Don't be afraid of the DARK

I know I'm late to the party alot, but I finally had the chance to ride Dehn's after sundown for the first time. Props to TATER for loaning me his nightrider headlight, which by the way is brighter than a barge spotlight, and we headed for the woods. I'm wearing an idiotic grin cause thats about as much fun I've had riding a bike. Better late than never HUH? If on the remote chance you've never experienced riding your local trail loop "under the lights" your missin out! I was thinking about ALL THOSE MILES ON A TRAINER in the winter, I love my trainer, but damn it gets old quick (like the end of January), I could have been rockin the woods, guess I'm gonna start saving for a nice headlight. I could kill two birds and wear a coon-huntin hard hat wheat lite combo???? SAWEET!

Almost Famous????

Heres the MAN, right outta VELONEWS!! Dennis in his flying recliner. I hate when he uses it on the group rides, its damn near impossible to draft off one of those things.

Be kind to animals...

Even though they KILLED Steve Irwin, "Crickey! Took that one right in the chest...oh fu...Dateline 9/6/06 A confused and terrified red squirrel jumped out in front of me at Dehn's and made THREE course corrections before i actually, and ACCIDENTALLY I might add, ran directly over the little bugger. I believe the only thing that spared this critter was the 4 inches of buttery smooth travel in my REBA fork. Maybe he was just messin with me, I had visions of him gettin stuck in my front wheel and sending me ass over tea kettle. To quote Arnold, "He'll Live". Dateline 9/10/06 During the 30 mile XC race at Comlara Il. this weekend I once again ran over a snake, believe it or not I was traveling at a high rate of speed and had NO time for an evasive action, I did not see him/it on the next laps so he escaped with minor ijuries, "good on ya mate"! Had I not been on the clock I would have stopped to examine this "Beauty". This is even after the three close calls with; Two young racoons Two Coyotes one MEAN lookin Possum, all at Dehn's in the space of one week, they must like the way the trail flows too!!! The possum spooked me the most cause he stood up and hissed at me, the cranky little bloke. I am striving to make XC riding as animal friendly as possible but they ain't helping...

Back to Riding...

I have not posted anything about actually riding my bike for awhile so I thought a quikie update is in order. Geode has some nasty type of poison oak/ivy/sumac on the backside. I did four laps the other day and inside my elbow is itchin like CRAZY, Dehn's is about the fastest drying trail I know, you can ride it (uptop) anyway about 5 minutes after the rain stops with nary a puddle, watch the bridges though, they get SLICKery when wet. There are a few XC races coming up, but the ONE race I WILL make is PAMBA's Festival. I know, I know, whenever I say something like that I miss it and I'm a liar. I'll be there! I must be bored-dedicated-wierd to put in 25 miles in Dehn's, but those are "normal" distances for the races so I gotta train to em right??? I've ridden it forwards, backwards and sideways to break it up some. And STILL no word from the parks guy about the trails. Can you say backburner? You can tell that its the end of the season on the roadie rides, everyone attacks and attacks again, those training rides are about my limit (are about my ASS, they ARE at my limit)But it is pretty cool to see who and how is pushing the group into the red and can you respond in kind???, I've seen 197 BPM's chasing these kids and ELDERS around, but its a great workout that has helped me on the trails as well. Looking forward to putting a number on my bike again soon, maybe even try a CX race, although I run like old people F_ _ _! Stay warm!!!