The man. The mountain. The wind: near-Arctic cold and blowing at 30 mph, if not more. The temperature: 39, and that’s being charitable. It was 34 at the summit.
There’s a YouTube channel out there called “Worst Retirement Ever.” It’s the brainchild of former professional cyclist Phil Gaimon, who used to ride for Cannondale-Drapac (now known as EF Education p/b Cannondale), which is a Colorado-based international cycling team. Its most famous current rider is Taylor Phinney, who recently took eighth place in the pro peloton’s most brutal ride, Paris-Roubaix (the one with 29 sectors of cobblestones).
Gaimon, 32, retired after the 2016 season. So what does an “unprofessional” (as he calls himself) cyclist do for a living after retirement?
Gaimon began challenging “king-of-the-mountain” (KOM) records on the athletic social network Strava. His favorite targets are KOM records set by riders who have used performance-enhancing drugs. Gaimon’s a bit of a maniac about clean cycling; he even went so far as to have a tattoo of a bar of soap with the word “clean” put on his right bicep.
This week’s news that disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong had settled lawsuits tied to his doping that allowed him to win seven Tour de France titles made him happy.
So Lance will go away now and we’ll never talk about him again okay?
— Phil Gaimon (@philgaimon) April 20, 2018
One of Gaimon’s targets for the past two years has been Lookout Mountain, near Golden. Just who holds the record isn’t 100 percent clear. It could be former pro Tommy Danielson, who also rode for Cannondale-Drapac until he tested positive for synthetic testosterone in 2015. The other record-holder could be Cannondale-Drapac’s current manager and former pro, the enigmatic Jonathan Vaughters, who confessed to using blood-doping during the 1996-2000 seasons, including three seasons when he rode with Armstrong’s U.S. Postal team. Vaughters has since become one of the sport’s most ardent advocates for clean cycling.
The record for the 4.3-mile jaunt up Lookout from the parking lot on Lookout Mountain Road to the 7,379 foot-summit is around 16:02. That might not seem like very fast, but at a 5 to 6 percent unrelenting grade, it’s impressive.
Last year, Gaimon, who seems to attract bad weather at Lookout, did the ride in 16:16. However, a local rider claimed to have done the ride earlier this month in weather conditions similar the ones Gaimon recently faced, at 16:06. The challenge was on.
Gaimon and his cookie-decorated bike and jersey (more about that later) showed up in Denver on April 11, ready to ride, but high winds made him rethink the plan. So at 7 a.m. April 12, he showed up at the lower parking lot on Lookout Mountain Road, grimly ready to tackle the mountain, the wind and the cold.
And a guy named Dan.
A small but enthusiastic group of fans and local cyclists were there to see him off and cheer him on as he started the course. But the wind was brutal.
At one point, I stopped at a trailhead about a mile from the summit and tried to take pictures. The wind literally blew me back and it made holding my cell phone nigh unto impossible. I decided the next best thing would be to follow Phil the Thrill (yes, that’s his nickname) as he and his chase vehicle, mounted with a camera for the YouTube channel, passed by.
At that point, Dan, who is apparently sometimes known as Dan-the-naked-cookie-guy, appeared from out of the shadows on the steepest switchback on the route.
There’s a kind of weird tradition in professional cycling for fans to run alongside their favorite riders, or really any rider, to yell and cheer (and sometimes taunt) the cyclists as they go by in a race. Oftentimes the fan will have some colorful or ridiculous costume. Or none at all, a tradition that’s more common in European cycling than in the good ‘ol United States.
Last year, Dan, who’s also a cyclist, ran alongside Gaimon, decked out only in his birthday suit and a giant cardboard chocolate chip cookie. And nothing else. It was August, although early in the morning and a bit foggy, so it worked, more or less.
Dan was there for Friday’s ride, too. And as Gaimon approached the steepest switchback, a mile or so from the summit, there was Dan, whose only shield against the wind was the cardboard cookie held to cover his frontside. At 34 degrees and a 30+ mph brutally cold wind. Once Gaimon passed him, Dan made a dash to his waiting pile of clothes. I saw Dan about 10 minutes later. He was smiling but still shivering. And fully dressed.
Those winds – and mostly headwinds all the way – kept Gaimon from reaching his goal Friday. His final time was just over 18 minutes.
“I can’t feel my hands,” he said as he got off the bike.
He jumped into his waiting car to warm up, not even able to grab a bag of fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies waiting for him at the summit.
You could say that Mother Nature cheated in order to deny him the record.
Gaimon told Colorado Politics he hasn’t given up and will try again. He’ll be back in July since he’s taking on another Danielson record, that of the legendary Mount Evans Hill Climb.
