Day Number 2: hammering!

Christian and I had an extremely good day (and night!); we picked up our leg in Sedona, AZ. Winding up through the cottonwood-lined canyons, we climbed up to Flagstaff, from about 5,000 ft alt. to 7,000 ft. We set a mean pace, exchanging frequently, blistered the steep climb, and continued the same past Flagstaff to the next time station at Tuba City. Cross-winds were very strong, which had me basically leaning my aerodynamic bike with the deep-dish front wheel and rear disc much of the time, as I descended to the desert floor from Flagstaff at speeds of 30mph+. We had the fastest time of any team between those 2 time stations, and this continued for the next 3 or 4 time stations. We made it all the way past Mexican Hat, UT, much to the surprise of everyone, including our other team of riders, who had to high-tail it on the highway in their vehicle to exchange with us. As a result, we ended up exchanging at 2:30 (MTN standard time) instead of our anticipated 1:30 exchange. We caught a few teams along the way and took 35 minutes out of the 1st place team. We were only about 10 minutes, I think, from the 2nd place team. Overall, we averaged about 22mph, I heard, for our leg, which is really good considering the mountainous terrain we covered. There were no mishaps or miscules this leg, our team has learned the system and performed near-flawlessly today. Our second team (Bill and Brian) looks solid so far today, and we believe that many teams are burning out due to their propensity to ride too fast the first day or so, and not take the longer rest breaks (ours is 12 hours vs their 8-hour or even 4-hour sleep breaks). This should help us in the last 2-3 days of the race when I think it will really count.