SMI²LE

Apparently I ended up winning the combined 1/2 Burner and 1/2 Growler despite running like I drank too much electric kool-aid.  Thanks to friends who stayed around, I won some schwag but it was adorned with the above message.  I have no earthly idea what this means.

I thought all I had to do was just stand up or walk.

Cape of Good Hope

With some tired and heavy legs I rode up to the Cape of Good Hope on the Colorado Trail on Monday.  Those switchbacks before reaching the Cape never feel good, that is unless you do an out and back and get to descend them (finally!).  

 This is one of those trails that will get put into Wilderness if the Hermosa Wilderness Bill ever gets approved. The USFS head ranger here has made it his life goal to get the Hermosa Watershed into wilderness and this steel post reflects his tenure.  Mark a trail as "Neglected", good use of tax payer dollars, huh?

The DDC will stand as is this year, although I doubt there will be many finishers of the 'A' ride due to the amount of snow piles to trudge through on Blackhawk and Indian Peaks.  I trudged through a few to get to Good Hope, but found them to be nothing more than minor nuisances.  The tree clearing crews are working hard right now and I ran into them up on Hotel Draw, and the section of trail to Good Hope only had a few trees down.  Looks to be good times this weekend!

Kennebec

It was time to hit up Kennebec pass and ride the CT back into town.  It's a long way up there to the pass, about 27 miles, but the climb is great and then once up there you are treated to awesome views.  

 I always like checking out the mining debris before hitting the actual pass.

 My friend, Manny the Marmot did make an appearance, but he was camara shy.  He lives in the boilers, and if you don't believe me, click here.

 Its a hike a bike in sections at the pass still.

 But all dry back into town.  A 5000-ft descent from here, with an infamous 1000-ft climb in the middle of it though.  

 All smiles for this up coming descent.

 Scree field was a bit loose, so I stopped an took a picture.

 In both directions.

 We are past summer solstice, but there is still a lot of snow up there.

 I saw a lot of waterfalls over the weekend, and some were more dramatic, but this one is sort of well known on the CT.  The singletrack descend right to it.

This a is a great loop from town and when making back up the mesa to the casa it's a 7000-ft climbing day in less than 60 miles, but it moves relatively fast.  

DDC Reconn

Made a trip out to Hermosa Park and met up with Rebecca to check out the trail conditions for next weeks Durango Dirty Century.  Ended up climbing to Bolam Pass, riding over to Graysill Mine and then Climbing Hotel Draw for the Corral Draw descent.  A few big snow drifts still up there right now on part of the CT at Blackhawk, but with luck, they should be mostly gone by next weekend.  

A little bit of water crossing at the end to cool down the legs. 

 Bring a shovel for next weekend.  LOL

 The Evil Eye of Sauron

 I passed this in a down pour during the 2006 Durango 100 MTB race, which is now defunct.  The water level was really high and they had volunteers on each side of the water fall to try to catch you if you slipped and fell.  Man, what a wild race - the start was delayed at 6AM because it was raining so hard.  We took off 40 minutes later and within 3 pedal strokes out bikes were covered with mud.  I actually washed my drivetrain in the creek when I passed.  If we do a DDC re route we will pass through here.

 Epic CT singletrack.

 A bit of snow at Blackhawk Pass next week will make the DDC really adventurous to say the least.

 But the views are always amazing up there.

 Not ridden by many, which is a surprise - truly one of the best Durango area trails.  Unfortunately the DDC route does not cover Corral Draw. it just passes by.  But if we do a re-route we will do Corral Draw as well. I'm leaning toward keeping the original DDC path and just suffering with snow drifts and dead fall intermittently .  This is back country mountain biking, not rolling laps in the park!

 The Corral Draw Trail starts out winding it's way through this field of Skunk Cabbage.

 Great ride and loads of fun, but high creek water did a number on the bike.  Had to remove BB cups today. 

I'm hoping to get up to Kennebec on Sunday and perhaps the Indian Peaks Area as well.  

Bailey Hundo

So I finally got to try out the Bailey 100 race this year after last years diversion. In 2010, I had enrolled in the Flagstaff Barn Burner 104, which was the same day as the Hundo but had been announced prior.  Knowing and loving Flagstaff through all these years, it too about 3 nano-seconds to sign up for that race.  Much to my chagrin, however, the race was cancelled at the last minute, because well Flagstaff was on fire!  I begged frantically at the last minute to get into the Hundo, but to no avail.  So this year, I signed up directly for the Hundo.

Here are some images from Mark Elasser's brother:  

The town of Bailey and me go back a long ways...to about 1974 or 1975.  My dad's employer had a camp / retreat in town so we visited both in summer, and later on in winter.  I actually learned to downhill ski at the nearby, and closed Geneva Basin Ski Area as well somewhere around 1978 or 1979.  What is amazing, is that I knew exactly where the camp was, even though I did not drive back then.  It's since been sold to a fly fishing camp, but the cool thing is that we  rode right past the camp at the start of the race, and finished within 1.5 mile of it.

More images from Mr. Elasser:  (really nice camera work, huh?)

Thanks to my buddy Cal, who raced this last year I got some advice on what to run.  I brought a 34x20 gear on the singlespeed, and should have gone rigid fork like Cal had mentioned.  Either that or pump up the WB fork with a lot of air, because turning a tall gear makes you stand up more, and I've been spinning the Divinity Gearing all spring which meant I was prepared to sit and spin through any thing.  That would not be the case here.  

I ran into the usual group of friends and racers and can say that this race is stacked from one to the other...there were Colorado heavy hitters all through the line-up.  I did not do as well as I would have liked, but finished in 8 hours and 35 minutes with some room for improvement.  Lessons learned for my first race here was that the hundo is a lot like the Growler, which is a hard race for me.  The first ~30ish-mins of both are crucial because they start with road and then go into singletrack and if you do not get in front, then you are stuck in the conga line on the singletrack.  I used to be good at that, but this time, I just let others rool on by when we left town thinking I'd catch them later.  Excellent singletrack on this course, with absolutely no "uh-oh" sections made it seems really easy, but it was darn near impossible to pass given the twisty sections with vegetation or burned downfall all around.

Congrats go out to Carney for the SS win!  I ran into Looney after she crashed around mile 35 or so, and good for her on the recovery - she took the win again for the females.  I rode a lot with a young racer from Salida, Craig Nelson who pulled me for several miles on the flat paved section at after Aid Station 6.  He was on gears and surprisingly slowed down several times to make sure I could get a nice wind blocked ride here.  He went on to win his age group too - 20-29 mens.  Way to go Craig!

I rode the Moots Mooto-X again and it was perfect along with the new SRAM/Stans No Tube wheelset and the Maxxis Ikon tires.  My trusty White Brothers fork was spot on.

So I'm torn for next year, but if run the same gear it would be with a rigid fork perhaps.  Either that or I just spin Divinity and work on the road sections.  Whatever the case, it's good to be back racing mountain bikes - really my first "true" race of the year as the DDG-160 was a cross bike 'ride' and the Growler 32 was part of the half enchilada 25k run, 32-mile run event.  I'm not sure I'll be able to ramp it up by Breckenridge - Carney put a good 40-minutes on me here in Bailey - but this season might just be like 2008 where i don't get my act together until September.  Dunno for sure, but I'm gonna have a fun time riding my tail off this summer and see how things progress.

Ruby Slippers

The other choice was neon green, so red it is.  Got my discount from the Running Store via my new membership at Durango Motorless Transit.  This group rocks!  Best discounts in town.  And you have to love a shoe that has the nuclear hazard icon in it's tread.  Supposed to be rock proof.

The old Vasques blew out in the sole.  I liked the shoe bottom tread, but the heel cup was too loose and it annoyed me up on the rocky and techy Raiders Ridge.  On smooth road or trail it was not much of a concern, but those slightly off camber landings caused heel movement and it made for some questionable foot plants.

These fit snug - at least like a new shoe always does.  Let's see how these Brooks hold up.  It's been a long, long time since I've had a pair of Brooks shoes.  I remember my mom buying me a pair at The Athlete's Foot in Greeley in early 1979, and the shoe tread piece not holding on more than a couple of months.  The tread strip came right off and we tried to glue it back on on, but to no avail.  Isn't it strange to say that while shoe technology has advanced, the industry now is based in third world countries...and the quality and performance is expected to be better?  How is that for progress?

I may not be the best runner, and my mountain biking may be slowing down, but I'm liking the marriage of the two sports for me personally.  Besides mountain bike racing has devolved to a very primal narcissistic level - the categories pretty soon will include not only age, gear ratio and gender splitting, but someday soon we will also have racial, DNA, hair / eye color, and SAT scoring criteria.   That said, my last running race did the same, so maybe it's just our culture.  America always seeks slight differences.  But I digress.

I'll probably put off any competitive runs until late fall early winter, but I plan to keep the weekly Raiders 10-mile run up.  The run seems to be strengthening and stretching the joints quite well.

Henderson Lake

I rode out to Henderson Lake for the first time, which is past the north terminus of the Missionary Ridge Trail.  The views down into the upper Hermosa Valley were amazing!

The lake was pretty cool, too.  Its a long way up there, but there were quite a few visitors up there, either by car, ATV, motorcycle, or in my case, bicycle.

 There were parts that I almost thought I might see a sign for Reno - Bear - Flagstaff as the terrain reminded me of Crested Butte in parts.  

Further on is the Lime Mesa, of which I keep hearing stories of epic single track out there.  I hope to find time to investigate this year.  

Cha, cha, changes...

Big things ahead and its challenge to keep the balance.  However, there is still time to ride and after bailing on Steve who wanted to do a big adventure out near Pagosa, I did my usual and rode from home.  I just really enjoy riding from the garage and not driving anywhere for a wheel spin.

Took a climb up to Missionary Ridge via Pioneer Trail and hit the cell towers and then some of the ridge trail, which sadly is still covered in deadfall.   

 As I dropped back down the road and Pioneer, I finally veered into Edgemont and rode through and down on the east end of Horse Gulch Road.  Pretty cool loop and ending in the Gulch brought on more singletrack.

While I was out biking, it was another Podium for Merv the Cat!

He's a super star, you know?

Madden 2011

The PsychloX has opened up riding more local options it seems almost exponentially.  The usual road ride up to the passes, while definitely world-class, does get routine.  Peak climbing is fun, but not always on dirt roads on the mountain bike.  So the cross bike offers up road bike like qualities and it also opens up adventures on terrain not suited for the road bike.

This little excursion was an attempt to make it up Madden Peak, by riding paved and dirt county roads over and through Hesperus and then connecting at Cherry Creek for the rail grade to Mancos Hill, where the road up Madden is.  I got to Mancos Hill, but a late start and a flat tire made me return without summiting.  It still came out to ~55-miles and 4200-ft of climbing, and with the Madden section added that will add perhaps another 3k and 20 miles.

The next one to throw into the routine will be the climb Endlich Mesa to 11k, which I've done on MTB and I'll also take the long Missionary Ridge Road out which is another great, long, and quiet x-bike ride.

Lumps

Climbed up to Coal Bank on Sunday on the Moots Vamoots roadie machine and had a hard time getting warmed up.  The spin out to Baker's Bridge was slow - very slow as my legs were tired from the week prior, but then getting passed by Deadly Nedly at the bridge was enough to wake me up.  He got a good distance on me before the climb up old Shalona, so I tried my hardest to reel him and for a time, I did make some ground.  Thats the advantage of a singlespeed bike - short steep climbs and you take off, whereas geared bikes start slower.  But by the time we got to the time trial finish, I had pegged Zone 5 and that would make the rest of the climb up to Coal Bank quite exhaustive.  I kept him in diminishing sight all the way to Haviland Lake, but by then it was time to go at my own pace and continue the painful cadence (50-rpm?).

A beautiful day nonetheless and it came out to a 5700-ft climb in a 75-mile round trip which includes the climb back up to the house.  I'm not afraid to spend time on the roads right now, which is far from years past where it was singletrack and nothing else.  Hit the trails during the week and hit the big climbs on the weekend.

Life During Wartime

Or perhaps life at 10k...this ain't no party, this ain't no disco, this ain't no fooling around.  The new PsychloX makes quick trips up to Champion Ventures (a 4k climb)  without the slog through the Valley if you wanna climb to Purg (a 3k climb).  Much better, higher, quieter, and more scenic(er).  Superlatives abound!

Newness

This year continues to be banner in that new found trails keep popping up.  Nice drop down from the west trail on Animas over to Sailing Hawks and it has some of the best ridge views in town...too bad I did not take pictures.

Also the signage continues to be added all over Durango.  What we once called Sailing Hawks, is now a network called Dalla Mountain Park, with signed trails complete with maps at every intersection.  I've heard Test Tracks....errrrrr Overend Mountain Park has the same.  I suspect the gulch soon will get these new ones?

Cross Dressing

The Moots Psyclo-X is no longer a virgin bike as I took it up to Log Chutes yesterday.  It's a great option to have as I rode the singletrack around FLC, dropped down the Nature Trail, and then hit Junction Creek Road and the trails up there.  It's the perfect mating of road biking and mountain biking.

 The pictures are a bit blurry, but I think I got the camera dialed in for next time.  White skies of late due to fires in Arizona, and the camera had been set for the high ISO setting, which makes things a tad blurry.

 The bike is great and the frame is a bit larger than I originally though, as Moots talked me into the next size larger.  I really like the position.

So with the title of this blog, I fully expect this to be one of the top three posts on this site of all time with regards to hits from the internet.  I titled one "Missionary Style" last fall for a ride on Missionary Ridge, and that gets a ton of traffic, and surprisingly the "Ditch Weed" post brought in a lot others.  I'm not trying to increase the volume of perverts and stoners, but I find it amusing that people google stuff like that.