Mount Lemmon

I think support is what brings out the best in athletes because that- An athlete who feels safe is an athlete who is willing to take sensible risks.

Um, you know, let's not talk about, like, you know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna no break the descent off of Lemon.

Please don't do that.

Um, that's not a sensible risk.

if you're gonna hit this section in the daytime or the nighttime.

And, like, for example, at Mount Lemmon in a 300-mile race, or even Elden at Cocodona, like, if you hit that in the nighttime, man, it can get to, like, nine degrees.

But if you hit that in the daytime-

[laughs]

Yeah, a few.

So I had never been to Mount Lemmon, so that was new.

Oh, nice.

Um, and then some of the other canyons, like Miller Canyon and some of those along that stretch I hadn't been to prior.

[gentle music] My Catalina Sky Survey teammate, Jess Johnson, was very surprised when the large comet with a long, stringy tail which he had just imaged with our 60-inch telescope on Mount Lemmon, Arizona, was an unknown object.

Jess quickly emailed his discovery observations, along with a description of the comet's coma and tail, to the Minor Planet Center.

Over the next eight days, astronomers at 11 different observatories around the world tracked Jess' new comet.

Oh, I think I almost got hypothermia.

I have a similar story that involves Mount Lemmon.

Did you guys know that Mount Lemmon is really high and the temperature at the top has nothing to do with the temperature at the

bottom?

I had no idea.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Mount Lemmon kicked my ass there.

On St. Patrick's Day, while searching for Earth-approaching asteroids with the Catalina Sky Survey's 60-inch telescope on Mount Lemmon, Arizona, I spotted a slightly enlarged star-like object with a tiny tail moving through the constellation of Virgo.

After checking to see that it was not a known comet, I sent my discovery observations along with a description of its coma and tail to the Minor Planet Center.

Turns out that it had been observed as a moving point of light but not noticed to be a comet by the Pan-STARRS group in Hawaii three months earlier.

I fought hard against that.

That would've been Sabino Canyon on the table, Mount Lemmon, uh, other beautiful sites in Arizona like you said.

It's all about conservation as well, and being able to protect our public lands.

Fought hard against that in partnership with other members, Republican ones as well, from Montana and other states that also value this quite a bit.

As do I. That's-

The Mount Lemmon, uh, Catalina Highway

... what you would call God's country-

It is

"He loved it and always said it was the best job he never got paid for."

[laughs]

"I w- I was visiting for spring break and decided to hike from Catalina State Park through Romero Pass and up to the top of Mount Lemmon." Wow.

That's quite a You know, it's interesting, 'cause I'm picturing this exact route, and I know you can picture it as well, and that's one of those things where if you're standing from a distance, you think, "Oh, I could probably knock that out in half a day."