On November 21st Linda and I rode in the El Tour de Tucson 2015 event. There were four event routes of 104, 75, 55, and 40 miles. We had last participated in El Tour de Tucson ten years earlier but this time we were spending the winter in Tucson and wanted to ride the longer 104-mile route. It had been 6.5 years since I last rode 100+ miles in a day, so I expected a challenging day. Of the 5365 riders finishing a route 2431 riders completed the 104-mile route, including Linda and me.

The 104-mile ride started at 7:00 am. We had been advised to start lining up by 6:00 am so we got up at 4:00 am, fed the dogs, stopped for coffee and a scone, drove to downtown Tucson, and found parking. We found the “Silver” assembly area for those expecting to finish between 7 and 9 hours and joined the crowd. It was a cool morning so I wore most of my warm bicycling clothes.

The start was slow and quite crowded in the Silver section, but the riders seemed experienced and considerate, the pre-dawn light was growing, and I saw no collisions. The crowd gradually thinned out as we progressed on the route. Many riders were passing us but we kept our own pace. The sun soon appeared over the Rincon Mountains as we headed south on the west side of the city. Various law-enforcement organizations enforced closed roads and held up traffic as the mass of cyclists came through on the route. We crossed the Santa Cruz Wash and continued east south of Tucson.

As the morning warmed up I stopped to quickly remove my sweater under my wind jacket and caught up with Linda at our first break stop. The riding was fun – we saw roads we had not yet visited during our stays in Tucson and the auto traffic was virtually nonexistent. At another rest stop I removed my wind jacket. We were getting hungry after an early light breakfast and had been expecting some snacks on the route but apparently the delivery vehicles had been held up. Fortunately we were carrying spare snacks. Water was plentiful at the stops and we kept our water bottles full.

Eventually we reached the east side of Tucson and familiar routes from our daily rides, turned north towards the Santa Catalinas, then began riding west across the north side of Tucson in the Santa Catalina foothills. Here we crossed the Sabino Wash and climbed over some steep hills to pass by the Sabino Canyon Recreation Area. We started passing other riders – perhaps their fast start earlier was beginning to wear on them.

We continued riding west through the foothills on Sunrise, Skyline, and Ina Drives, then turned north on Oracle, entered Oro Valley, then turned west again to enter Marana. Linda and I were still feeling strong and the day was sunny with ideal temperatures. The auto traffic gradually picked up. The first riders had finished the route long before and the authorities were beginning to give auto traffic equal time to bicyclists. I was grateful for the patience the auto traffic had shown earlier and now gave more attention to approaching traffic in both directions.

We joined the 40-mile route in Marana and with the staggered start those cyclists filled the route. These cyclists were slower than riders on the longer routes and less experienced riding in crowds so between dodging heavy bicycle traffic and watching for autos the remainder of the route required careful riding.

The last ten miles seemed to go slowly with frequent traffic stops and consequent bunching of riders. But the traffic cleared out the last three miles and it was a fun and quite satisfying finish to a long day of riding. El Tour de Tucson 2015 was a success for Linda and me. We finished in 7 hours and 55 minutes total (including several stops and wash crossings) and we will likely repeat the event next year.