Sept. 29, 2019

Wouldn’t think it needed saying…

Bill and me

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Sept. 15, 2019

‘crossiscoming is now ‘cross is here!

First race of the year, an open Cat 2-3 on a very bumpy course, including this multi line minefield.

I started on the front row, and stayed with the lead group for a while, it’s a training series and no matter how hard I want to train, I can’t duplicate the effort racing takes. There were over 20 racers and I finished top 10 – I think. When I finished, one of the experts yelled nice job keeping the young guys honest…. umm fuck you! ; )

Aug. 25, 2019

On top Caraway Mountain. This was the first time I had ridden over Caraway Mountain, so the group decided I should also do the climb to the summit, up two pitches, one 18% and one 20%. Then at the top, Dave (in back explaining the next climb) says we need to climb to the fire tower too.

Aug. 21, 2019

Some days I am too optimist about life. I had a 7:30 tennis match and despite a severe thunderstorm warning, I still decided to ride. About 15 minutes in, lightning started and the wind was crazy… I bush whacked my way back  to the trail head and reached the truck as it let loose! Maybe I need to be more negative!

July 19, 2019

It was a hot, dry and dusty ride. Temperature was 96 degrees when I started, and this is dried sweat and dust.

July 14, 2019

Spanish moss and mountain bikes, I camped and raced at Poinsett State Park in the Spring but it was fun just riding the trails, completing the South Carolina trifecta, Harbison State Forest, FATS and Poinsett State Park a great weekend of riding.

While waiting to see where I was riding, I decided to figure out why I was flatting so much… looks like a hard hit to the rim at some point, I did bend it back.

After riding I decided to explore the dirt roads in the Manchester State Forest for a while.

July 13, 2019

So happy to wake up in my Flippac again after it broke a couple of weeks ago!

Ride #2 FATS (Fayetteville Area Triathlon Society) visit FATS (Forks Area Trail System) ride was cut short after I double flatted, used 3 CO2 cartridges, 2 tubes, 2 patches and a CX tube to get out. Great trails and I had a blast on Great Wall and Skinny Loops

An afternoon and evening at Bill and Shanda’s, low country boil, swimming in the rain and an evening boat ride for Purple Martins (if we had enough gas in the boat)

July 12, 2019

Weekend ride #1 Harbison State Forest

20+ miles, just over 11mph average, 94 degrees – I love riding here, so fast and flowy, parts feel more like a pump track than singletrack.

July 9, 2019

This was a “reach into the hurt locker” ride. I did my Reedy Fork & Blue Heron out and back with the goal of negative splitting the ride. I wanted to push the pace a little at the start, I normally average just over 9mph…. opps 11.2. That meant the negative split was going to hurt, it did, average 11.4 on the return.

June 26, 2019

A solo trip to DuPont to mountain bike, hike and swim. Day 1 of biking was awesome, I have a time lapse to add, but 3 hours of joy!

After 6pm, I started looking for a place to primitive camp in Pisgah National Forest, after driving for way too long, I found this spot and made dinner, then right before I started to make camp, I noticed the sign… 15 feet up a tree…. WTF. As I started to turn around I realized I forgot where a couple of tree stumps were but noticed a two tire track heading back towards the forest service road, I will just do that.

I didn’t get out to look down the hill, I just drove into it…. see that big rock? It used to be in the middle of the trail. As my nose started down, I hit it with my bumper and became stuck at a very steep angle (in fact so steep, I was worried about oil pick up/pressure) but also was afraid to turn off the truck in case it would not restart. I switch to 4 wheel drive low and turned on my locker and managed to back up a bit, but crabbed and high centered my slider

Now I am really stuck, alone off a minor FS road – I didn’t take any more pictures because I was trying to self rescue… in the end Maxtrax saved the day and I was get off the slider, drive back down the hill (could not go backwards) and just push the big ass rock out of my way with my front bumper! It took 20-30 minutes of work!

So now I still needed a place to camp, I drove further into the woods, passed the trail head for my planned morning hike and finally found another camp spot, I go to flip the camper and POP

at first I thought the torsion bar snapped, but the hinge was what broke! That was the final straw, I am heading home…. great day, but this night has been a shit show!