Category: cycling

After some slushy / muddy riding on 26-Nov my bike needed to be washed. As today was the first sunny day I’d been home, I decided to wash it off, 20°F (-6.66°C) weather be damned. Having a straight hot water line from the house kept the job from being too cold, and I was able to keep ice from forming on the bike. Now the bike is mostly dried off and sitting behind me in my office drying the rest of the way.

The lockout on the fork seems to be broken, so I’m going to try and take it into the shop this week and see about having it fixed. I purchased the bike just after Christmas last year, so hopefully it’s still under warranty.

I think I need to look into some clip-on mountain bike type fenders for future poor weather riding. Here is another photo, this one of the down tube, BB, crank, etc area. That night was really muddy for this area.

I’m about to go to bed, but first I thought I’d post this photo of my CamelBak from last night after riding a bit at Stony Creek last night with some friends. The route to and from the park was quite muddy, and the whole area in the park was either muddy, snowy, slushy, or covered in wet leaves and pine needles. It was a nice ride, just very tiring because of the snow and slippery-ness. My bike is thoroughly covered in mid and snow, and my pants, jacket, face, gloves, and everything else had a pretty solid spray on them as well.

Hopefully Saturday or Sunday I’ll be able to get out for another ride before cleaning off my bike. Well, time for sleep.

I finally put the cleats on my new Sidi Bullet 2 shoes, covered them with Pearl Izumi AmFIB Moutain Shoe Covers, and went for a bike ride. Beyond the new shoes and covers I also wore the gloves I purchased last month, BDU pants, my old blue North Face jacket from my Alaska adventure in 1996, and a Descente Coldout Beanie under my helmet. I did not feel cold, nor did my toes get numb. This is good.

The ride was 13.5 miles, and in just over an hour I went from my house, up to River Bends park, through the 5km hiking trail, out of the park, down to 21 Mile, back past Schoenherr, through a subdivision, then back to my house. At one point while riding someone in a car yelled something at me, but I’m not really sure what it was. It may have been “Ghostrider!”, but I couldn’t really tell. Weirdly, I caught up with them at the next light (about a mile away) and ended up passing them as I crossed.

My head and tail light both worked great for the whole ride, but it was a bit spooky riding along in the woods alone, knowing that it was unlikely that anyone else would be out there any time soon. At one point I turned the light off just to see how difficult it was to ride, but the only markings I had to follow were the dim blue/grey slush and snow on the path. I quickly turned the light back on. That said, there was something really pleasing about riding along seeing small snowflakes fluttering down and streaking past me, and in the woods I saw at least one set of eyes looking back at me in the brush.

I think I’m set for cool weather (~32°F/0°C) riding.

I hadn’t realized it existed, but while poking around some unsigned single track at Stony Creek today I came across what seems like some older bandit downhill and freeride stuff at Stony Creek.

I made my way down some of the downhill stuff, although the ~16″ drops were a bit of a surprise. I didn’t attempt the bridge shown above, but instead just turned around and walked my bike back up the hill.

After riding around some I started heading back to the parking lot, but just after passing some folks and crossing over a small jump-like area on the double track between signs 2 and 1 I saw what I initially thought was a wallet and a bunch of ID laying on the ground. Heading back I found that it was just a Genuine Innovations Patch Kit Large opened and spread across the ground. I picked it up, posted about it on the MMBA forum asking if anyone lost it, and I’ll just hang on to it unless someone claims it.

It seems that some gnomes introduced a bit of entropy to the rock garden in The Pines at Stony Creek. When riding through there this evening I fell, hit my left knee (it doesn’t seem bad), and broke my brake lever. Good thing it’s just a cheap Avid FR-5, for which I can get a replacement from REI for $14. I have to place an order with them for a large size yellow jacket to replace the too small medium one I’d purchased, so I’ll just throw this on the order as well.

Also, coming around a corner while riding trails in the dark and suddenly seeing a child-sized silhouette in the trail with glowing eyes staring at you is a bit disconcerting. Riding alone in the woods in the dark is a bit odd and worrysome. Even the normally-cute deer are a bit frightening. I was really getting a feeling for how lost/scared one would feel if hurt out there.