Breaking my own legs off. ;)

Not really... but I definitely got a good workout yesterday. Jason and I teamed up to lead a MORE ride at Black Hills, Hoyles Mill and Schaeffer farms. The terrain isn't really technical, though there are plenty of logs and a few good rock gardens, but the ride is tough because of its distance.

I figured there might be some folks that needed to cut out early, and others that need to resupply. To make this possible, I parked my car at Schaeffer, met Alexis and Denis and the three of us rode the 7.5 miles over to Black Hill Regional park for the ride meet. Jason started riding about the same time and met us in the middle. The 4 of us got a few warm-up miles for what was going to prove to be a long day. By my calculations, my total was going to be close to 50 miles for the day. Denis was going to be more than that since he rode his bike from home to Schaeffer. Jason's too was going to be pretty long because he had a few extra miles than the rest of us in the warm-up.

Warm-up.... that is a good idea. For an April morning, it was dang cold. It was 38 degrees when I got out of the car. How do you dress for a ride that starts at 38 and is supposed to peak at almost 70? Leg warmers and a wind breaker over the normal short sleeve jersey and bib shorts was my plan. It worked with a little help from a guardian angel. (I took my leg warmers off at the trailhead and one fell out. Some kind soul hung it on a branch and I picked it up on my way back).

I wanted to limit the group ot 12 people. I knew that wouldn't happen. It never does. I let a few extra people in. Some others showed with 4 people instead of the expected one. We had a group of almost 20 for the start. That worried me a little, but as long as everyone knew what we were in for, I figured we'd be okay.

One dropped off after Black Hill. She was keeping up just fine, but felt like she was having to work too hard to do so and might not make the full distance. She did a few extra loops at Black Hill and called it a day. We picked up 4 stragglers and headed for Hoyles Mill.

First on the menu is the jump section. I'll post up the photos from that. We had fun goofing with the table tops.

The rest of the Connector was just a bunch of fun. The creek crossing was low. Bill and a few others had oodles of fun on the big rock garden. I'm happy that James gave us the lowdown on some singletrack that we were missing at the soccer-plex end of the connector. He went out and flagged it so we could follow it easily. That was great because it really helped having 17 of us riding back and forth over it 2 or 4 times. The trail is new, so it needs to get ridden in. We definitely did that today.

There's a new section of trail by the lake that is fantastic. Instead of following the road, we got to follow the countours of the lake. The trailbuilder did a great job. There are lots of little woops and berms on the ride. It will be a fun and challenging trail when it gets ridden in a little. I had a blast with it even as is.

There's another new section that isn't open yet. We didn't touch it, but it looked prettty amazing. Turn out for the work day June 4th and we'll finish it off. That will cut out over a mile of road riding. It is definitely something that needs to get finished.

Once at Schaeffer, we hit the white loop. Everyone begged me to do the Whoops section going up-hill. I don't know why. The trail sucks in that direction. I was an ass and left that section for later when it could be ridden going downhill. I knew there was some new trail there that needed to be ridden in. More about that later.

Jason blew up another pedal. I know that pissed him off. I joked when I shouldn't have. Sorry Grumpy J. I didn't mean to piss you off. Glad you got it fixed and made it back up with us later.

We rode the rest of the white loop and yellow loop without incident. I had a tire going low and blew up a BRAND NEW PUMP(!!!) trying to fix it. I borrowed someone else's to get my fixx of air. We rode the red loop which needs to be done on a regular basis to keep it ridden in. It was pretty badly eroded at the bottom. I had no trouble riding it on the way down, but I blew it on the way back up. I'm still not used to riding with gears. It was one of three spots where I sketched because I wasn't ready with the right gear. I need to do something about that. MUST LEARN TO SHIFT GEARS!

Jason joined us again below the cell tower. He was riding his beater bike (Full XT Blur) and had a smile on his face. I think he was happy to be riding again.

At the 4-way, Bob was running into a time constraint. He lead a group back to the parking lot and gave them directions back to the cars. The rest of us picked up the pace a little on the climb out to the top of the white loop. That turned out to be a tough one for me. I felt great at the bottom, but by 1/2 way into the white loop, I was bonking pretty hard. The new Whoop section on the white is amazing. I can't imagine why anyone would want to ride that going uphill. What a bunch of jerks!

We got back to the car and re-supplied. I hopped up on extran and carboom and was ready to go. Everyone had one trip on the Connector left, I had two. I didn't make it all the way. I ran into a time constraint, and I was pretty tired. I turned around at the town of Boyds, about 4.5 miles into the connector.

My mileage for the day was just under 44 miles at an average pace of 9mph (8.9mph to be precise). I think that is one of the longest rides at a decent pace in many years.

David and Denis were going to ride back over together to get a few more miles in. I don't know what happened with that. I got in the car and was driving out and I saw David with his bike on the roof. He might have given Denis a ride home. Since both of them had a ton of miles in for the day, I don't blame them a bit. We worked pretty hard.

I did a similar ride last weekend on the single speed. Even though the mileage was a bit less... only about 34 miles, the ride felt much easier. I don't know if I ate better, or if the SS makes me stronger. There's a point at which I can't push harder on the SS. The geared bike doesn't allow me to do that. I don't think my average speed was much less, but I sure felt fresher. Who knows...

Jump Trail Pics

Thanks for reading. Thanks to all for a great ride. It takes a good group of people to make a ride like that happen. You people are the best!

Pete