nothing special

Quick post today, I got a bunch to do but I felt like blogging and since that type of stuff has been scarce around here I figured I'd better get on the stick.

Anyway, 6 straight nightshifts, 12 hours each and I feel like a zombie. It had to be done, I gots some hella vet bills to pay. I did pick up Jackson's remains yesterday and since Moonshine is still sulking around the house I held the box down to her and told her I brought Jackson back. She took a long sniff of the box and looked at me as if she understood a little.

Oops sorry didn't mean to get sad on you, I woke up this morning with thoughts of riding the FROG out at Warriors this afternoon for our weekly group ride but when I opened the shades I saw that it had rained. Crap! I checked the weather and the future looks bright so I moved the ride to Bays Mountain where things tend to dry up much quicker than Warriors. Warriors is a rocky, rooty maze that can really kill your momentum and ride when those rocks and roots are wet. With this high humidity I figured they'll still be wet this afternoon.

Speaking of the FROG, I did a bit more research and found a couple more easier to understand explanations as to how to fine tune my Reba and I tried it out last Sunday. I don't know if it was the rebuild or my fine tuning attempt but my fork seemed alot smoother. I gave Melinda's the same treatment but she didn't seem to like it as much. I think I may know why, prior to my research, my attempt to make things smoother was to drop the psi to a lower setting to achieve a smoother ride. On my fork I upped it to where it should be but I don't think I did on hers. I guess I'd better remedy that.

For a while now I've been wanting to shave my head but I've put it off partially due to Melinda's affection for me with hair, but since I continue to loose the battle of going bald I finally convinced her it was for the best. My plan was to shave it off this morning but I think I may have talked myself out of it yet again. I'm really not to the point where what hair I do have looks bad but it is getting thinner on top maybe I just need to flip a coin.

Last weekend while in Brevard we were cruising downtown sticking our heads in whatever shop looked appealing and while we were headed back to the truck I noticed the newest Brewery in town. Not Osker Blues, but the Brevard Brewery. http://www.brevard-brewing.com/ I drug Melinda across the street and inside to check out the wares. Being that we both had full bellies from lunch and Mexican beer, we opted to go with 2 of the samplers and try them all. I have to say I was impressed, probably my 2 favorites were the Munich Dunkel, a dark German lager. This was definitely a first for me but I liked it! The other was a good ole American IPA, it was good and punchy and the 6% snuck up on me just a bit. The guy running the place was pretty cool and said if we ever come back we were welcome to bring in a pizza or whatever and dogs were allowed to, as long as they were friendly.

That's all for now, not the greatest post but definitely a start to getting back in the groove.

mixing it up

So I promised more blog posts and less talk about sad stuff that might make you cry so here I am ready to deliver..................

Um.........................

I think I forgot how to blog and write something halfway entertaining.

My last ride out on the FROG left me feeling kinda bummed, ever since I bought a Fox fork I've grown to dislike my Reba more and more. My last ride on it was out at Warrior Creek and although they have a fairly smooth trail system, there is a new section called the Head Waters Loop a trail that will leave you feeling like a rookie for sure. It has some of the nastiest rock gardens I've encountered in a while. And they throw it at you near the end of the loop so you're already feeling a bit tired, at least I was. Anyway, the Reba on the FROG felt like a freaking pogo stick. Some of that is my lack of attention span to read up on what all the multi colored dials do and how to properly adjust them to make the ride better. So what did I do? I took it to my local shop and had them rebuild it. That's right I threw money at the problem, it is a 2010 fork that's never been serviced so I figured it probably needed it.

While it was in the shop I took a few minutes to do a bit of research online to see how to better tune my fork. I'd heard about a thread on mtbr from Anthony that was supposed to be really good but I can't make heads or tales of what the guy is talking about. I think I need to take an engineering class or two and then go back and re-read it. Anyway I got the fork back a week ago and let it sit while Melinda and I ventured off to DuPont for a few days of camping and riding. A much needed break from the depressing house that's missing a giant, friendly, nervous, half chicken, half dog we called Jackson.

Once we got back and settled in I made my way into the bike room and got the FROG back up and running. I've yet to ride it or try to apply any of the things I think I might have learned online but I plan to give it a go next week. I could have rode it today but it was HOT outside for some reason and I had this weird urge to ride my road bike. I've only had it out 3 times since I got the new frame so I took it for a spin instead to mix things up a bit. Road riding and running are two things I'm trying to incorporate into my routine, I need to mix it up, shed a few pounds and get myself in gear.

As I was finishing up my ride today I pulled into the parking lot where I had parked and had my first official road crash. A total rookie mistake and I felt really dumb but thank goodness no one was there to witness it. I've developed this habit of dismounting as I roll up to my truck when riding my mountain bike and it's not big deal in mountain bike shoes, even on asphalt. So as I approached my truck today not even thinking I unclipped my right foot, swung my leg around and tried to walk it out as I grabbed the brakes, think of it as a slower version of a cyclocross dismount just before a barrier section. Well needless to say, carbon soled shoes and smooth asphalt are a bad mix. As my foot touched the ground it was like stepping on ice and before I knew it I was laying flat on my back. Most of the impact was to my butt, thankfully no injuries just a bit of soreness and a wee bit of parking lot rash.

I guess I need to get a few more road rides under my belt before heading out on any group rides or I'm sure to be the laughing stock of the group.

jackson's post

I know I've been slacking pretty bad this summer here on the blog front and I do believe I said that in my last post. I apologize and I'll apologize again for this post as it's not a good one.

Last Thursday we lost Jackson, our kid, (dog) of 9 years. He was getting old and for his breed mix he lasted at the long end of his normal life span. He was a great dog and companion even when he drove me crazy with his nervousness that seemed to get worse as he aged.

We came home to find him laying on his bed not wanting to get up Wednesday afternoon. I coaxed him up and out the door and watched him stumble like a drunk out the door. I knew it wasn't good and he seemed to be incoherent. Within a couple of minutes of going outside he began vomiting and fell on his face. We immediately rushed him to the after hours clinic and admitted him. They took some x-rays, and did some blood work and decided it was probably Pancreatitus, an infection of the Pancreas. We left him over night for treatment thinking he would be fine according to the vet.

The next morning before work I called to check on him. The vet said he was doing better so I decided to go on to work. Melinda went to pick up Jackson to take him to our regular vet but upon arrival she felt like he looked the same. When she arrived with him at our vet he had to be carried in on stretcher. After reviewing his bloodwork and x-rays they didn't think he had Pancreatitus but weren't sure what was wrong. As the vet came in and began discussing our options with Melinda, Jackson began having seizures and died shortly after. Three vets working together tried to bring him back with no luck.

It was a sad day and even a tougher weekend as it took a couple of days for things to sink in for me. I took his loss alot harder than I thought I would. Jackson had always been a Momma's boy but I loved him just the same.

I apologize for such a sad post but I felt the need to share since he was such a big part of our lives. I will leave you with this video, one of my favorites from a few years back of the dogs running the trails with me.

Enjoy!

riding with dogs from Greg Carr on Vimeo.

I promise I will get back into blogging soon and bring more positive vibes soon. Thanks for reading.

Long time no post, sorry bout that, it's been a busy summer. I did have a few minutes to put another video together from our trip out west. More footage from the Moab Utah area. This trail, Bull Run was part of the Magnificent 7 system. It was easily one of my favorites, 2 from our group had done this ride the previous day and volunteered to drive two of the cars to the bottom so we could do a shuttle run back to the top and skip the long slog up, via a sandy fireroad. The decent was awesome, rocks, rocks & more rocks galore! It offered up some beautiful views as well as large sections of slickrock.

If I ever get a chance to go back, this trail will definitely be one I will ride again.



Enjoy!

the return of Sully

It had been a while since I'd last seen Sully the Warriors Gnome, a few of us were actually beginning to get worried about him. His last finder took him somewhere, not sure it was in the park trail system. From the funny clues we were getting it seemed Sully was flying around on some sort of magical carpet.

Then a couple of weeks ago when we were just getting ready to begin our monthly club meeting in walks our waitress with Sully in her hands. I'm not sure what Sully was doing with the waitress but he had the biggest smile on his face. I asked him where had he been and the only answer I got was something about a "it's been a long strange trip man."

He left it at that and join the rest of the crew for a few beers while I rambled on about the local trail news.

Once the meeting was over and the beer was gone he hoped into my box of club swag and said let's go. I figured he needed a few days of R&R so I took him home to my house until I could get him back to the trails where he belonged.

Right off the bat Sully and Sneaky Pete hit it off. They both looked strangely alike but when I asked them if they were related they both shook their heads no. I swear I saw Sneaky Pete wink at Sully shortly after.

Sully hadn't been there but a few days when I noticed he was beginning to get a bit restless. Pacing about, staring at the bikes in the bike room.

He even got into my beer stash, which was ok at first but after 2 days he'd drank it all.

He tried to blame some of the beer drinking on Jackson but I knew better.

He even tried to get Moonshine to take him to the trails but she said, "What makes you think I can drive fool?"

Finally once I had a couple of days off I took Sully out to Warriors. I think he was really glad to be home.

He found a nice hiding place, mumbled something about looking for John Kay and layed down for a nap.

slam dancing with trees

Sorry for the delay in blog posts, last week I was suffering from lack of sleep, time and desire to blog. Actually I guess I had time to and I almost worked on another video from Utah but I decided to rest because my head just wasn't in it and I'm not sure anyone even watched the last one.

I'm beginning to wonder if the three other actions cams I saw mounted to helmets, bikes and various other parts were even on? I've only seen one other video from our time there. What gives fellers? I'll try my best to edit another one, maybe add some sort of flair to make this one a little more interesting, I do need some new music, my selection sucks.

Last Wednesday, Melinda and I made the drive up to the New River Gorge near Fayetteville, West Virginia to scope out the Arrowhead trails and the area for future camping trips. There was too much to see and ride for one measly daytrip and with a 3.5 hour drive one way. a third of our day was gobbled up driving. There was alot of road construction and 2 separate toll booth willies that kept slowing us down.

I've seen this bridge from photos and was excited to drive across but was severely disappointed when bridge construction forced us into the inside lanes going both ways, killing any view from the bridge. We did do the touristy thing and stop to hike down the to one of the overlooks with the rest of overweight, out of shape America. I wouldn't really call it a hike, these days most places take the hike out of hiking with paved paths or stairs. This path not being any different was completely built as a wooden deck trail of sorts but the abundance of stairs still winded the couch potatoes who probably thought it was a BIG adventure. At least we got to see some of the gorge.

Our main mission was to check out the trails and we did just that, until it started raining. We got in about 8 solid miles of singletrack before it started. What we rode was fun, not really much effort involved but tight enough to keep you on your toes. I guess I got a little to cocky trying to take a corner at speed. I was coming in hot, trying to cut the small tree on the inside as close as possible to keep from having to scrub any speed but what I didn't see was the smaller tree hidden behind the one I was trying to squeeze past. I cleared the first one but the second I clipped with my right hand, basically punching it with my fist. I'm surprised that I didn't break anything as hard as I hit, thank goodness I drink milk.

The impact spun my handlebars so fast they spun hard right at 90 degrees but the rest of me and the bike kept going straight. I heard a loud squeal as I rolled the tire off the rim and burped Stan's and air. I rolled the tire just enough to pick up a few small sticks which lodged themselves between the tire bead and rim when the tire found it's way back into place. I don't know how I didn't completely roll it off the rim or taco the wheel but everything stayed in tact as I did a flying squirrel move toward the ground.

I hit the ground jarring me hard enough I had to do the basic body check to make sure I didn't break anything and all of my limbs were still in place. After everything checked out ok, I had to take a minute to walk it off but was able to get back on and finish the ride. Two days later I was still finding new bumps and bruising, aching from just about every limb.

During our reconnaissance mission I stopped to snap a pic of this old heap sitting on it's roof deep in the woods. As I stood and stared at it wondering who and what kind of mischief was involved to bring this car into the woods and land it upside down was intriguing.

Although we didn't even get to ride half of the trails in the NRG, I can see a ton of potential in what the area has to offer. Hopefully the trailbuilding has just begun.

Last Monday as I prepared to hold our monthly mountain bike club meeting a familiar face showed up at the door, Sully the Warriors Gnome. It's been a while since we've seen him last. I asked him, "What's up?", and all I got was, "It's been a long strange trip brother." We welcomed him back, Spencer bought him a beer and he's currently resting up and getting ready to head back into the woods for some much needed trail time.

Video footage from Utah, Dead Horse Point

Finally got around to editing my first ride from Utah, we got everyone rounded up and headed to the trailhead, all our luggage in tow which made for unloading bikes in the parking lot a freaking mess. It was pretty windy that day and a little on the chilly side, similar to our first day in CO. but the sky was dry and blue as can be so no complaints here.

Dead Horse Point was a bit more on the tamer side of things compared to some of the trails we rode but it was still a blast to ride. Also a bit shorter so we took full advantage of another nearby trail down the road and put in some more singletrack time. That video will be up next.

Enjoy!

tsali re-cap

The 12 Hours of Tsali has come and gone, not really much different from last years race except that we had to secure a pit this year as we didn't camp at the Tsali campground. Once again we registered in the Sport category and once again there were some ridiculously fast teams. We ended up 10th in our respected category, not a bad finish but nothing really fantastic about it either. I had a good time racing, the course was fast, smooth and well fast, that pretty much sums up Tsali. 

I started off the race for our team again with the run, my only real goal was to try and keep up with Mr. Dillon, a fast rider and fast runner. I did for the first couple of miles but he slowly pulled away from me on the fireroad climbs. I pretty much knew this would happen so I'm not really surprised and once we were on the singletrack there were just too many people between us to make up any time, not that I had it in me anyway. The run and fireroad sprint always really take it out of me, by the time I hit singletrack I'm red lined and all over the place but backing down just can't happen. 

My lap times were a few minutes slower this year than last year. I'm going to blame it all on the craft beer and my focus on building trail over trail riding. Sounds like a good excuse to me.

There were no mechanicals to blame my performance on the FROG, it performed flawlessly. I did notice a bit of creaking coming from the EBB but I swear I think it went away after a couple of miles.

As I entered the bike staging area of the run I began to think I'd passed up my bike but as bright of green as it is I kept going thinking I couldn't have missed it. Sure enough I found it laying in the weeds right next to Melinda who was snapping away with the camera.

I caught alot of flack from this photo, I swear I wasn't trying to shove this guy off the trail. He was standing right in the middle of everything taking his sweet ass time getting on his bike. Everyone else was running up grabbing their bikes and taking off running with them, usually jumping on with a cyclocross mount of some fashion. Not this yay-hoo, he was in no hurry and in my attempt to squeeze into the river of racers I lost my balance and leaned into him. I did apologize as I sprinted off trying to chase down David Dillon.

My first 2 laps were on the FROG and I felt good on it not sure if I wanted to ride the JET or not. After my first lap I had noticed the new Conti tire I'd mounted up had gone flat without a single ride on it. I pumped it back up felt and listened for leaks but and left it sitting to see if it would hold in case I needed to call it into service.

As soon as I rolled in off my 2nd lap it began to rain and the following 2 laps my teammates were coming in covered in mud. I had a feeling the knobbier tires, extra gears and more squish might come in handy as rumors of a peanut butter course started coming in. I checked the psi on the Conti and it was holding so I took the JET out for my final lap. Sure enough the first 6 miles were a sticky momentum killer but the farther I went things began to dry up allowing me to pick up a bit of speed but not enough to help me advance much in position. It turned out to be my slowest lap not surprisingly, just a hair over the 1 hour mark.

I'm pretty sure there is a small gash in the sidewall of the new Conti tire causing the slow leak. This morning I noticed it had gone soft again but not completely flat as I rolled it out the door on my way to work for our weekly Tuesday ride at Warriors. I guess I'll pull it off and patch it, maybe throw it in the back up parts bin if it continues to leak. That's the 2nd Conti we've got with a gash in the sidewall, undoubtedly getting sliced by a heavy handed box cutter.

Speaking of slashing sidewalls, I pulled the George from the Saguro and washed the Stan's off of it so I could return it back to it's rightful owner. Thanks Mr. President, you served my tire and your country well.

As promised the FROG will return to a singlespeed this weekend, I kinda wished I'd had time to convert it back before tonight's ride but I didn't. I watched alot of singlespeeders crank past me on the climbs last weekend not too mention local badass David McDaniel pulling off a 2nd place finish in the 12 hour SS solo category. Nice job dude!

                     

Just in case you missed, my video recap from Bike @ Bays.

will gummy bears make the FROG go fast?

Busy week for me this week, preparations are being made to ready the ECO for a weekend of camping and racing. This weekend GRT Racing is heading back to WNC for the 12 Hours of Tsali. We've got the same line up this year as last, Andy, Abby, Anthony & myself, the only oddball who's name doesn't start with an "A". I thought about asking my teammates to call me Arthur just for the weekend so maybe I might feel like I fit in a little better. Still no co-ed category and once again we'll be up against some fast as hell teams that should probably be racing in the expert class. If it weren't for the great watered down spaghetti I might lodge a complaint, wait I totally missed the spaghetti flavored water last year. You think the Gone Riding folks have caught wind to my blog heckling of their cooking? I'll lay low this year and see how it all unfolds.

There was a bit of smack talk earlier this week from one of the other local teams that will be traveling down with us. A bit of friendly, spirited smack talk, calling me out because there was a rumor I was putting gears on the FROG for the race. I won't deny, the rumors are true, the FROG will be sporting a 1x9 drivetrain. Have no fear, as soon as we get back from the race the gears will come off. I've been back and forth on what to do about FROG, SS or gears? I thought on it and thought on it, tried to ask my teammates on what their opinion was but heard nothing but crickets chirping. I was discussing it with Melinda one night last week and she simply responded, why wouldn't you put gears on it. Yeah why not, so I did. I'm not so worried about the climbs, it's more the fast rolling sections that I'm afraid I would be spinning out and losing time so I went for it. Gears it is.

With a gash in the rear tire on the JET and currently only one tire option I will be attempting to mount up another Continental tubeless this week. A brand new X-King that we got as a warranty replacement that been sitting in the bike room for a couple of weeks will be replacing the Saguro. Melinda's had good luck with hers so far so hopefully I will to or I'll be forced to go down and dig through my pile of worn out tires for a suitable back-up.

A few times I have been asked if I own any t-shirts other than cycling t-shirts. I've been asked this on more than one occasion and by more than one person. With that I decided to go a whole week without wearing a single bike related t-shirt.

Monday's t-shirt, plain navy blue.



Tueday's t-shirt, plain gray. Some said it was the same shirt as Monday, they must have been color blind. Wednesday, will probably be black or brown, I've yet to decide. So many non-cycling shirts to wear the decision will probably keep me up at night tossing and turning over which one to pick, oh the horror.

The real decision keeping me awake is what race fuel do I take this weekend? My current list of options is as follows: gummy bears, twizzlers or skittles. I was leaning towards gummy bears until I remembered Anthony's addiction to little funny colored bears that squish. I'm afraid he will raid my stash while I'm out on a lap and in an attempt to cover cover his own tracks will eat them all and make himself sick and useless to the team.



The Ribbon Trail video

As promised my video from the Ribbon Trail in Grand Junction. This trail was just up the mountain behind our house. Probably one of the tougher rides we did in Colorado. We shuttled to the top and rode/hiked a bike down. There were alot of sections that were over our heads but it was a fun trail, especially the large flat granite sections near the top which offered up some of the best views.

After that, we hit the Gunny Loop which ran through our backyard and dropped us off just the road up from our driveway. I actually enjoyed the Gunny Loop better, mainly because I spent more time actually riding my bike rather than pushing it but like the previous days I ran out of battery juice and didn't get any of it.

Enjoy!

4th Annual Bike@Bays recap

Saturday we, the mountain bike club, held our 4th annual Bike@Bays. It's a small one day festival of sorts that celebrates all things bikes, mountain bikes mostly. It started off  a few years back as mostly a friendly competition amongst ourselves in the way of a 12 hour race and then down to a 6 hour race. After a couple of years we realized the need to plan a day around more than just racing, we needed to draw people in and create an event that would cater to the core of our area's riders, people who just enjoy riding for fun not racing. With that, Bike@Bays was born.

Every year we build on the event making it more fun and adding things to draw folks from all levels of riding, from the newest beginner to the guys who live for pure competition.

 

We saw a huge crowd turnout across the day with close to 100 people pre-registered.

 

We saw all kinds of bikes, very small bikes, Wal-Mart bikes, shop bikes, demo bikes & fat bikes.

 

One of our local shops brought out a first ever fat bike to our event, a Surly Pugsley. I wasted no time in jumping on it and hitting the trails. I've seen a couple here and there but had never had the chance to ride one much less on actual trails. That's the great thing about Bike@Bays, you can actually demo bikes from multiple retailers on actual singletrack, all for free.

The Pugsley surprised me but in all honestly I didn't know what to expect. It did take some finesse to make it dance through the tight singletrack but I was able to push it much faster than I thought I would. I may have pushed it a bit too hard when I railed a berm and hit some sand as I exited the turn and slid off the trail but thankfully I managed to slide between the trees and did no damage to myself or the bike. Not really having time to get it dialed in properly I opted to ride it with the flat pedals that were on it. It went smoother than I expected until I hit a small jump actually getting a wee bit of air and I remembered I was not secured in. My feet shifted on the pedals a bit but stayed in place, just enough to give me one of those "oh shit!" moments.

I wished I could've spent more time aboard it but I had an event to run and I didn't want to hog it all day. I regretfully turned the Pugsley back in where a line of folks were patiently waiting for their turn.

 

One of our newest events at Bike@Bays this year was the Tiny Bike Race. Adults racing around a set of cones on kids bikes has to be one of the funniest things I've seen in a long time. There was some serious competition going down with the first round of races pitting two racers against each other. The final showdown had the winners of each heat, all racing against each other in what was the most entertaining races of the day. There were crashes, elbows being thrown, a small amount of cheating and a final sprint at the end between two rider who almost took each other out in a cloud of dust and little pink bikes.

This year we brought back the Chainless Downhill Race which was definitely one of the highlights of the day. This year I threw my hat, or should I say sombrero into the ring. Costumes are encouraged and help those who choose to dress up make it a little farther down the hill than those who don't. I chose to go with a Mexican man outfit, complete with a sombrero, poncho fashioned from an old beach towel and a fake moustache.

 

Before we even got started with the race I had a bit of an issue. Rather than completely removing the chains from the bikes most were removing it from the front chainrings and ziptying the chain out of the way which actually worked very well. After I ziptied my chain to my chainstay I was handed a rather sharp knife to cut away the excess ziptie. That's when I made the dumbest move of the day, not paying attention I sliced a nice gash in the sidewall of my tire when the knife slipped. Needless to say it was much too large for the Stan's to have any chance. There were no 29" tubes to be found so with a $1 bill dipped in Stans and a 26" tube stretched around the rim we made it work.

It did hold but the bulge that appeared after 20 psi made me reluctant to run it in the race. Partly not wanting to ruin a rim at low pressure on the rocky downhill and partly not wanting to take the chance of flatting at high speed I took Josh up on his offer of riding his Trek Fuel. No doubt this fix would have gotten me out of the woods on a normal ride but I just didn't want to take the chance, the patch was still holding nicely the next morning.

The Sombrero wasn't the most aerodynamic hat to be wearing atop my helmet but I still managed to break into the top 3. Oley!

Video from the event to come soon, but first up my video from the Ribbon Trail in Grand Junction. It's uploading to Vimeo as I type this and will be posted up here tomorrow.

a good ride

Yesterday I was dragging ass, 5 nightshifts in a row took it's toll on me and I was worth all of 2 cents all for most of the afternoon. Most of my plans of some needed yardwork got washed away with the on and off, tiny but fierce rainstorms that rolled through every 2 hours. I couldn't have cared less though, my only obligation for the day was our regular Tuesday evening group ride at Warriors Path that I kicked off 3 weeks ago. It's been a bit of a slow start compared to some of the regular group rides around the area but then again this is the only organized group ride off-road. The roadies see a huge turn out but most of those rides have been going on for a couple of years.

I had a feeling with the brief rain showers that last nights group might be small and I was correct in my assumptions. There was only 1 other car in the parking lot when I arrived but no sign of anyone belonging to that car so I figured it was safe to assume they weren't joining me. I wasn't surprised at the turnout, I wasn't 100% gung ho on the ride myself but I showed up not wanting to let anyone down that wasn't scared of a little rain.

Once I got on the trail I was really surprised at how great of shape they were in, I half expected the roots and rocks to be a tad wet but nada. Hero dirt all the way around! Those noisy cicadas had even taken the night off, I guess the rain shut them up for the evening. A nice cool breeze kept things feeling good, so good in fact I wished I'd had more daylight to hang out and just enjoy the beautiful scenery.



I stopped for a minute to play around with a new app I downloaded to my phone that takes panoramic photos. Not really the best scenery for this one but I thought it was cool.

As I neared the end of my ride I crested the top of Ridge Top just before the decent on Magic Carpet Ride to the parking lot and I was rewarded with this. The photo didn't really do it justice and those pesky power lines didn't help either but the low hanging sun was sending some really nice rays my way across the lake.

It made for some really great photos when looking away from the sun.

Last night was one of those nights where I wanted to back out but was glad I didn't. It couldn't have been a more perfect ride, the only thing that was lacking was a post ride beer waiting for me in a cooler at the end. That's the difference between living in the southeast, topping off a great ride with a frosty beverage at the trailhead is frowned upon, out west it's a must do.

I hope you've enjoyed my videos from our western adventures so far. I've got a 3rd one finished but waiting in the wings until Vimeo says it's okay to upload another. It's the price I pay for the free version.

Video from The Kokopelli Loops

The second video from our trip out west. This video is from the Kokopelli Loops in Colorado, the trails we rode that day were: Rustler's Loop, Mary's Loop, Horsetheif Branch and Steve's Loop. It was a long day on the bike but an awesome day on the bike. I ran out of battery juice and missed out on some really cool footage near the end but oh well, I plan to go back. This particular trail system had some sections that I recognized from the photos of my Bike magazines, talk about cool. When you see sweet pics in mags of awesome singletrack and then actually get to ride it, it's like living your dream. I did alot of stopping just to take in the scenery and marvel at my surroundings. The pics and videos really don't do this place justice, trust me, you gotta go.

Enjoy!

 

I've got another video coming down the pipe but Vimeo will only let me upload one a week with the free version. Next on tap, The Ribbon, part of the Lunch Loops in Grand Junction.

on the road again

I know it's been a while since my last video but things have been busy for me lately, we're prepping the backyard for some fencing and it's been pretty labor intensive. Last Sunday alone Melinda and I cut down 8 trees, cut them up and hauled them to the curb. It's long over due that we built a fence to keep our dogs from dropping bombs in the neighbors yard but I guess better late than never.

I have been sorting through my footage for the next video, next on tap will be the Kokopelli Loops in the Canyon Lands Area of CO. It was definitely one of my favorite days and one of the longest on the bike in Colorado but I ran out of battery juice before the day was over. I had passed on the chance to pick up an extra battery before we left for $13 but the big dummy that I am I didn't go for it. The following day I spent $20 on a back up so I wouldn't have that problem again.

Before I bought the FROG a friend of mine had warned me of the creaking problems of Eccentric Bottom Brackets but I ignored the warnings. I'd read up on Niner's EBB, which works a bit different that the rest and was supposed to not have any creaking problems. I didn't at first when I used waterproof grease but had slipping issues. My next step was to use plumbers tape like instructed on Niner's webpage, that's when the creaking began. I scoured the web in search of a solution and found a mtbr post where Niner recommended a spray called CarboGrip designed for carbon parts. Well I couldn't find any locally so I tried what I could find, Finish Line's version which helped but didn't eliminate the noise completely. I broke down and order a bottle of CarboGrip and paid almost as much for shipping as the CarboGrip, meh. I finally got around to cleaning the EBB today and spraying down the BB shell with the new stuff. I slapped it all back together and headed out into the yard with only 15 minutes to spare before work and gave it a test run. Success! The only noise I heard were the Cicadas.

Speaking of bike fixes, I am now back in the road riding business. My replacement frame came in last week and I gave it, it's first test run Wednesday. I had all kinds of ideas on what I was going to ask for in means of a replacement but I never got the chance, I was either going to upgrade to carbon or go for steel but before I could place a request my frame was in. What I received was a 2 year old model, not much different from my old one but still brand new. I'm not complaining, I like it better than the old one, the color that is. My old frame was dark blue, my favorite t-shirt color but not my favorite bike color. My new frame is sparkly silver with white and black graphics. All of the parts from my old frame were transferred over to the new frame included the dark blue saddle that now looks out of place.

 

I'm thinking it needs a white saddle and white bar tape to match my white shoes.

So my first ride aboard the new roadie was not a ride of magical proportions but it didn't suck either. For one my legs were pretty much trashed from all the yard work and a singlespeed lap at Warriors the night before but I had to know how it would feel. I had some pretty serious thoughts of selling it to fund some fancier parts for my dirt sleds but I guess I've changed my mind again.

 

the first video of many

The first of many, this video is from our first ride/day in Fruita Colorado, probably one of the shorter rides we did but definitely big on the fun factor. I shot this video in 960 dpi but who knows what it ended up after being compressed when I uploaded, 720 I think. Anyway, Vimeo only allows 1 HD video per week so I guess I'll have plenty of time to get another together. The amount of footage I have is a bit ridiculous, it should keep me busy through the summer.

I hope you enjoy!