Stuart Spies has been recounting his 2007 La Ruta Experience, read Day One and Day Two.
Irazu Volcano…..now call me old fashioned but when someone sticks a volcano in a race they probably mean business.
The profile made you shiver. Our shortest day and one that really messed with my head, I love climbing, I will ride any hill, hump or mountain, but this thing really tested me. It’s not long, it’s not steep, but the past two days and my pacing strategy of “no computer, no worries” were not a wise move. You climb from the word go, a frantic race through the streets of San Jose then it’s point your bike skyward time. Total ascent is 2654m. Not killer, but just about enough to make your eyes water, man it seemed to take for ever!
I crawled to the top. Once you summit you think, “hey great its home time, all down hill“. Well no of course not. Riding with sunglasses is pointless. So you eat enough cow shit and volcano mud through your tear ducts to have you shitting concrete. It was not a fun descent, rocky, muddy and frustrating. Some riders have support trucks trailing them. Fantastic for them but rather crap for the rest of us trying to negotiate an already sketchy rollercoaster ride without big jeeps getting in the way!!
I moaned and groaned and pinch flatted. I could have walked home right there, as the head was not in it. Garry had passed me before the flat and cockily pointed to his back wheel in a replay of what I’d done to him at TransAlp shouting ‘Hold on Stu I’ll tow you!’ Fairplay, I’m ruined!
Worse was to come. I stopped to put the raincoat back on and Charlie passed me. Now generally I’m not fussed but Charlie has a habit of reminding you everytime he takes breath that he passed you. This was going to be a long night. Still, Hamish (another Brit who never seemed unhappy) relayed how a Tico he had been battling with smacked a jeep in the final kilometre and Andrew my new found American mate had taken five flats…it could have been worse I guess.