Albemarle

Ben is building some fun looking stuff right now in NC

flow no

My work trip this week took me deeper into Virginia and my drive home took me within a mile or two of a new pump track. Nice that riding a pump track doesn't take 2+ hours to get a good ride in, and was a nice break in the day. This track is not in-town, it's out at a park which has several miles of multi-use trails. The pump track is actually out amongst the trails, about a mile or so from the parking lot.

It winds among the trees, and covers a lot of space. The track is much bigger than Chambersburg's, with many line options (too many to try to count). It seems like they tried to do way too much and build too many lines. The track has very little flow and fun, and most of the berms make you slow way down instead of accelerate you out of the turn. Many of the line junctions are choppy, with one set of rollers not exactly matching up with the next set of rollers, and many places where it seemed the best line was to roll the skinny part on top of a berm. I saw their tool cache, and could tell they're working on a S-turn section and other tweaks, so I'll try it again next time I'm in that area.

Learned that a huge pump track is planned for Lake Fairfax Park (Rich's masterpiece perhaps?), and hopefully one at another park in a different part of the county.

Missed the wake-up for the dawn patrol full pull,
or, maybe I had the wrong day altogether...
maybe that wasn't such a bad thing,
I wasn't feeling too strong at 0645,
love this quote from one who did meet the call
"Hardest fucking forty miles I've ever ridden."

I followed other signs instead
led me to the spoogy end,
that new entrance almost makes it worth riding again

auxiliary weekend shots around town

spring race

Man, this maximus is gonna be one meaty manly dealy. Those 42 or 47 miles are going to put you in the cave. Yes, it's true that the designer course features some of the best trail that Norchaux has to offer. And it's also true that there will be a lot of work connecting to the fun dashed line sections.

We rode many sections of the course again today. A lot of it is still soft, as am I. Cycling is a volume-based sport, and I am clearly lacking volume. It's true that the more times my legs spin in circles, the more prepared I will be. Coasting, and pumping is not the same thing as riding. No photos today, not even close. The rubber band snapped often, falling far back out of sight, hearing the calls and songs of the slummin' man from the hills ahead. I could almost keep contact with the Mule, after he nearly sliced himself in half on a hard fall on a sharp fin-shaped rock. We had nearly 2 more hours of riding to do, and the Mule only got stronger.

This Friday will actually be my first road ride of the year. I need to spin more often.

not

TR sent this out,

I love the filename given to the .jpg by whomever saved it,
I think that person has it backwards

Pete's Movie Opening

I wish I could post a larger image, but blogger doesn't eat PDFs.
it's in Gettysburg May 1st.

metal guru

The Metal Guru, aka Michaux Masher, is now doing service under the capable ass of Rider.Big.E.

commuter run

cheap cell phone pic
Rocky Gap Shelter
trail run on the AT on my way home from VA

happens to be quite near a really good beer store
singles, sixes, whatever
coincidence

new Dirt Rag arrived today. 20 years they've been at this game. 21 for me. most of my regular PA&VA riding buds have been at it even longer.

a Michaux foto in there too, and one of TonyB from the SSO PunkBike by Steve. Nice work all

Oliver and the Junior Intro crew at the MACDC

they rode Weitzels for a bit, don't know how far they went or what else they did

with them in camp, I rode something new, something which needs wheels on ground, something some of you may get to see in a few weeks.

did the big Cupcake group hug in the fog today, rode some more new stuff and some abandoned stuff. the abandoned wasn't half bad actually. a good loop, though with a bit much of the gravel in it. not a single Cupcake taker on Ego Rock. Can't explain that at all..
no pics, too far off the back

Nice to be back here again. Been a long while...

Dr. Dawg on cleanup
there's another picture of what's under that steri-strip here

MASH'n

Craft Brewed Earrings

Zach, Brett and company put on an excellent first-time event. The view from the kitchen was that everyone had a good time, and got in as many laps as they wanted to.

History Lesson

Buck's new plaything

goin' on

a couple interesting bowls

Tried to make it to the Cupcake ride today. The 8AM one. There was another ride leaving at 9AM. I wanted to ride the 9:oo ride, but wasn't sure if the 9 had been moved to 8. The change to DST added another twist to the time, though I was confident that all in Cupcake Kingdom knew enough to change their clocks in the right direction. I planned to arrive at 8 for the 9AM ride. Problem was, I didn't know how to find the Evil Doctor's Secret Lair. I had verbal instructions from Possum from several months ago: Go past Jake's house. Turn left at the stop sign. Do some more stuff. Look for an orange cone. Turn left at the orange cone and look for happy men and bikes. There was probably some important detail in that do some more stuff part that I needed to know. Cells didn't work. Drove up some wrong roads, and discovered what would make a cool climb on a cross bike, Old Railroad Rd. Discovered also that it gates out onto Piney Mountain Ridge. The Subaru didn't make it under or around the gate. The ATV guys offered to build a ramp over the gate, but didn't have enough material for the landing side, and I didn't want to air drop that far. Soooo, back down Railroad Road and on to my second ride option. There was a ride leaving from the Furnace too. The time for that ride was a secret and I thought I'd take a chance. But it was obviously later than I was.... no one there. Not a bad thing, as that ride was going a lot farther than I needed today.

Good thing there were still two other Michaux rides to choose from, both leaving at 9 DST from the north and south.

She smiles and giggles a lot more since she started riding a 29er SS

The deer herds in the northern forest have been active lately, and it looks like their patterns have moved to heretofore unknown ridge sections. Smart deer I guess, trying to avoid hard packed dangerous roads.

Rode some new stuff. Good stuff. Rode some favorites. The north has it goin' on these days.

project

It's ridable for these guys in the clockwise direction, and still very soft. Am trying to put in some small rollers to help them in the anti-clockwise direction. Will be a good test to see if the simple addition of rollers makes it easier to ride uphill. Reality check, is that the dirt is wheelbarrow only, and it will take a lot of wheelbarrow loads. Probably more than I will want to do solo, so it might just end up a clockwise loop.

SS SSPBE2009

must steal this cool graphic from Steve.

I was nowhere in the mix, not ever coming close to placing a stage,
got some points only once, from the no-dab section on the Little Canaan entrance,
which came right after embarassing myself trying to climb up the wet rock shelf adjacent to said entrance. Here's the result of that, ...so typical, I usually seem to hurt myself in the parking lot, or at breaks in the action. What was that about being 13 again.....?

a keg o' Peg Leg Stout at the 2/3 mark. emptied,
then, down the freeride trail to Lil' Canaan. Loved it.
more pics, story, and movie coming soon...?,
but not from me, these are the only pixels I caught

wheels turning

The wheel is turning and you can't slow down

You can't let go and you can't hold on

Lot's of biking things have been in my mind lately, not just the past few days of melt. Small talk conversation over the weekend about the Shenandoah 100 and racing with gears. Thinking about doing a lot less racing than usual, and replace some of that with touring. And the race(s) I do do, I may be doing with gears. Like I said last Sept, I can't imagine doing another 10 SMs on a single-speed, and I can't yet imagine not doing it at all, so maybe gears will be a compromise? Maybe a 1x8 or 1x9?

Won't you try just a little bit harder

Couldn't you try just a little bit more

So many projects in my head:

• make a Tomicog fixxy out of the Soul Cycles cross frame; ride the mixte, new motivation to spin cycle the legs
• pick up a 24" Mirraco from this guy- pump track'n, learn to dirt jump, skate park, wall wides, be 13 again, learn to manual on a bike designed for it
• introduce Oliver and his friends to a little more woods riding, maybe some BMX track action if they're into that; use that manual on a track
  
• an Eastern Woods for the SM 100; cheapness and laziness have prevented me from doing anything towards acquiring said type of machine; Crouse's Paragon?? if it's still for sale??
  

No sponsor's jersey on my back for the first time in 8 years, no minimum race requirements, no minimum work requirements. I probably won't do so many races; I'll miss seeing a hundred friends at a time.

Of course, even with gears, I can't just show up at the 100 without some prep work in the legs, riding the pump track all summer long won't cut it. Thinking of filling the race void with some of this kind of stuff:

• rack and pack overnights; SAG'd overnights; The Ring; M-G-M (like SDS, but closer to home); 1903 rides; Tuscarora Explora (maybe one of these will happen?)
  

Little bit harder, just a little bit more
Little bit further than you gone before

Then there's all these thoughts penetrating:

• build more fun stuff to ride here in town, get a grant, try to help the kids and town a little more;
• help people build more trail like I***erg and M***ey;
  
• help people build more official trail;
  
• help build Buck's pump track, other pump tracks, and ride more pump tracks;
• spend a little more time helping things in Michaux;
• buy/borrow a tandem, try some woods or overnight stuff with Oliver stoking
• ride Raystown every chance I get
  

.... all the different ways to have fun with pedals. 52 weekends/year, and I'm using up about 16 of those with skiing..... it can ... all .... wait...

yadda yadda blah blah, all good thoughts, in 10 months, we'll see if any thing is any different.

Every time that wheel turn round
Bound to cover just a little more ground

Opinions welcome

Send a Kid to Camp

Help a brutha out
let's get this kid to Colorado!

3 days

our weekend view from the house
thanks to Mr. Million Vertical Feet!

Not a lot of pixels or words to capture the weekend. Lots of lunges, some jumps, some moguls. Quigley, Buchness, Brothers, all of them rippin' tele skiers. More friends stopped by for the party Sat. night.

Oliver skied comfortably from the big lift, Kim stuck her toe in the terrain park for a few runs, and my mogul skills went up a hair. Super-soft hero snow helps an awful lot with all that.

Friday, I was easily convinced to take the morning off and grab a session with Legend Withers and his Roundtop buddy. These guys can ski! Five seconds into the first run, and I knew it was gonna be a fast day. Frequent tailgates gave the legs a break.

Looks like a terrible week for temperatures. It's still too early to jump right into mud season. The mountain biking can't be any good right now. Some Wx geeks are predicting a strong and cold second-half of February into March.

Wow!

Food for thought, as the topic of Oliver and ski racing has come up lately. I guess high-speed crashes with low-speed trees are a lot worse than your standard over the bars mountain bike crash. That's 2 deaths and 1 amputation in this season in this thread. Can't say I can recall any mountain bike related deaths. Wonder what the actuaries think of ski racing? Maybe we'll just stick to the terrain parks....

found today on the DCSki Forum from a college ski racer in PA.

Injuries this year
Sorry to diverge from this topic... seemed kinda dead but what I am posting is kinda related... but I wanted to comment on the high number of injuries I have witnessed this year.

Our first race of the year,at wisp, a racer from WVA flew off the run that merges with the lift at the base of main street and had a compound fracture in his leg. Unfortunately, the bone nicked an artery and two weeks later, doctors had to amputate his leg a few inches above the knee.

The same weekend, a racer at Denton, PA; from the roundtop team; flew off a green and died upon impact with a tree.

Two weeks later, during a Giant Slalom race at Elk Mnt in PA; two racers from my team tore their ACL's and another from my team stressed their ACL and is out for the season.

And just this past weekend, at Timberline, another racer from my team had a compound fracture in the lower part of his leg and the medivac had to be called (i think they in the end took him to the Oakland hospital by ambulance). Another kid from another team, on the same day, tore his ACL.


Has anyone else noticed a greatly increased number of injuries locally? Or is it just centered on local racers? Kinda nerve racking

year of quantity

Lot of various turns in the past few weeks. Have probably skied 4-5 days/week the past few weeks. If time on skis and number of turns can make you a better skier, then I certainly must be getting better this season. In the past week, I've had a pretty good-snow night session at Liberty with the Single Plank Outlaw and crew, also ran into Lee & Scotty Jones; a hard ice night on Thursday with Oliver; a harder icier session Friday evening at Whitetail with Tony (who missed the Tuesday), some Outlaws, and Mr. Quigley. Didn't ski much with any of the Outlaws though as we all had trouble with our timing and catching up with each other. Found Tony and Joel in time for the chilly tailgate afterward though. After that session, I have to think I've improved my fall line ice turning ability significantly this week. Learning how to push that controlled sideslip in the middle of each turn a little bit more.

Saturday was a pretty good snow day at Liberty with Oliver, and yesterday was a completely different situation. Warm, 50 degrees, slow and soft. Ran into Tim on my second run, and skied the rest of the time with him and occasionally some of his buddies. Hit the moguls on Exhibition, and skied them better than I ever have. They were slow, really slow and sticky. So much so that we found ourselves actually steering towards the shiny spots just to pick up a little speed. Actually trying to go faster through moguls! Yea, that's never happened to me before. OK, so they weren't fully grown moguls, they were only a day or two old after having been groomed out after the recent ice storm. Still, I'll take slow & sticky Exhibition and Bold over fast & sketchy Exhibition and Bold any day. It added some work to recover from the constant pitching forward. We moved around, hitting the terrain park lift for several runs, Tim and Patroller Jay encouraging me to drop it a little faster so I can clear that gap and not smack the flat landing. Then over to Fanciful seeking the shady fast line near the trees.

Lots of options out there this weekend. Some folks were getting some quality, and others were doing some good works. Others hit Laurel Mountain for some fresh poached eggs, and I think a few others camped out at White Grass. Other friends rode in timed circles on frozen farmland. I selfishly went for more and more turns on snow. More turns equals more better, right? Time on snow adds up right? I'm certainly gettin' my $ worth out of the season pass.

And this past week, got better on steep boilerplate, soft baby moguls, and gap jumps. Fur sur.

Bike meeting tonight in Emmitsburg, maybe some new trail to build in the near future...

utility skiing

Wanted to tilt the new skis on their sides. Again and again. That was mission one for the weekend. Filling some available time, go get some turns, maybe learn something.

Pulled up for a noon patrol to a packed parking lot, and headed for the locals lane. Luckily a few folks had started leaving by then and I got a snow row. It was crowded, I'd be riding the singles line all day.

Did a few laps on the Far Side, working the slow speed, round turns, tuck the back leg, arms forward, squeeze that orange, stay in the fall line, control that speed kind of thing. repeat.

Re-discovered that ski lifts are an interesting thing. The rides last far longer than most elevator rides with strangers, but on a lift you hear and learn all kinds of things you never hear on an elevator. I'm usually pretty chatty on the lift during off-peak times. I usually find some interesting people skiing here during the week. Today I figured I'll just keep my mouth down and listen.

The first lift ride I shared on the Expert lift was with two youngish seeming guys. One of them misses getting on the chair somehow and dives underneath to cover his head. We get him back on, and after a while he says something about having a choice of either going for the chair and maybe missing it, or diving under to keep from getting clocked. I utter something about that being a hard choice to have to make. I decide those should be the last words I speak on the lift for the rest of the day. Chairlift rides give us a unique opportunity to be right there in someone's personal space, and not have to say sqat. I needed to exercise that right today.

Another ride up the Exp. lift a guy is telling his buddy about meeting a pro snowboard girl who lived in Hawaii in the summers and surfed. He was in Hawaii for a war game. Hot pro girl was a friend of a coworker, and waited on them at a bar called Dukes. She hooked them up with free drinks and all. She was friendly to him, but nothing ever came of it. He'd like to run into her again. He added that she also worked at a plastic surgeon's office, as a receptionist or whatever.

Saw about 8-10 guys just rippin' the moguls under the lift. Hour after hour I heard, many of them very old school, some old men skiing for the first time this season, and a couple young-uns. One guy wearing mogul pants. Rode a couple chairs up with some of them, they talked amongst themselves, about the lack of a contest environment nowadays, and scoping the skills of those ripping under us.

A guy on another chair ride was skiing with a pretty young lady in a fancy ski coat. She was amazed at the mogul skiers under us. He said her form looks pretty good, and if she wanted to try it while her legs were still fresh, that he'd give her a quick mogul lesson. I've always wanted a quick mogul lesson too, haven't you? If there's anything someone can tell me and teach me at the top of Exhibition that will help me rip it, then I want to hear it.... I didn't stick around to see the lesson though, instead jumping down the far side going as slow and straight as possible. I saw them still coming down the moguls as I was halfway up the lift the next time.

Saw a guy in what looked like a mid-90s James Bond bad guy jumpsuit making big turns down far side. Wondering how somebody still has clothes like that, and why they would wear them. Saw two zippy little kids ski up to him in the liftline followed by a narrow waisted pair of black stretch pants with nice long hair and a lot of fragrance. Accents seemed very European, Seemed like they'd all skied somewhere other than Whitetail before.

Luckily my legs got bored with the far side work and instead of heading off to Dr. Evil's lair I decided to ski the terrain park a bit and then time it to the stone cabin. I talked to no one on the new terrain park lift. All solo rides, on a packed weekend day. When the ice sux, or the liftlines are too long, I've been using the terrain park lift. There's always better snow there, and there are big carvable walls and ramps to session.

***

The half-pipe finally opened this week too. Got in there for a few runs Sunday with Oliver. I never was much into pipes when I was a snowboarder. Wondering why I think it's kind of fun now on freeheels. It'll be fun to hit when it's soft or slushy, and there's no lift line there.

When I swapped over my bindings to the new planks, I greased them according to Voile's instructions. Voile thinks I should be doing this after every season. Both my skis released today landing a jump. Was a perfectly normal landing I thought, not that much higher than any other landing. It seemed like they came off in the air, since I landed in the normal position, ready to ski away, when I realized I had no skis below. I guess there's no way they came off in the air, so I figure I landed on my edges, and that twist caused the piston on the CRB to release. Then when I unweighted to turn, they dropped away. Interesting. Don't want that happening any more.

smackdown

Blue Knob knocked me back in my place. After a feel good session at Whitetail on Friday, on the newly forming bumps, under the soft snow blow, I finally was getting some decent runs down exhibition and thought another corner was turned.

Today I was schooled by narrow trails, woody lines, brush, snakes, and general Blue Knob steepness. Buchness gave me the Blue Knob version of steep and soft, hitting mostly trails I'd never tried before. Most of it was fun, but I was fighting it all day, constantly on my tails, not charging forward into hard, narrow turns. Mike tore it up on his fat Atomics, getting every line calm and controlled. The first glades were just opened up, and they're still in need of a lot of ski pruning. The steeper glades still need more snow and no more melting. Then they could all use some tracking. So, everyone, go pack down BK's glades please.

Scouted out another x-c touring spot on the way home. It took me near a couple of the finest towns in Pennsylvania.

LM

note the thermometer. it was a great day

the lifts are going to start running again here next year.
Not sure if that's good or bad

a new Michaux race

The Michaux Mash, on some good trail

details here

I re-discovered soft dry snow
it comes from a can
I get it now

reality <> expectations

not at all what I was hoping to see
contrast my reality Saturday against those previous snowy shots
Blue Knob was much more on the challenging side than the epic side,
was there before they opened, and lasted 'till 1:00 hoping the blue radar would finally arrive,
it arrived briefly at noon, then the pink radar overtook it as I left.

***
today was much more fun
skiing better snow at Whitetail with different folks throughout the day,
Kim, Oliver, and Tiff to start,
found Buchness after awhile,
then finally saw Tele-Todd, and then Tomi in the tele clinic
Kim took the kids home after lunch, and I stayed to ski,
longest ski day of my season and was glad Tomi didn't want to take any more runs after the clinic
thanks for the ride home!

a few states north

if we ever move again, this state is at the top of our list

and, Fri afternoon at White Grass

saw this in the Whitetail parking lot

Tele Todd feeling that back foot with his new Hammerhead/Kodiak rig