First day in paradise, and man it’s great to finally be riding outside again, in shorts mind you.
First ride set out from the hotel in South West of Tenerife.
It was only 3k to Playa San Juan, and from there , it is only up. The start of the climb is a well paved road, that winds through the banana fields. After around 10ks, I reached Guía de Isora, and Chio another 5 ish k later.
From there the climb up Mount Teide is only 3 more huge hairpins, the lower two of which are through the „Corona Forest“, a needle-leaf forest. From the third hairpin out, it’s a lot more exposed. You can see the snow capped Pico del Teide, and the lava rock is a lot more fresh looking than lower down the mountain.
The last few Ks were a bit of throwback to my bad experience in Sierra Nevada a few months back. It was super windy, and getting really really cold (5 degrees C). So I stopped for the first time to put leg warmers on, and continued to the „top“.
I was able to hold the power I was planning at consistently, didn’t have many spikes in HR. Very happy with the current form.
I finsihed the climb at 2100m, the climb would continue in a flat down hill from here, and then a few ks later pitch up again to get to 2250m. I’ll see to get that another day, when tackling the climb from the other side.
The view to the much higher peak was great from the pass.
I descended super slowly, like grandma coming home from the shops, some I had passed on the way up zipped past me again, but that’s okay. once I was below 1300m and the winds were a lot calmer, I picked up the speed again. Also, it got a lot warmer and the sun came out.
The ride home was relatively eventless, with the one exception of the great Peter Sagan passing by me.
Not bad for an ordinary Wednesday.
