cycling – Page 37

Dented Salsa Delgado 29’er Race Rim

April 5, 2011

Originally I was going to post this photo of the sun setting over River Bends, taken while out on my first proper trail ride of the year, but then I dented my rim while screwing around in the parking lot post-ride and thought that it would be more interesting. More specifically, I tried hopping over a curb ad moderate speed (~10 – 12 MPH) and did it wrong, slamming my rear wheel and all my weight into the curb. The impact was both felt and heard as a resounding metallic TWONK as one sidewall folded in. Surprisingly the tire didn’t pinch flat nor blow off the rim.

After a rather unpleasant day at work I headed home and found myself with just enough time to quickly eat some cereal, change clothes, and dash up to River Bends for a first trail ride of the year before the sun set. So, I did. The trail is pretty much ready to ride, with only a few small slick/muddy spots which aren’t too difficult to traverse and which shouldn’t damage the trail. I pushed myself a bit and am already a little sore for it, but it felt really good. Riding trails is something that I really missed over the winter, and even being limited to the ~40 minutes that I was able to ride, my head felt clearer and all thoughts of broken things at work (and effort required to fix them) went away. I need more of that…

…and I guess I need to rebuild my rear wheel.

2011 Trail Work at River Bends

April 3, 2011

Yesterday afternoon Jon Boughner and I headed out to River Bends to do some trail work. We ended up finishing all the major points that I’d wanted to hit:

· Rerouted the return loop entrance to make it flow better and not involve any sharp downhill turns. This should also eliminate a user conflict area.
· Rerouting a quick (and blind) uphill near the seasonal loop split-off. While ridable, this hill would catch some people off guard and would likely end up full of brake bumps after a few years. the new section should flow much better.
· Moving or marking (for later cut-out) any downed trees. There were only two that we couldn’t move by hand!
· Bench cutting a few previously built sections which needed a bit more work.

While out there we also ran into Pete and Mark as they were riding through. They stopped and helped us with a bit of the initial work on the return loop entrance reroute, and then test rode it to check that it flowed sufficiently. Later on, Mark returned with his friend Brad on another ride and they were able to do a few test rides of the second reroute, but unfortunately this route was still a bit muddy and they left a significant rut through the center of the trail. Thankfully we were there to stomp this section flat before it has a chance to dry in that bad shape.

The rest of the trail is also still fairly muddy so I won’t consider it ridable until the rain stops and things can dry a bit further, but it’s definitely coming along nicely. It’s pretty much set for now, and I can begin thinking about a bit of expansion that I’m hoping to do.

Here’s some photos from yesterday:

· Jon Boughner standing on top of the new return loop entrance to River Bends.
· Mark Senyk and Brad riding through a brand-new reroute at River Bends.
· Me (Steve) standing on a reroute at River Bends which eliminates a steep, blind uphill.
· Another photo of me (Steve) on the hill-eliminating reroute.
· Pizza cutter rut left in fresh mud at River Bends.
· Detail of the fresh rut at River Bends.
· Jon Boughner standing on the new River Bends return loop entrance.

cycling outdoors

Still Muddy…

March 27, 2011

As expected local trails are still spring-time muddy and unsustainable to ride. I managed to access a short spur of single track that I knew would be safely passable and used it to connect paved areas today, but that only wetted my appetite. While I live in a decent area for being able to take off and ride relatively safe routes, I’m getting a bit tired of the same-old paved areas. I can’t wait for everything to thaw and begin drying out and becoming ridable again. Unfortunately I guess that thawing will involve more water, like here which was dry and passable last weekend.

cycling weather

Wormsign!

March 20, 2011

While taking the trash out tonight I saw worms crawling along the pavement. This is a good sign, as it means the ground is mostly thawed and thus off-road riding will be possible soon.

cycling outdoors weather

Finally, an Evening Ride!

March 16, 2011

After a long winter I think it’s finally going to be time to ride soon. Tonight found a group of us riding along the Macomb Orchard Trail from it’s start at Dequindre up through the bridge at Van Dyke and then back. Total was around 22 miles, but since I’d ridden around the parking lot a bunch beforehand my statistics are a bit off from what the ride itself entailed. Still, it was great to get out and take advantage of the nice weather.

cycling

Updated River Bends Map

March 13, 2011

After a bike ride this afternoon I decided to (finally) update the River Bends trail map so that it’s more usable. Besides adding more asphalt and a better key I cleaned some things up, added the park’s address, and changed the trail lines to dashed pieces. These dashed lines should make the map more readable when printed in black and white, and the addition of the river, railroad tracks, and more road should make it easier to tell where one is when riding along.

In the future I’m going to consider adding in the Clinton-Kalamazoo Canal and maybe tweaking the route a bit. Maybe there will even be some more single track to add by that next time, too…

Click the image above or here for a PDF of the map: River_Bends_13-Mar-2011.pdf

cycling making things outdoors

Banananuunlingonberry

March 8, 2011

Today I found that Ikea’s Lingonberry concentrated drink mix can easily be combined with some water and one banananuun-flavored nuun tablet to make a decent tasting impromptu electrolyte drink. Having run out of HEED this past winter and wanting to go on a reasonable length ride today I needed something calorie-iffic to drink, but I wanted to be sure it had a few electrolytes in it as well, since I tend to sweat a lot. Well, this did the trick.

I’ll still probably pick up some HEED or possibly an Infinit Nutrition product for normal riding, but at least for the next few rides this should suffice. (During normal riding I like to have my CamelBak full of water and a bottle of something sweet on my bike. I can then sip the water when I’m thirsty and drink the bottle of whatever throughout the course of the ride to be sure that my blood sugar stays sane and I don’t bonk.)

cycling food

Home Early and Riding

March 8, 2011

Today found me home from work a bit earlier than I have been lately, and with the nice weather I patched a flat on the Titus (photo gallery retired) and set out for a ride. Since it was just above freezing and (yet another) big snow fall is still melting, I stuck to a paved route as best I could. Still, I couldn’t help but occasionally run into some slush or dirt left behind by the thaw, or even some mud. At one point on a small neighborhood trail I ended up leaving a few-inch deep rut, so it’ll be interesting to see how well this serves as an example of what not to do on a trail. (More information about damage caused by riding muddy trails in springtime can be seen in this flier from the MMBA.)

The route that I rode ended up on the Macomb Orchard Trail which was quite a bit less thawed than I expected. Most of the route was what’s shown above, with a thawed section in the middle full of muck with slush/snow/ice along the sides, but some portions were completely snow and ice covered. Thankfully it was compacted, almost-slushy which made it very ridable.

I’m extremely happy that the weather is taking a turn for the nice. I hope that I’m able to ride this year after work as I was last year, as being able to get outside in evenings and spend some time by myself watching nature go by is extremely relaxing and just the sort of thing I need most evenings.

(Total for the day was 23.53 miles in 1:43:51, following this general route: Home, 22 Mile, Neighborhoods to Shelby, Mound, 25 Mile, MOT West, Dequindre, School, Neighborhoods, 23 Mile, Mound, Shelby, River Bends Pavement, Home via 22 Mile and Neighborhoods.)

cycling outdoors work

Four-Bolt Stem on the VooDoo Dambala

February 2, 2011

Due to the two-bolt clamp on the stem on the VooDoo Dambala I’d occasionally have problems like this where the bar rotated precipitously while going off a small drop. While at this year’s MMBA Annual Meeting in Lansing I found the 80mm Specialized stem seen above for $10. I fitted it tonight, and hopefully it’ll keep the bar solidly in place.

At 80mm it’s maybe 5mm shorter than the previous Bontrager stem, but I don’t think this will make much of a difference. At least now I’ll be able to ride without worrying about the bar suddenly changing position. And, if it proves to be too short, it was cheap enough to not be a big deal.

acquired things cycling

2011 North American International Auto Show

January 20, 2011

After leaving work today at the RenCen I hopped on the the nation’s stupidest public transport system to visit the North American International Auto Show. I was originally planning on going with some new coworkers during the day, but actual work got in the way of that so I decided to go by myself afterward.

The show was as expected, but worth the $12 admission as I got to wander around and look at interesting things, ride in a Chevy Volt on a small indoor test track in the basement, see a microscope that I would really like to have (a Vision Engineering Lynx Dynascope), and the smart fortwo seen above showing off it’s incredible strength by holding up a (52.2 lb) Magna Excitor 2x Dual Suspension not-for-off-road-use Terrain Bike.

automotive cycling travel work