillside from highway 145. I ended up with 50.6 miles and just under 4k of climbing. 3 hours and 55 minutes of pedaling time. This is a perfect cross ride if you want to stick to just pave and fire roads but Grindstone/Bear Creek are up there for a great mountain bike ride once the snow recedes. The gearing seemed appropriate with a 42x18 and with the Crusher coming next month I will be doing more of these type of rides getting used to the beating the cross bike gives you on the fire roads. The Crusher may require a lighter gear (42x20?), cheater brakes, gel padding under the bar tape and fatter tires. I recently put new Avid V brakes on which are much better than the cheapo's the bike had originally.

Other excellent cross rides:
Dunton loop from HWY 145 (approx 60 miles and 3k+ of climbing)
Roaring Fork from HWY 145 (options are an out and back up to the divide road, over to Purg/Durango. Or loop around to Bolam Pass and down Barlow to HWY 145)
Taylor Creek from HWY 145 (out and back)

There are lots of options for these type of rides around Rico.

ps....Rode up Scotch Creek this week too. Snow turned me around ajust below 10k. I think Blackhawk may be rideable later in July. The Durango Dirty Century may have to reroute depending on snow melt off.