Tuesday, May 31, 2005
Monday, May 30, 2005
stokesville...
how to start blogging about such a great weekend. great company and 3 great rides... lookout mountain on saturday afternoon, the southern traverse on sunday, and fun rip down from reddish knob this morning. more to come, for now here are some pictures...
a motley crew on reddish knob
joe taking a break on he southern traverse
steve carving along the ridgetop on shenandoah mountain
Friday, May 27, 2005
back to dirt...
i like road riding, but after 2 days on the road it was nice to get back to dirt for a night... out to wakefield/accotink for the thursday ride. rode the singlespeed with the fast group and felt ok... not really fresh, but holding my own. trail conditions were marginal... ok in places - like the new wakefield phase 1 trails, bad in others.
no riding today, need to get the car packed up for the weekend - i'm heading down to harrisonburg tommorow morning for a couple of days of camping and riding. sounds like there might be a group hitting the southern traverse on sunday...
i've got a new camera that's small enough to stash in my camelbak instead of lugging around another bag, so hopefully i'll have some snaps from the weekend up here next week. it's obviously not going to replace the d2h for serious shooting, but should be good for carry-everywhere snapshot duty.
no riding today, need to get the car packed up for the weekend - i'm heading down to harrisonburg tommorow morning for a couple of days of camping and riding. sounds like there might be a group hitting the southern traverse on sunday...
i've got a new camera that's small enough to stash in my camelbak instead of lugging around another bag, so hopefully i'll have some snaps from the weekend up here next week. it's obviously not going to replace the d2h for serious shooting, but should be good for carry-everywhere snapshot duty.
Tuesday, May 24, 2005
hill repeats in the rain
sometimes you have a really good ride when you're not expecting it... just posted a new article over at bikecentric...
Sunday, May 22, 2005
on the road with crashmore...
since all of the local trails got a really heavy soaking on thursday and friday, and i had some errands to run on saturday i decided to pull out the road bike. since racing kicked up in the last couple of weeks it's been a while since i'd done anything but an easy spin on the road... i got in touch with ashmore and we decided to do a loop starting in germantown. i normally prefer road ridest that start from home - with the great rides i can do from home, driving somewhere with the road bike to ride just seems kind of wrong - but jason had a time limit on his end, and it would be easier to get a longer ride in if we started up by his place.
we started from the soccerplex under beautiful blue skies in crisp air on the back roads north of schaeffer, heading up towards poolesville. the roads around there are rolling but most of the climbs are pretty small and not too steep. he headed west towards river road and then started heading south. at this point jason's normal loop heads back towards the soccerplex, for about 30 miles but we turned right and followed river down towards potomac village. the climbs along river are still rolling, but they're bigger than we'ed done so far in the ride and i had a workout plan to work into the ride, so i pushed the big ring all the way down to falls rd. 20 minutes in zone 4-5b with big gears and low cadence... but the time i hit falls my legs were full of lactic acid and burning.
we turned down falls, riding in pretty heavy traffic to glen rd to start heading north. while we were on glen, a massive group ride came around us. jason and i both thought about trying to hang with the ride, but jason was still recovering from an impressive solo effort at lodi last weekend, so we took it easy. climbing up glen back towards sceneca rd i did another workout session and passed a couple of stragglers from the group ride.
once we hit scenca we joined back up with jason's route. once you turn off sceneca onto berryville you hit the hardest section of the ride... narrow, steep, and twisty roads with a really bad road surface. the ride finishes up on black rock road, with the steepest climb on right at the end of the road... knowing the climb was coming, and with the pain in my ribs from lodi still stinging every time i stood up i tried to save up a bit for this last climb. it's not a long climb, but it really kicks up so that you've got no choice but to stand on the pedals and push as hard as you can.
a great ride, on a great day, with great company...
we started from the soccerplex under beautiful blue skies in crisp air on the back roads north of schaeffer, heading up towards poolesville. the roads around there are rolling but most of the climbs are pretty small and not too steep. he headed west towards river road and then started heading south. at this point jason's normal loop heads back towards the soccerplex, for about 30 miles but we turned right and followed river down towards potomac village. the climbs along river are still rolling, but they're bigger than we'ed done so far in the ride and i had a workout plan to work into the ride, so i pushed the big ring all the way down to falls rd. 20 minutes in zone 4-5b with big gears and low cadence... but the time i hit falls my legs were full of lactic acid and burning.
we turned down falls, riding in pretty heavy traffic to glen rd to start heading north. while we were on glen, a massive group ride came around us. jason and i both thought about trying to hang with the ride, but jason was still recovering from an impressive solo effort at lodi last weekend, so we took it easy. climbing up glen back towards sceneca rd i did another workout session and passed a couple of stragglers from the group ride.
once we hit scenca we joined back up with jason's route. once you turn off sceneca onto berryville you hit the hardest section of the ride... narrow, steep, and twisty roads with a really bad road surface. the ride finishes up on black rock road, with the steepest climb on right at the end of the road... knowing the climb was coming, and with the pain in my ribs from lodi still stinging every time i stood up i tried to save up a bit for this last climb. it's not a long climb, but it really kicks up so that you've got no choice but to stand on the pedals and push as hard as you can.
a great ride, on a great day, with great company...
Monday, May 16, 2005
12 hours of lodi farm...
luck has never been on my side at Lodi, and it's served up some valuable lessons...
2 years ago it was my first race ever and it rained non-stop from the start to the finish. when i finished my 2nd lap (6th overall) the rest of my team had already decided to stop riding, so i joined them in a pancake breakfast and dry clothes. I ended up driving home in wet shoes and socks, and now I always make sure i have a good rain jacket, waterproof boots, and a reserve pair socks for any race of camping trip.
last year i tried to race solo and was riding well, but had to call it a day early due to problems with bike fit. it turned out that my saddle was a couple inches below where it should have been... a disappointing day, but it probably saved the rest of my year.
this year i was determined to change the pattern and have a team that rode all the way to the end of the event. Luck still wasn't on my side this weekend, but thanks to a special guest rider we did make it to 12 o'clock...
I picked up Matt at his place, and after some careful packing (stuff it in wherever it fits) and some rack reconfiguration we hit the road and the traffic. Normally it would take about an hour and half to get to Lodi from the city, but saturday it took almost that long to get to springfield. We finally made it to fredericksburg about 2 hours behind schedule and met up with our other teammate Lee on the road to the racecourse. We set up in the main area and went out for a quick pre-race spin... the course, as of 6pm, was dry, dusty and loose.
as we were having dinner a thunderstorm blew through leaving us scrambling to get everything under cover and gave the course a couple hours of rain and me flashbacks of 2 years ago. the rain stopped though, and didn't come back for the rest of the race. during dinner we settled on a 1-2-1 pattern for doing laps... that way we each got a lap in early - so that none of us were waiting untill 4 to ride - then a 3-4 hour break, 2 laps, another 3-4 hour break, then a last lap if there's time.
at some point during the day, i can't really remember when, i decided to ride singlespeed instead of geared... i'd probably be a bit faster on gears, and the course would probably be easier, but something about this vibe at this race just made me want to see how long i could manage to ride the single...
matt started us off strong, turning in a 57 minute lap and coming in right behind ricky and joe's teammate markie - they where one of our competitors in 3-man sport... i took off on the course in a futile attempt to catch ricky and very quickly crashed, missing a bridge that i didn't know was coming arouns a bend. the course wasn't muddy, but it was slick and fast... the first part of the course was a bit of a suffer-fest on a singlespeed, a couple of steep rooty climbs, and the only long climb on the course... i caught and passed a couple of riders.
half way through the lap the course comes through the camping area for a couple of feet and then heads back out into the woods... after this the climbs are a lot more singlespeed friendly, but the riding gets a good bit more techincal... i crashed again, hooking my bars on one of the many small trees along the side of the course which twists the bars around and throws me down on top of them, putting one end of my bars into my rib cage and straining my shoulders... i was back up pretty quicklyand take it easy for a while, not sure how my shoulders will feel when i have to stand up and crank on the pedals, but after a while i'm back into the swing of things.
there's a new section of trail back on this part of the race course that's even tighter than usual for Lodi and has a couple off-camber rooty sections that have me riding with one foot clipped out, just in case... i'm keeping an eye on my time, trying to beat matt's 57 minutes, but by the time i'm recognizing parts of the course that come near the end it's pretty clear that i won't... i get back to start/finish at somewhere around an hour and hand off to lee, then head back to the camp to recover...
Lee gets back in later than expected, and it turns out his light failed half way through his lap and he's been riding in the dark. matt went out for a double lap, but an hour later he's in camp telling me something... it took a couple of minutes to realize that he shouldn't be there, he should be riding. turns out he'd taken a bad fall and the volunteers at the start/finish want hime to check with the EMT before he goes out again. at first matt is trying to get me to take the baton and go out for another lap, but i figure i'll hang out for a couple of minutes to make sure he's ok in case he needs to go to the hospital. The EMT has a look at him and it looks like he's going to need stitches, which is going to be a problem, since both cars we have there are blocked in by tents, cars, and EZ-ups... luckily the camp right behind us is a Nick from pedal shop, a teamate of Lee's and we manage to move things around so that i can pull out under their EZ-Up.
i spent a couple of hours trying to find a comfortable position to get some rest in the waiting room while Matt ended up getting 6 stiches. while we were away Lee rode another lap, and Phil VanWerkoven, a friend from MORE who was volunteering at the start tent while his son raced, said he'd ghost ride a lap for matt if we wanted.
we got back to the campground around 9 and i got my stuff together and went out for a 2nd lap. the course was drier by this point and even though i felt like i was riding more casually i came in at almost exactly the same time as my first lap. i handed off to phil who rode our last 2 laps - he'd been looking for a team to ride some laps for, so he was pretty stoked to be riding - while i had a couple of post race beers and traded stories of the night before with the many friends who were there. we ended up with 2 laps a piece. it's not quite what we had expected, but the 12 Hours of Lodi Farm never seems to be what you expect...
looks like it was pretty good race for a bunch of riders i know... full results aren't up yet but special 1st place congrats to:
2 years ago it was my first race ever and it rained non-stop from the start to the finish. when i finished my 2nd lap (6th overall) the rest of my team had already decided to stop riding, so i joined them in a pancake breakfast and dry clothes. I ended up driving home in wet shoes and socks, and now I always make sure i have a good rain jacket, waterproof boots, and a reserve pair socks for any race of camping trip.
last year i tried to race solo and was riding well, but had to call it a day early due to problems with bike fit. it turned out that my saddle was a couple inches below where it should have been... a disappointing day, but it probably saved the rest of my year.
this year i was determined to change the pattern and have a team that rode all the way to the end of the event. Luck still wasn't on my side this weekend, but thanks to a special guest rider we did make it to 12 o'clock...
I picked up Matt at his place, and after some careful packing (stuff it in wherever it fits) and some rack reconfiguration we hit the road and the traffic. Normally it would take about an hour and half to get to Lodi from the city, but saturday it took almost that long to get to springfield. We finally made it to fredericksburg about 2 hours behind schedule and met up with our other teammate Lee on the road to the racecourse. We set up in the main area and went out for a quick pre-race spin... the course, as of 6pm, was dry, dusty and loose.
as we were having dinner a thunderstorm blew through leaving us scrambling to get everything under cover and gave the course a couple hours of rain and me flashbacks of 2 years ago. the rain stopped though, and didn't come back for the rest of the race. during dinner we settled on a 1-2-1 pattern for doing laps... that way we each got a lap in early - so that none of us were waiting untill 4 to ride - then a 3-4 hour break, 2 laps, another 3-4 hour break, then a last lap if there's time.
at some point during the day, i can't really remember when, i decided to ride singlespeed instead of geared... i'd probably be a bit faster on gears, and the course would probably be easier, but something about this vibe at this race just made me want to see how long i could manage to ride the single...
matt started us off strong, turning in a 57 minute lap and coming in right behind ricky and joe's teammate markie - they where one of our competitors in 3-man sport... i took off on the course in a futile attempt to catch ricky and very quickly crashed, missing a bridge that i didn't know was coming arouns a bend. the course wasn't muddy, but it was slick and fast... the first part of the course was a bit of a suffer-fest on a singlespeed, a couple of steep rooty climbs, and the only long climb on the course... i caught and passed a couple of riders.
half way through the lap the course comes through the camping area for a couple of feet and then heads back out into the woods... after this the climbs are a lot more singlespeed friendly, but the riding gets a good bit more techincal... i crashed again, hooking my bars on one of the many small trees along the side of the course which twists the bars around and throws me down on top of them, putting one end of my bars into my rib cage and straining my shoulders... i was back up pretty quicklyand take it easy for a while, not sure how my shoulders will feel when i have to stand up and crank on the pedals, but after a while i'm back into the swing of things.
there's a new section of trail back on this part of the race course that's even tighter than usual for Lodi and has a couple off-camber rooty sections that have me riding with one foot clipped out, just in case... i'm keeping an eye on my time, trying to beat matt's 57 minutes, but by the time i'm recognizing parts of the course that come near the end it's pretty clear that i won't... i get back to start/finish at somewhere around an hour and hand off to lee, then head back to the camp to recover...
Lee gets back in later than expected, and it turns out his light failed half way through his lap and he's been riding in the dark. matt went out for a double lap, but an hour later he's in camp telling me something... it took a couple of minutes to realize that he shouldn't be there, he should be riding. turns out he'd taken a bad fall and the volunteers at the start/finish want hime to check with the EMT before he goes out again. at first matt is trying to get me to take the baton and go out for another lap, but i figure i'll hang out for a couple of minutes to make sure he's ok in case he needs to go to the hospital. The EMT has a look at him and it looks like he's going to need stitches, which is going to be a problem, since both cars we have there are blocked in by tents, cars, and EZ-ups... luckily the camp right behind us is a Nick from pedal shop, a teamate of Lee's and we manage to move things around so that i can pull out under their EZ-Up.
i spent a couple of hours trying to find a comfortable position to get some rest in the waiting room while Matt ended up getting 6 stiches. while we were away Lee rode another lap, and Phil VanWerkoven, a friend from MORE who was volunteering at the start tent while his son raced, said he'd ghost ride a lap for matt if we wanted.
we got back to the campground around 9 and i got my stuff together and went out for a 2nd lap. the course was drier by this point and even though i felt like i was riding more casually i came in at almost exactly the same time as my first lap. i handed off to phil who rode our last 2 laps - he'd been looking for a team to ride some laps for, so he was pretty stoked to be riding - while i had a couple of post race beers and traded stories of the night before with the many friends who were there. we ended up with 2 laps a piece. it's not quite what we had expected, but the 12 Hours of Lodi Farm never seems to be what you expect...
looks like it was pretty good race for a bunch of riders i know... full results aren't up yet but special 1st place congrats to:
- becky for 1st place womens solo
- ricky, joe p, and markie for 1st place sport
- marc and lauri for 1st place duo
- erin and stuart for 1st place singlespeed
it was great to see so many people there -- joe, ricky, mark, marc, bob, pete, jason, stoner, butch, barbra, becky, erin, anne, nick, dt, spearman, craig, denis, stuart, jon, tris, mike, david, shiva steve, trevor, phil, derek, dan (sorry you didn't get to race), and off course matt & lee -- it's the people that make this a great event even if your race doesn't turn out how you expected.
Thursday, May 12, 2005
Goodbye Hello, Hello Flickr...
i was using Hello to post pics here, but it's been acting up for the last couple of weeks so i'm switching to Flickr... seems pretty cool so far, plus i can do more with the pics that i've posted. i've added their little applet on the left to show some of the shots i've got over there on this site, and i'll see about posting a link to an xml syndication feed of my photostream just in case anyone cares...
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
12hrs of lodi farm looming on the horizon...
starting to think through preparations for this weekend... gotta make sure all my good shorts/jerseys/socks/random clothes get washed... time to dig up the rain jackets that never get much use, except at Lodi... bikes (epic & IF single) are both in good shape... EZ-Up will be borrowed and supplemented with my Kelty sunshade... need to start making a shopping list for friday night...
every time i do a 12 or 24 hour race i always think i'm taking too much stuff...
- case of 6 x 1 gallon bottles of water
- bread/bagels, peanut butter, jelly, pringles, instant oatmeal, gatorade
- coleman fuel and new mantles for the lantern
- fuel for my camping stove.
- extra batteries for flashlights & camera (AA & AAA)
every time i do a 12 or 24 hour race i always think i'm taking too much stuff...
Monday, May 09, 2005
second race, better than the first...
my expectations going into greenbrier were, well i don't really know what they were... i've trained a lot this year and lost weight, so i expected my laptimes to drop from what i managed last year when i was racing beginner. at the same time, after my DNF at spring mountain a couple of weeks ago, i just wanted to make sure i finished.
got there with plenty of time to spare... checked in, watched the start of the beginner races, then started to get ready... bike is good shape, get my camelbak filled and hammer gel flask filled and start warming up... cruise around some of the roads and trails that aren't part of the course and then do the climb up from the boat ramp/start area to the parking lots a couple of times. my parents came up to the race, and i ran into them while i was warming up, so we head back to my car so that i can give my mom her mother's day present and a card, and then i give them directions on some good places to watch the race...
into the startng grid with 15 or so other sport 30-34s... up on the front row. with a couple minutes to go a rider in the 19-29 group ahead of us has his back tire suddenly flat and now he's rushing to change it, right in front of me... he makes it with a couple of seconds to spare, their group starts and we're getting ready to go.
the whistle blows and we're off like a shot... i'm in the first 5 as we hit the woods and 4th at the bottom of the first little climb. as we get to the top, i figure that if knowing course will be an advantage, it will be here on this downhill/rock garden section so i shift up and get past the 3rd & 2nd place riders and charge down the downhill as fast as i can. holy s*&^, i'm in 2nd... i'm still pretty close to Girts - the first place rider - coming down through the rock garden, but up the next small climb he's away from me pretty quickly. another downhill to recover and then up the big climb... rode most of it this lap, passing the slower 19-29 riders...
at some point i looked at the pouch that had my gel flask only to realize that it was empty... no food, but at least i still had diluted gatorade in my camelbak... ride along the ridge, still pushing, heart rate really high, the the nice flowy downhill then into the 2nd rockly climb... still feeling good, passing slower 19-29 rides and it seems like i've got a pretty good gap back to the 3rd place rider... fly down the downhill and the camp loop trail and then head back to start/finish... see Girts already heading back into the woods as i'm still heading towards the start/finish so he's well ahead.
look at my hrm as i'm heading back into the woods at it's just past 31 minutes... coming through the start area i start looking for any teammate or friends who might be able to get me a hand me up a GU on the next lap... ricky & welp are there so i start yelling that i need food on the next lap... just hoping they heard me, i made sense, and that they want to help...
once i hit the first climb of the 2nd lap i could tell my legs were really starting to suffer... don't know if it was just the pace or the lack of food was hurting me, but i knew i was riding the climbs a lot slower on this lap, and walked more of the big climb, but i was still riding the downhills hard. the faster 40-49 riders were starting to pass me, and i wasn't passing any more 19-29 riders...
back around at the start finish, ricky was standing there with a GU, so i ate that as fast as i could and headed back into the woods, just one more lap, still in second, just have hold on... the first climb was really slow this time, and as we came to the bottom of the rock garden the 3rd place ride came past me and i couldn't hang on... up the 2nd & 3rd climbs i'm suffering, but the GU is kicking in a bit. i'm in third and 4th place catches up with me while we were both walking up the big climb... i got back on the bike sooner and put 20-30 feet on him, but i got caught up in slower traffic from some of the 2 lap races. held onto 3rd untill the bottom of the last climb, but he got past me... talking after the race he said he almost threw up at the top of that climb. 4th, still on the podium, but not as nice as 2nd would have been... pushed as hard as i could manage down the last downhill and around the lake to make sure no one else caught me... looking at the results, i still had a couple one minutes on 5th, but i didn't know it then and was looking over my shoulder every 20 seconds...
finished in 1:41:24... 3 laps in about 13 minutes more than i'd done 2 laps last year. first lap was sub 31 minutes and i was flying, 2nd & 3rd dropped to 34:30 and 36 minutes respectively. could have been that i pushed to hard on the first lap or it might have been the lack of food...
in maryland state championship standings (only riders with an annual NORBA license) i placed 2nd, so i got a little silver medal... don't think i've ever won an award for any athletic event, so it's kind of cool to have.
got there with plenty of time to spare... checked in, watched the start of the beginner races, then started to get ready... bike is good shape, get my camelbak filled and hammer gel flask filled and start warming up... cruise around some of the roads and trails that aren't part of the course and then do the climb up from the boat ramp/start area to the parking lots a couple of times. my parents came up to the race, and i ran into them while i was warming up, so we head back to my car so that i can give my mom her mother's day present and a card, and then i give them directions on some good places to watch the race...
into the startng grid with 15 or so other sport 30-34s... up on the front row. with a couple minutes to go a rider in the 19-29 group ahead of us has his back tire suddenly flat and now he's rushing to change it, right in front of me... he makes it with a couple of seconds to spare, their group starts and we're getting ready to go.
the whistle blows and we're off like a shot... i'm in the first 5 as we hit the woods and 4th at the bottom of the first little climb. as we get to the top, i figure that if knowing course will be an advantage, it will be here on this downhill/rock garden section so i shift up and get past the 3rd & 2nd place riders and charge down the downhill as fast as i can. holy s*&^, i'm in 2nd... i'm still pretty close to Girts - the first place rider - coming down through the rock garden, but up the next small climb he's away from me pretty quickly. another downhill to recover and then up the big climb... rode most of it this lap, passing the slower 19-29 riders...
at some point i looked at the pouch that had my gel flask only to realize that it was empty... no food, but at least i still had diluted gatorade in my camelbak... ride along the ridge, still pushing, heart rate really high, the the nice flowy downhill then into the 2nd rockly climb... still feeling good, passing slower 19-29 rides and it seems like i've got a pretty good gap back to the 3rd place rider... fly down the downhill and the camp loop trail and then head back to start/finish... see Girts already heading back into the woods as i'm still heading towards the start/finish so he's well ahead.
look at my hrm as i'm heading back into the woods at it's just past 31 minutes... coming through the start area i start looking for any teammate or friends who might be able to get me a hand me up a GU on the next lap... ricky & welp are there so i start yelling that i need food on the next lap... just hoping they heard me, i made sense, and that they want to help...
once i hit the first climb of the 2nd lap i could tell my legs were really starting to suffer... don't know if it was just the pace or the lack of food was hurting me, but i knew i was riding the climbs a lot slower on this lap, and walked more of the big climb, but i was still riding the downhills hard. the faster 40-49 riders were starting to pass me, and i wasn't passing any more 19-29 riders...
back around at the start finish, ricky was standing there with a GU, so i ate that as fast as i could and headed back into the woods, just one more lap, still in second, just have hold on... the first climb was really slow this time, and as we came to the bottom of the rock garden the 3rd place ride came past me and i couldn't hang on... up the 2nd & 3rd climbs i'm suffering, but the GU is kicking in a bit. i'm in third and 4th place catches up with me while we were both walking up the big climb... i got back on the bike sooner and put 20-30 feet on him, but i got caught up in slower traffic from some of the 2 lap races. held onto 3rd untill the bottom of the last climb, but he got past me... talking after the race he said he almost threw up at the top of that climb. 4th, still on the podium, but not as nice as 2nd would have been... pushed as hard as i could manage down the last downhill and around the lake to make sure no one else caught me... looking at the results, i still had a couple one minutes on 5th, but i didn't know it then and was looking over my shoulder every 20 seconds...
finished in 1:41:24... 3 laps in about 13 minutes more than i'd done 2 laps last year. first lap was sub 31 minutes and i was flying, 2nd & 3rd dropped to 34:30 and 36 minutes respectively. could have been that i pushed to hard on the first lap or it might have been the lack of food...
in maryland state championship standings (only riders with an annual NORBA license) i placed 2nd, so i got a little silver medal... don't think i've ever won an award for any athletic event, so it's kind of cool to have.
Thursday, May 05, 2005
uh, where did my chainring bolts go?
tried to ride schaeffer last night... almost managed to. seemingly good luck with traffic, made it there with plenty of time to ride... checking out the bike before my ride - trying to be a good bike owner rather than letting things slide - i found i was missing 2 (of 4) chainring bolts. went down to the shop and they got the bike back up and running while i helped bring the bikes in from the racks outside the store... too late to ride by the time they were done, so i'll ride tonight instead... wakefield/accotink or schaeffer, can't decide... basically a choice between being social or being anti-social.
Tuesday, May 03, 2005
back on the singlespeed
after a couple of months of riding geared almost exclusively, and a couple of uninspired rides on the single-ated IF i finally found the singlespeed love again tonight... ricky helped fix my drivetrain so the chain wasn't skipping everytime i put any torque to the pedals and that made all of the difference. the bike went from feeling loose and uneven to feeling great... solid and flowy.
after a quick warmup around the bowl with miller, and a quick trip to shoot pics of ricky hopping logs, i hooked up with the moderate group (pete - only just back from utah, dom, ricky, rick, and more) and headed out to accotink. without the constant skipping i really got into the flow of trail and the simplicity of the singlespeed... sitting, then standing, then sitting again, trying to keep my front wheel glued to pete or ricky's up the climbs and around the twisty singletrack...
a perfect ride for the workout i was trying to get, powering up the climbs and then crusing in between. after a while, i broke off with ricky and a couple of the others to head back to the cars, no need to go too hard right before a race... easy ride tommorow at schaeffer to shoot some pics (if anyone comes out to ride with me), then off thursday, and a bit of riding at the IMBA congressional staff ride on friday... greenbrier is on sunday.
after a quick warmup around the bowl with miller, and a quick trip to shoot pics of ricky hopping logs, i hooked up with the moderate group (pete - only just back from utah, dom, ricky, rick, and more) and headed out to accotink. without the constant skipping i really got into the flow of trail and the simplicity of the singlespeed... sitting, then standing, then sitting again, trying to keep my front wheel glued to pete or ricky's up the climbs and around the twisty singletrack...
a perfect ride for the workout i was trying to get, powering up the climbs and then crusing in between. after a while, i broke off with ricky and a couple of the others to head back to the cars, no need to go too hard right before a race... easy ride tommorow at schaeffer to shoot some pics (if anyone comes out to ride with me), then off thursday, and a bit of riding at the IMBA congressional staff ride on friday... greenbrier is on sunday.
Monday, May 02, 2005
time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so...
no riding on saturday thanks to rain... my legs have been feeling pretty tired recently thanks to the extra training, so not riding was a pretty easy decision and i think it was the right idea since i felt good today at greenbrier...
went up top greenbrier with a couple of friends to get a crack at the racecourse before the race next weekend. i rode up there a couple of times this winter as it stays in decent shape longer than most parks, but i wanted to see what kind of shape the course is in, where there are trees down, where the trees have been cleared, etc... took 2 laps of the course, plus a couple of the other trails and an extra trip down the rock garden. still haven't made the whole climb on the red trail, but i'm damn close, both tries today were foiled by technical bobbles on my part...
the ride got a bit competitive at times, with a couple of little sprints near the end and some fun passing on the more open sections of the trail. a lot of fun... might have ridden a bit harder than i should have, but my legs feel good this evening...
hopefully i'll get a couple of cool rides this week but not as intense as last week. going to try to do another photo ride at schaeffer on wednesday and the IMBA congressional staff ride is friday, always a pretty cool day...
went up top greenbrier with a couple of friends to get a crack at the racecourse before the race next weekend. i rode up there a couple of times this winter as it stays in decent shape longer than most parks, but i wanted to see what kind of shape the course is in, where there are trees down, where the trees have been cleared, etc... took 2 laps of the course, plus a couple of the other trails and an extra trip down the rock garden. still haven't made the whole climb on the red trail, but i'm damn close, both tries today were foiled by technical bobbles on my part...
the ride got a bit competitive at times, with a couple of little sprints near the end and some fun passing on the more open sections of the trail. a lot of fun... might have ridden a bit harder than i should have, but my legs feel good this evening...
hopefully i'll get a couple of cool rides this week but not as intense as last week. going to try to do another photo ride at schaeffer on wednesday and the IMBA congressional staff ride is friday, always a pretty cool day...
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