Back in Boston 2.0

Sneaking out of work to do some laps. Super out of shape

Girona Day 6: Return to Rocacorba +

Girona Day 5: God tier descent. I’ve been to some crazy cycling locations but this takes the cake for best descent +

Girona Day 4: Sant Hilari Sacalm…All the riding is beginning to catch up +

The final day to end this trip took us up Rocacorba. The last time I did this climb in 2022, I remember it being an absolute brute. At that point I had never experienced a climb with that amount of elevation and steepness; so it felt extremely difficult in the moment. Ever since then this climb was the boogie man of mountains. Fast forward 2 years and I feel like I’ve done a lot harder stuff since then. Hell, a couple days ago I did the Deu del Mont climb which is just as steep but over a thousand feet higher. Before we took on Rocacorba we did a lap around the lake in Banyoles (which is wildly overrated imo). We were set to do only one lap but then got told turn around by a Spanish looking Mario, so we did a second lap in the opposite direction. Then it was go time. I had talked up this climb so much that Zev was pretty worried. He was actually so nervous about it that his head started feeling weird and he said he might have a stroke (lol). Since I’ve been sitting at the top of a lot climbs waiting for Zev, we decided to give him a 12 min head start so that if it was cold at the summit we wouldn’t wait freezing up there. He took off and I waited. When I eventually went, the plan was to pace it conservatively to not blow up. This meant keeping my heart rate between 140-165 bpm. Have ridden a century the day before and 350 miles up until that point my legs were far from fresh. I was more worried about surviving rather than thriving. I feel like I did a good job sticking to my pacing plan. On my Wahoo I could see Zev’s name up the road. I really wanted to catch him but his marker never got much closer. Towards the top with about a mile to go, it looked like he was right around so I started to push harder hoping to catch him. It turns out I was chasing a ghost because Zev had already made it to the top a couple minutes prior. I ended up making up 7 out of the 12 mins I gave him at the bottom. Although I put 10 minutes into him on Els Angels I kinda figured that wouldn’t happen here for a couple reasons: Rocacorba is so steep in places that you need to do a high minimum wattage to stay moving forward. That alone would force Zev to put down the power, he’s been hesitant to display elsewhere. The second reason is also my legs are pretty gassed. Regardless I beat my previous time by over 30 seconds. The descent off Rocacorba is one of my least favorite things to do. The road surface is ass, it’s always cold, the pavement is wet in spots, and there are hairpins everywhere. The descent alone makes doing the climb far less appealing to me if I lived here. If you visit Girona, do Rocacorba because it’s famous but know there are far better climbs out there. On today’s ride I surpasssed 9,000 miles for the year which puts an end to biking for the year. This trip was a very nice way to end the year. Although Como was a big block of riding, this was bigger in every regard; distance, elevation, and time.

Final stats for this trip (6 days):
Distance: 430 miles
Elevation: 31,378 feet 
Time: 28 hours

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Nick S

Girona Day 6: Return to Rocacorba +

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Back in Boston 2.0

Sneaking out of work to do some laps. Super out of shape

Girona Day 6: Return to Rocacorba +

Girona Day 5: God tier descent. I’ve been to some crazy cycling locations but this takes the cake for best descent +

Girona Day 4: Sant Hilari Sacalm…All the riding is beginning to catch up +

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