Falling In Love

Yep, I have a secret to share.  I'm falling in love with mountain biking, again.  I used to ride off road a lot about 12 years ago, then got away from it for years.  This past month, I haven't touched my road bike and I've gotten out on the single track every weekend.  It really is refreshing.  Instead of cranking out the miles like a diesel engine, you get to maneuver over, under and around obstacles like a Jeep.  Totally different feeling and really enjoyable.  Here are some pics from this past weekend. 

Oh, week 1 of becoming a morning person was a success!

Day 1 - didn't sleep well. Woke up about every hour. Still managed to get up at 5:30 and got a rough 3 miler in.  It was dark and starry outside and 40 degrees.  Felt groggy and tired mid- afternoon. Felt drained like I did during peak NOLA training, but I did it!
Day 2 - Slept much better. Got up at 5:30 and ran 3 miles and felt good.  Dark and starry and 50 degrees.  Felt good all day.
Day 3 - Arrived in Cleveland the night before and had a late business dinner.  Lousy night sleep, but got up at 6:30 and ran 3 and a half miles on a crappy route.
Day 4 - Managed to get a 35 minute run in before the meetings started back up.  Felt good.
Day 5 and 6 were the weekend.


On to week 2.......

Broke A Spoke

If you follow me on Twitter or BT, you know I bonked on my long ride last Sunday then broke a spoke and called the SAG wagon.  I dropped my wheel off Sunday at my LBS and didn't get it back until Friday (after calling Wednesday and again Friday).  I love my LBS, but the service is either immediate or a little slow.  Good excuse for buying some new wheels and making these a back up :-).

Anyway, I had two rides planned during the week and no road bike.  Perfect excuse to dust off the mountain bike and hit the single track.

We have some great trails just 10 minutes from my house that were built by the Gateway Off-road Cyclists .  Years ago, I use to bike off road a couple times a week and loved it.  I hadn't ridden my mtb for a few years and actually looked forward to it.  When I started the ride, I felt like I was riding one of those Harley choppers with really tall handlebars and sitting straight up.  Totally different than a roadie with aero bars.  I made it out to the trails and took a few pics.

My off ride bike handling skills and confidence are gone.  I kept my shoes unclicked in 90+ percent of the time.  It didn't help that I saw no one on either ride.  It was actually kind of spooky.

The vegetation was pretty thick and touching both my legs at several places.  I'm surprised I don't have poison ivy already.  I used to get it routinely back when I went off road routinely.

Brings back memories.  Back in the late 90's a friend and I would bike after work on an abandon trail (that has now been revived by GORC) in Highland Illinois.  We strapped bow saws to the back of our bike frame and when we came across a downed tree, we would clear it.  One time I had three flats in the span of 5 minutes due to thorns.  I was changing/patching tubes while my friend Chris was trying to keep the thousands of mosquitoes flying around off my back.  Frantic back then, funny now.