Drooper Related Syndrome

The squish thing.  It's not what you think.  Dropping to flat is 2001.  I stopped that business a long time ago.  Jumping?  Don't think so.  I'm about as close to my limit as I wanna be.  That drop/gap/jump thing I've been doing at the Backyard?

It ain't much of a thing although it's a tad bigger than it looks.  3.5ft down, mebbe 8ft out over a slight gap to a nice transition.  Rear suspension won't make much a difference.  Front suspension is probably only just a mental enabler.  There's a much bigger gap back there to my left (your right) that I've been eyeballing.  I can imagine doing it, but then I imagine something like this if I fail:

Watching the Red Bull Rampage gives me a glimpse at glory as well a peek around the corner to see the Ghost of Carnage Future.

BTW: I knew Lacondeguy was gonna win hours before the big show.

What intrigues me (again) with a frame that has way too many moving parts?

The hardtail.  It can do so much.  With a 150mm fjork, even more.  Straight line shots down a hill can be fantastic... as long as your head and eyes can keep up.  There's a nasty root line on the Weigh Station Loop at the Whitewater Center I hit last weekend.  Gnarl burger speed, but with the straight shot and big, round roots, the bike just floats between my legs with the drooper drooped.  Felt so good.

But those square edge hits.  The ones I don't see at the last minute and fail to avoid.  Gnar gnar like I rode on Spencer Gap last week.  All's well and then it's like a torpedo out of nowhere.  Horrid noises, hull integrity compromised, possible tire damage, certain rim unhappiness.  It was going so well up until then, and then regret and sads.

The other time I think about it?  Railing a corner, drooper drooped, bike leaned hard between my legs, center of gravity as close to being over the contact patch as possible.  Burning full-on Enduro™ turns.  Roots, rocks, detritus... all trying to pull the rear wheel out from under me. 

Damn it.  Is it the drooper allowing me to go just that bit faster?  Sometimes I think so.

I don't want life to be more complicated.  I don't want more maintenance.  I don't need another bike.

I think back to those short few days on the MOOTS Rogue YBB 27.5.

That bike with a drooper and a 140mm fjork, preferably something Pike'esque.  Not so complicated, but enough to take the edge off a square hit?  Dunno.  I really liked grooving on the smaller wheels.  Didn't run stuff over as well, but felt playful.

Maybe it's just that time of year.  The opposite of Spring Fever... Air Spring Fall Fever.

I've spent way too many slow days at work looking at the options.  Norco, Devinci, Specialized, Transition, Scott, Santa Cruz, Pivot, Intense, Rocky Mountain, Foes... all better to buy at full spec.  None spec'ed/built out the way I would want them.  1X drivetrain, internal drooper, Shimano brakes, high bottom bracket, pink wheels... maybe it's better that way.

I know gears come with the package, so the frame would have to absolutely stellar enough to make me forget about the bits.

Maybe I just need to ride more.

I Tried

Friday.  Tried to make it to my first ever Critical Mass.  The first one in Charlotte was... oh, I don't know.  1999?  I've been slack.  Pre-beer and roll outta the house at 7:00.  Meet Bill Nye at the Common Market.  Beers are had.  He gets us another round at 7:55.  The Mass rolls out at 8:00... without us.  They're headed to the Birdsong Brewery.  We'll just meet them there.

By the time this is over...

I decide it's time to head home.  I'm never very good at navigating after dark from NoDa to my house using practical routes.  I always end up semi-lost.  Tonight is no different.  Navigating by phone, I slip a pedal on the coaster.

Not sure if the best decision was riding in flip flops or replacing the stock plastic pedals to Bear Traps.

Saturday.  Wake up.  Wait for a family friendly window.  Make a break for the Whitewater Center.  Casual solo lap of the fun stuff... maybe twice down the Tower #93 jump line.  Back home safe.  No flip flop related mayhem.

Alarm on Sunday.  Meet with Hubs and Doug to walk the new pinned addition at the Backyard Trails.  Keep my wits about me, one eye out for chiggers and the other for aggressive geese.

Trounce around in the poison ivy and holly bush (joy!) for an hour and a half.  Massage a couple turns.  Much nodding and chin stroking.  It will be a fine addition... once it actually exists.

Back in the parking lot to meet up with Stabby, Eric Van Driver, and Mason.  Grab the bike and go.  Mason eyeballs some jumps.  I accidentally pee on my hand.  Fantasizing about full suspension whenever I'm ripping the short descents.  Eric falls asleep waiting for us to get done playing on a jump line.

Go home and don't watch the Red Bull Rampage as planned.  It's been postponed until tonight due to rain during the scheduled qualifiers.   Watch Where the Trail Ends on Netflix to satiate my need to see young people slay the gnar.

And even though I wouldn't ride 90% of what they did in the movie, I feel the desire for squish and silliness.  I hope I get better soon.

Fell on Bad Days

Wednesday.  I'm up early enough to get some riding in before work.  Raining.  Forecast says it will end by 8:00AM.  It doesn't.  Back in the house, fold laundry, unload the dishwasher, head back out the door in the rain at 8:30AM.  Never dawned on me to put on my fender.  Oh well, only calling for some more light rain around 1:00PM and no more.

Off and on rain all day, no fender, butt going from soaked to just moist throughout the day.  Go out to the furthest point I deliver to some thirty-five blocks away when the rain picks up, ride back into town via the greenway only to get another run back out to the same place.  This time, the greenway is flooded.  I start to ride under the bridge at Morehead Street, realize I can't ratchet the cranks on the Fastest Bike in the World until it's too late.  Stop about a third of the way in.  Wade back out of the underpass through the nasty storm runoff. 

Last minute run to the courthouse in a steady rain assures me that I will ride home with a nice swamp-ass.

Sours the mood a bit.

The Pie texts me.  She's headed out to pick up puppy milk.

"Need anything?"

My resolve to not drink beer for four or five days crumbles less than seventy hours into it.  Come home, grab a can and a coozie, head downstairs to disrobe and down-gear.  Take off the shoes that normally smell like a thousand dead corpses to find out they now smell like a thousand and one. 

Pretty sure I was in a semi-dismal mood before the day even started.  Not entirely sure why.  The finish line is in sight.  Less than a month to go before the races that require actual fitness are behind me.  Then there will be no early miles, much more sleep, fewer things and agendas.

The goal is to hang onto the shreds of fitness I have remaining which are actually the shreds of shreds at this point.  Just enough gas in the tank so I don't suffer unnecessarily.  Have fun... you know.

Think I might be slightly bummed about not doing the Pisgah Stage Race.  I almost signed up multiple times.  Had I known so many people whose company I like to keep were gonna be there... the scales mighta tipped.  I'm holding onto my remaining 5.8 days of vacation like a greedy time miser.  The Pie and I were pondering a Sedona vacation next Spring Break, but a recent realization that even with US Airways $99 buddy passes, it's still close to a $2,000 trip... maybe more.  We might be too practical minded to toss that kinda money on one trip.  Those days I'm saving might not have needed to be held so tightly.

I'm happier today.  Over the hump.  Clearing skies.  Drying trails.  Can't wait to ride dirt soon.

But for now, beer is my fender.

Old People Problems

My back was sore Saturday night, prolly from pushing a stupid 32X18 up Pisgah climbs I had no business trying.  Heating pad while watching the tube to make me molar betterer.

Wake up Sunday, store, go see mom, mow the lawn, bend the blade on a stump, bend it back to semi-serviceable with a vise, finish... mower shaking from being unbalanced.  Even more sore now then before.

The Pie and Nia are going for a two hour run in preparation for a ten miler coming up in a couple weeks.  Nothing better to do with myself, so I grab the DickStickel and head to the BYT.

Yes, ride rigid 32X18 in Pisgah, ride 150mm of suspension with a 32X20 in Charlotte.  Because... burrito.

Speaking of the Backyard Trails, Faster Mustache is once again putting on The Backyard Experience, a race like none other (for the most part).  An excellent time riding/racing the most technical, feature-strewn trails in Charlotte, for the very best price, with food, beer and all manner of good times.

Registration is open.  A better description of what it's about is on the BikeReg site, so click the link for more info.

Back to my ride....

Feel pretty good, despite the fact that my Pop Tarts burned off hours ago.  Jump the cannon jumps that I've been afraid of ever since they modified them from jumps to flat to jumps with transitions... and gaps.  Hit the tech loop.

Things are going smoothly.  Clean a log ride, make the tight climb outta the rock pile, crush the switchback, the steep carpet climb out, get over the rootball.

I start thinking about Kürdt's almost clean ride on the tech loop last time I was out here.  Almost... he got through the crux of the entire ride only to wash out in a loose corner.  Foot down.   Bragging rights on the day lost.  I was going to make it... unless I did something stupid.

Hop on the low log ride (1.) with some speed.  Seeing that it's rotten, I wheelie drop to the right, noticing that my rear tire is landing on some rotten wood.  I look back under my left arm to see if it's pressure treated, possibly with nails/screws hanging out.

Head turned the wrong way, run into the large, dead log (2.) head-on.  The bike stops and I do not.  In the air, then on the ground, wondering what just kept my bike from coming with me.  Review and assess.  I'm sore in that "my bike stopped and I didn't" kinda way.  No clean run this time and taken down two pegs in the process.

Continue on.  Come to the huge gap/gap step-down/ride-around option.  I always take the ride-around.  Sore, shaken and hungry.  I decide to take a closer look.  Maybe eight feet or so out, three feet down, a hole in between.  Screw it.

I go back and hit it.  Then again.  Then one more time.  Another BYT demon defeated.  Finish the Farmbrook Loop in its entirety, backtrack to the gap jump and hit it a few more times.  Try to photo document the moment with the new camera, but realize had I carried my iPhone, I coulda used the remote control/interval feature to get it 100%.  Instead...

Whatever.

I kept thinking about Bill Nye and I's conversation from the day before about learning new skills, pushing things a little bit, and my reluctance to just do it.

So I did it.  I might do it some more.  We'll see.  Right now I'm "old people sore" all over.

Pisgah for Dummies

I promised a lot of pictures of Bill Nye standing around with his bike.  You only get one.

Eric "PMBAR Honcho" Wever surprised me early Saturday morning with an offer of a Sprinter shuttle ride to somewhere high up in the mountains.  Being slightly smarter than some, we accepted the lift and started our ride much higher than our car.  Bill Nye, being totally unfamiliar with the area, was happy to see new trail all day long... even the parts he didn't like.

I was nonplussed all around.  Except Spencer Branch.  I love Spencer Branch.

First descent down and then headed back up, we saw a hillbilly towing a homemade teardrop trailer behind his truck...

Oh, it's our hillbilly.

Jim had just spent the night in the woods scaring the local meth operators and was looking to get in a ride.  He joined us on the the remainder of the route.  I had my camera on me the whole time, but if you ride Pisgah, you realize it's much more about being in the moment, and sessioning trail for the sake of image making?

Meh.  Not always gonna happen.

The experiment with the 3.0 Chronicle was a success or a failure depending on how you look at it.  I was too lazy to take off my 32X18 gearing (32X20 being my Pisgah gear), so the climbs were harder than usual... thus making it difficult to determine if I could notice the extra rubber (almost a half pound) up front while climbing.  I had a hard time putting any distance between Jim and I on the descents, and he was running the 2.4 Ardent I usually run.  I could really let the bike go occasionally, the tire soaking up more of the hits than its smaller predecessor, but it's still an air-filled rubber tube on an aluminum rim mounted to a rigid fork.  It can easily be overwhelmed with the right combination of speed and chunder.  I tossed a bottle for the first time in a long time letting loose on Spencer Branch.  It might add a bit in terms of speed and comfort on fast descents, but just not "Who needs a suspension fork with a tire like this?" speed and comfort.

The Chronicle did give me some über confidence on some of the blown-out tech gnar on lower Trace... so much grip when things get sketchy.  Wicked sweet.

Of note:  Bill Nye, posing majestically in front of a good 15 foot gap jump, mentioned that while he lingered out west (when my portion of the trip was over), he considered going to Keystone for some instruction/coaching on doing bigger stuff.  I told him that my days of stepping up my game are over, too old to learn and/or recover from the possible injuries.  I experimented with all that in the early 2000s, and I was never going to be comfortable on a consistent basis, especially as we have no decent place in Charlotte to keep up the skills (balls).

And then I rode out at the Backyard Trails by myself the next day.

Cupcake

Taking a slight break from all (most) things bike, we celebrated Sexy Sizzlin' Sizemore's one year anniversary last night.

365 days ago, The Pie carried a nine pound sack of bones into our house.  He couldn't walk or stand, but he could wag his tail... pretty much the thing that kept him from being euthanized when they found him in the hoarding situation he was literally stuck in.

Photo taken obviously after he was able to stand again.

He's a happy, albeit lumpy, boy.  Shy and skittish when he first moved in, now sleeping in the bed... pretty much wherever he wants.

He's still a little leery of coughing and falling objects, but he has a strange toothy smile and wags with his entire body... especially when it comes to cupcakes.

Don't worry. We did not deprive Maggie, the Oldest Dog in the World.

Found as a puppy in 1998, still getting around and doing things dogs do.

So yeah, mountain biking in actual mountains tomorrow... I think.  On trails as opposed to 70 miles of gravel and pave'.

Don't tell Bill Nye, but I'm bringing the Vertigus.  He'll be on that couch cushion of a bike of his.  I've yet to have the 3.0 Chronicle west of the White Water Center here in Charlotte.  I want to know what 29X3.0 at 13PSI can do in the real world.  Too lazy to swap from a Charlotte friendly gear for one day... gonna practice pushing my bike in order to get ready for the Double Dare.

Expect many images of Bill Nye standing next to his bike doing nothing interesting on Monday.

Looking forward from the side

Things are as they should be.  Pisgah Monster Cross checked off the to-do list.  Two year old patch finally sewn onto my travel courier satchel.

Level achieved!

Now all I have to do is get the Double Dare officially finished, and I won't have much more to-do list to do.  As far as the King of Pisgah Series goes, I dropped like a pumice stone (not quite as fast as a normal stone), from 5th to 7th, woulda been further had Sam Evans not dropped out due to illness.  Sorry, Sam.

Gravel cycle racing is such a cruel mistress on the SS, and all those shifty competitors hurt me due to this (fair) rule:

"Points are awarded based on overall race results of each race, including non-series participants."

So all those people in front of me... 49 of them to be exact, they all hurt me, none more mentally than these two that kept me from leapfrogging ahead a couple more points:

photo cred: Steve Barker/Icon Media Asheville

 Had my head been in the game, I shoulda yelled "KING OF PISGAH POINTS ON THE LINE!  OUT OF THE WAY!!  YOU MAY COST ME MY 6TH PLACE AND YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I LIKE THE NUMBER 6!!!"

Brad Cobb, Captain Morgan and Scott Rusinko all got ahead of me in the points, Scott a somewhat reachable three points (coulda been one, unnh) away.  I don't think I'll get those spots back... unless the weather is PERFECT at Double Dare AND I'm somehow convinced to shoot for something more than just a finish.   Fewer participants, smaller gaps in placings, harder to move up in the points... but on the bright side, just as hard to fall down.

Hey now.  Tab Tollett (right in the above picture) races for Motor Mile Racing, Brad Cobb races for Motor Mile... I've been conspired against all along.*

Another thing back to how it should be?

Muh bike.  3.0 Chronicle back up front, 2.35 Ikon in the rear.  Thomson drooper post still inserted in the proper hole.  I said I was going to take it off after PMC, but honestly I'm having a hard time parting ways with this technological wünder.  Everything just feels so right about this, so much so that I can't wait to "race" the 2015 Trans-Sylvania Epic (registration is live BTW) with this exact setup.  I'm loving the 29+... to the point where I'm fat-curious.  SRSLY.  I probably won't do anything about it, more due to apathy and preconceived notions than a lack of desire to part with funds.

I need to go to Outerbike and ride fat-bikes until I decide I totally hate them.  The plane ticket would be much cheaper than the money I'd lose trying to sell off my three month old, used fat bike.

*Before anyone gets their panties in a wad, I don't actually care that much about where I place in the KOP.  I know I'm not top three material, and those are the places that matter... although I do really like getting sixth place when I can't get on the podium.

And before I can let it go...

Jens is going for the hour record tomorrow.  You can watch it live assuming you're into watching Dizzy Dizzy Hamster (brought to you by Trek, making a better image for itself since yesterday) for a sixty minutes.  You know how I feel about him already.

Seriously.  Anyone who can pull the Sergeant Schultz "I see nothing" bullshit after being so deep up in it?  I don't get it.  To make matters worse, there's this:

I would love to say I made that list up... I didn't.  I woulda added some Enya for sure.

Allow me to cleanse your palate.

Fallout from the Pisgah Monster Cross

When I woke up in my car at whatever dark o'clock on Sunday morning, I felt as if someone had stuffed my mouth with desiccant packets.  I fished around for a water bottle that I knew was somewhere up front and made a mental checklist of my belongings that I felt could be anywhere.  My bike and cooler were on the other side of the bridge at the campsite, but my camera, helmet, glasses, raincoat and commuter light?  I guess I need to go back to sleep until the sun comes out and reassess the situation.

7:00AM.  Up.  Find my helmet on the ground with my glasses (minus one lens), find my lens, remember that I left my raincoat at the start finish, dig through my messenger bag and find my light and camera.  Good enough.  Hobble back to the car and head home to deal with this... again.

Cracked the callous on the bottom of my left foot.  First time it went this deep in 2014.  Ouch.

photo cred: Steve Barker/Icon Media Asheville

Bob Moss, not a fan of having his picture taken with non-podium single speeders.

I knew that the race was going to be fast, as in pegged for 4.5-5 hours for me.  It wasn't until I was on my way to work yesterday that I started thinking about average speeds.  Had to pull out my iPhone and calculate.

14.8 MPH average or so.  Interesting.  Painful considering this:

Thanks, Eric "PMBAR Honcho" Wever... you and your chicken.

For those that say there is no "party atmosphere" at the Pisgah Monster Cross, I say you must not have brought your own.

There until the final racers crossed the line and then some.  Plenty to drink and all you can eat.

The Simrils stayed around long enough for Brenda to be the last podium occupier to leave the premises.

Eventually, things got torn down, and it was time to head around the corner to the White Pines group campground...

Where one must answer me these questions three ere the other side he/she see, as queried by the naked bridge troll.

Shanna, always a supporter of single speeders big and small, helped Nick wash the shame of his defeat away.

I spent most of the rest of the night on the ground.

I use the phrase "rest of the night" a little too loosely, as I was in my car sleeping around 10:00PM.  After being up at 4:30AM, drinking 32oz of coffee on the way to the race, 12oz of beer right before the start, 44oz of Carborocket Half Evil and 10oz of Gatorade during the race, and then starting in on the beer at 12:45PM... I felt like this by the time I went to bed.

I had a great time, and now I have a month to get over my sore knees.  Oh yeah, it was chilly on the Parkway, what with the 40MPH+ descents and elevation.  I didn't cover my knees.  Not smart for an old dog like me.  I know better... I just don't "do" better.

2014 Pisgah Monster Cross

My heart rate is already around 185BPM around 4:55AM.  This is probably because I realize I'm hydroplaning down I85, watching my speedometer go from 65 to 85 MPH in a second.  I guess I'll slow down.

Get to the campsite, grab my bike, go-bag and emergency beer.  Head to the start.  Sign-in takes seven seconds.  I have an hour to kill.

Get dressed, drink one Busch beer, do little that could be considered useful or beneficial.

Line up late when we're called to the start and get a spot maybe a third of the way back in the field and next to my nemesis, Nick (insert nickname of the day here) Barlow.  He's swapped to smaller tires since I last saw him.  Damn.

Go.  I amble out of the start.  I'm with a group that isn't trying to be in the teeth of the aggressive neutral roll-out.  I give it enough to get with the back of the lead group.  I can see Bob Moss way out in front of everyone, making the turn onto the live course in the overall lead.  Shit gets real.

People are flying by me on the flat portion of 477.  A few single speeders go by, using their taller gears and little tires to fly past.  Some guy I don't know, Chris Joice, Scott Smith, and eventually when the climbing starts... Nick.  I keep him in sight, and when we get to the top of the climb, he reaches down to drink.  I attack.  He won't keep up on the descent.  I'm cheating with my big tires, low PSI and drooper.  Goodbye... or see you later.  I guess we'll see.

photo cred: Steve Barker/Icon Media Asheville

Down to the pavement on 276.  I put in some efforts and get to the rolling gravel of 1206.  I reel Scott and Chris back in.  I hear a rattle.  Brake line banging on the back of my number plate?  No.  Look again.  My caliper is falling off.  I stop and confirm.  Meh.

Back on the bike, I pull out my Tülbag, ignore the rattling until I get my 5mm in my teeth, and pull over to fix it.  Tight but rubbing the rotor now.  Better than falling off, getting wrapped up in my wheel and killing me, I guess.

photo cred: Rob Coulter

All of Team Dicky showed up for the race.

There's some more back and forth with Scott and Chris.  Where their gears and skinny tires are working for them, they put the hurt on me.  When those things matter less, I bury myself to take full advantage of my reduced disadvantage.  Skip the first aid station and I heap up towards the Parkway ahead of both of them, by my reckoning, in third place single speed.

On the gravel climb up Wash Creek Road, I notice that the sweat pouring from my helmet is brown.  100 miles of Shenandoah dripping into my eyes like a swamp water bucket challenge.  I coulda cleaned my helmet.  I didn't.  Some pointless back and forth with someone who didn't seem to want to ride behind me but not go faster than I needed to go... made my head hurt more than my legs.

The Parkway is hell with my squishy fat tires.  I've had to pee for the last hour.  I skip the second aid station but stupidly come off the Parkway to pointlessly roll through it.  Doh.  More climbing.  I ask a fellow rider for information I know I probably don't wanna hear.

"We're only at mile forty... still have to climb up through Graveyard Fields."

Shit.  I've been up there before, ironically with Eric "PMBAR Honcho" Wever.  I am now sad.  Good time to stop and pee.  Five minutes later, Chris Joice rolls by on his cross bike thing.  Bastard.  There is not enough gravel descending left for my bike to be an advantage.  I'm now more sad.

Down the pavement of 215, my knobs making a noise I've never heard before.  The pitch and rhythm changing as I lean into the corners at some speed I'm not comfortable with.  At the bottom of 215... The Hub/Pisgah Tavern aid station.

Jordan points out the quesadillas.  I shit my pants.  I shove half of one in my face before I see the guacamole.  My pants are shatten once more.  I plunge the remaining half of quesadilla into the bowl and abscond away with enough guacamole to feed a small village.  I don't care what happens from here on out.  My life is perfect.

Up the back of Gloucester Gap.  I don't ever remember being here before, but I probably have.  It's steep towards the end which would explain why if I had been here before, my brain was blocking the memory.  Once at the top, the long cakewalk begins.

Knowing that the SS'ers pushing bigger gears with smaller tires would be able to take minutes out of me here, I turn myself inside-out pumping like a sewing machine.  The finish was in sight, a couple riders closing in... too fast to be on single speeds.

They close the gap, make the pass, take the left turn into the finish, get to the three cyclocross barriers right in front of me... and then decide to walk over them, celebrating, me stuck behind their smiling selves.

photo cred: Steve Barker/Icon Media Asheville

photo cred: Steve Barker/Icon Media Asheville

 I consider throwing my bike, but then I remember this is cross and one should only throw beer.

photo cred: Steve Barker/Icon Media Asheville

Yeah, fourth place SS.  Just off the box.  The rain started coming down hard right after I finished...

and with a good eight to nine hours left to drink and a seemingly endless supply of beer, I'd say I won.

photo cred: Shop Kitty

And I beat Nick... so there's that.

He tried to blame his loss on an infected nose piercing.

That and his inability to ride bicycles very fast.

More things and stuff tomorrow.

My ass is like a tube of circus peanuts

Today is a good day.  Yesterday was just okay.

Of course on the day that I decide to ride the coaster brake bike, I'm busier than I have been in a long time.

Things that sucked:

Riding plastic flat pedals in a pair of Sanuks.

There's a reason that cycling shoes are stiff.  I used many muscles throughout the course of the day that are normally dormant getting in order to get this bike up and moving... speaking of moving.

This "bike" is a scientific anomaly.  Although the whole thing weighs less than 24lbs, the wheels and tires alone weigh 30lbs.  At least that's what it felt like when I was accelerating or climbing.  Yet despite their weight, they had no inertia.  Amazing.  Like a black hole that gravitationally pulls all my effort into a dark void of nothing.

Coming to a stop AND doing a track stand at the light.  Truly a skill to master.  Unless you've tried this feat on a coaster brake bike, don't judge me.  It's quite an awkward sammich to eat in public.

But the bike will do what I ask of it, and I still want to make some changes before it fills its official role as grocery getter/way homer/meeting shuttle.

So glad to be back on this today:

The Fastest Bike in the World, parked upstairs in my auxiliary office in the living room.  Part of the agreement when we moved into the new place.  I didn't wanna hike up and down stairs every day with my work related items.  A trip to ReStore and Bike Source later, and this is where the other magic happens, my job thing.  The Pie is a tolerant spouse indeed.

Anyways, I finally got a new 48T ring and 17T cog.  I should be rolling crunch-free all day, just in time to stop putting in extra miles for "training" purposes.  Brilliant.

I'm also ready for the Pisgüh Moünster Croüsse tomorrow.

King of Pisgah Series number plate not shown.

Ikon 2.2 tires... because they are the smallest thing I've got.  It's called a "mountain bike," and I only own "mountain bike tires."  I'm not buying a set of 1.8 rubbers for graveling, as I have no intentions to do more graveling in the future.  The 2.2 @ 19PSI beat the ever loving crap out of me last week at the Whitewater Center.  I can't wait to get a 2.4 or 3.0 back on there, proper style.  No idea what the bike weighs with this setup, and don't care, as it will never be seen again in this livery.  And yes, the drooper is still on there, because... gravel, I mean burrito.

For now, this will do.  Up at 4:50AM tomorrow, on the road at 5:00AM, unhappily headed up FR 477 @ 8:07AM. 

One more thing of note.  I have not taken this race very seriously.  The last time I really looked at the information on the site was back in 2012...

Side note:  That was the year my elderly canine had a medical emergency as I was trying to get out the door.  Fast forward to last night.  She let out a whale sound at 3:00AM that scared the shit outta me.  I sat up and put my hand on her side... waited to see if she was still breathing.  She was.  I think she likes to fuck with me.

Anyways, I only skimmed the information about the race and put this in my head:

"The riders will be treated to some of the highest elevation sections of the Blue Ridge Parkway and over 40 miles of the toughest gravel roads Pisgah has to offer."

And for some reason, that "40 miles" part stuck in my head.  It wasn't until last week that Namrita pointed out to me that the ENTIRE race is 70 miles, a piece of information I woulda known had I read the previous sentence on the site:

"Up to 200 participants will be challenged to complete a 70 mile, 11,000’ of climbing loop of gravel and paved roads."

So there you have it.  Guess I'm riding 70 miles tomorrow.

I am sad boy



Who gives a shit indeed.