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In between riding and watching The Tour de France, I decided to finally go and do some exploring at a local trail I’ve been meaning to ride for awhile. I found the route on a local ride website when I was recovering from my ankle surgery and jumped at the chance to ride there when my friend Joe mentioned it.

You can see the destination from quite a distance away:

Joe arrived right after I did and we set out. Climbing begins immediately and is the theme of the day:

View from halfway up to the “P” summit. I’ll be climbing the fireroad on the left later, but for now I’m just dreading it from a distance:

There’s a few more “gravity oriented” trails here and there. We stayed off of them. This one cuts across the fireroad and down the other side:

And another:

Finally at the summit. The Spot in all her glory:

The Spot joined by Joe’s Intense 951:

And off the other side of the summit we go:

After some initial tech, it smooths out into nice singletrack:

After that singletrack section, the riding got interesting! Ditch riding–the latest and greatest craze:

Back onto the fireroads for more climbing:

Great views from up this high too:

There’s singletrack off-shoots everywhere! But for me, I’m still climbing:

More climbing. Yes, I’ll be going up that:

Downhill at last!

Over too quick though!

Hidden pond:

Flat for a bit:

A very short bit! There’s the next climbing section:

Joe does a little pushin’:

Awesome singletrack section!

One upside to all the saddle time I’ve been putting in: epic glove tanline!!

Garmin Connect ride info.

Hoping to get in rides Friday and Saturday. It’ll have to be on the Spot since I’m still waiting to hear if Chris King is going to warranty the Niner’s rear hub.

Ride lots…

I don’t think rear axles are supposed to do this:

This is the second time a Chris King hub has failed me. I expect a lot more from a $450 component. Color me unimpressed!!

I swung by Bicycle Warehouse and dropped it off for repair since that’s where I bought it. Tom the mechanic was pretty sure it’s out of warranty but he’s going to call and check. It’ll likely cost me in the neighborhood of $50-70 for a new axle!!

The worst part is that it’s on the Niner 1×9′s rear wheel. Now I’ll have to slum it on the 5 Spot all week. At least the Tour is on and I have that to make me feel better!

Ride lots…

After my first ever visit to SCST at the SDMBA “Weedpatch Ride” last Saturday, I couldn’t believe I have been putting off riding such a fun trail network for so long! I wanted to get back ASAP, so I hit it up again after work on Friday with my friend J. I was able to follow the same route as the week before with only 2 wrong turns. Not too shabby!

As the name implies, there is ample singletrack out here and I would imagine countless different loops could be strung together. I rode it on my 5-Spot the first time but took out my Niner 1×9 this go ’round. It was more fun on the 1×9–all but 2 steeps are doable.

Heading out:

Nothing but singletrack!

Western entrance to Blue Chair:

And the singletrack rolls on:

The singletrack crosses the main fire road numerous times, but is very easy to follow:

And the singletrack rolls on:

There’s a few bridges to play on as well:

Great views too:

The East end of Blue Chair, with its namesake on the left:

A fun, flowy section:

Twists and turns:

Into a couple bridge crossings:

Little log roll between the uprights:

Doe. A deer. A female deer:

The singletrack is electric!!

Or maybe it’s just the power station:

Fun section down into some trees:

And back onto more singletrack:

Bring your climbing legs though. Our route was 15 miles with over 2,100′ of climbing–but all worth it!! Too much good stuff!!

Garmin Connect Ride Info

Ride lots…

Usual Wednesday “quick ride” at Lake Hodges with Jeremy. I didn’t feel good at all. Don’t know why, just one of those things I guess.  I almost enjoy the rides where I feel bad more than the rides when I feel good. There’s something about pushing through it that makes you feel like you got a little tougher.

Garmin Connect Ride Info

Daley Ranch is next on the ride menu for tomorrow, followed by a return to SCST Friday and a big loop at Cuyumaca Saturday!!

Ride lots…

Hit up Santa Rosa Plateau today with Dylan. I wanted to do the bigger “double loop” I came up with, but Dylan wasn’t exactly feeling it and we had to cut the ride short and head back early. I felt really good too and wanted to bust out some mileage. Oh well.

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Ramona by statmtb at Garmin Connect – Details.

It seems that once again I have been slacking on the Blog updates. I blame Facebook. It’s so darn easy to just post it up there instead of here. And what really is “here” anyway?? Sometimes I wonder why I do this Blog. I think sometimes I’m stoked and all fired up to do it, then other times I wonder if anyone is reading it anyway. Oh well.

So catching up–the weight loss is going really well. Since my last post I’ve dropped another 10lbs. I’ve also pretty much exclusively ridden the Niner 1×9. I’m just enjoying the extra challenge and the feeling of accomplishment I never quite get riding a FS 26er.

I finally got the long awaited Niner 32tooth front ring for it:

I decided with the successes of conquering my local trails on the 1×9, I wanted to test myself and see how big of a ride I could pull off. I ended up doing a long ride at Sycamore Canyon that totaled 33 miles and 3,100′ of climbing–and felt great the whole ride. Encouraged by that, I decided to put a SART ride together–with the idea to ride it on the 1×9.

This past Friday I was finally able to make it up there. J, Mark and James were able to make it up with me and we set out on a beautiful day of riding. Aided by cool temps, Perpetuem and determination I knocked out 32 miles and over 4,100′ of climbing on the 1×9. When the ride was over, I still felt pretty good and could’ve ridden further. Don’t get me wrong–I was glad to be done, but I could’ve ridden further.

Hopefully I’ll be able to get back in the swing of things and post here a little more often!

As I mentioned a couple posts ago, I recently converted my Niner to a 1×9 set-up. I had only gotten in saddle time on it at Lake Hodges. Some of those rides were longer routes and the rides were no stroll through the park necessarily, but let’s be honest: there’s not really any climbing there that is really going to test me.

Well, the last couple days have been pretty interesting as far as really testing my fitness and whether or not I would be able to ride  on trails other than Hodges.

Friday I rode it here in Fallbrook with Dylan. There are a few climbs I wasn’t sure of–I can spin up them slowly in a standard “granny gear”, but definitely had my doubts about cleaning them on a 1×9. I’ll use older “archive footage” for the pics below. I didn’t stop to take any on the ride–I was busy not stopping to clean the climbs honestly!

The first climb is short, yet steep and pretty sandy. Dad and I nick-named it “The Suck” for obvious reasons:

I cleaned it fairly easily and once at the top, I started to feel like maybe I could do this 1×9 thing after all.

The next significant climb is a steep and nasty hill dad nick-named “The Puke-inator”. Again, for obvious reasons–though it’s really the steepness that makes it hard. The only real pic I have of it is from last weekend’s trail maintenance hike. It does an OK job of showing the steepness. In this pic, I am about 20 feet up from the bottom and the family is not even close to halfway up:

I’ve been cleaning it consistently in the standard “granny gear” but I really knew deep down that I didn’t stand a chance of cleaning it on a 1×9. I was going to try my hardest, but didn’t expect much. I attacked it with all I had and the next thing I knew, I was sitting at the top!! Wow. I was really liking this new set-up.

I knew the last climb–the climb out–would be the hardest. But inspired by my first two successes, I knew I could do it.

Dad, Dylan and I have nick-named this section “The Brown Mile” — a take-off of “The Green Mile”. You gain over 300′ in less than a mile. The last section is paved, but it’s definitely hard.

The start:

Still going:

Almost there–that tall Pine behind the second telephone pole is the top.

It hurt a little, but I cleaned the whole thing and felt really good when we got back home.

Today, Dylan and I rode my old loop in Ramona. I knew of 2 climbs in particular I figured I had no chance of cleaning–even with my success in Fallbrook.

I don’t have any pictures to show them, but I was able to clean them both–and fairly easily at that!! I am now certain that building up the 1×9 was a good idea. I would still like to test myself on it at a place like Daley Ranch that has some serious climbing sections. But for now, I know that I have a decent enough level of fitness to ride it just about anywhere. And I’m only going to continue to lose weight and get into better and better shape, so I know it will only get easier!!

I also got the N-Gear Jump Start Chain Guide in the mail and installed it Wednesday. It looks lot’s cleaner and works really well so far–absolutely no dropped chains!

What you are seeing is — bash guard (that’s always been there)/chain/chain guide:

I do want to make it look and perform a bit cleaner, so I plan on dropping the bash guard and getting a non-ramped dedicated front chain ring for it:

Happy Mother’s Day!!

Ride lots…

We all went out for a hike in Fallbrook today. The weather was great and I love the family time. However I also had an agenda: The trails in Fallbrook are getting choked off by a nasty, thorny, menace of a weed. It loves to grow right on the edge of the trail, easily reaches 3′ high and its thorns will go through clothes and full finger gloves with no trouble at all. So armed with my machete, I planned on doing some much needed trail maintenance.

Sydney leads the charge:

Spencer, armed with his bamboo “walking stick”, gets an early start on the weed abatement:

Dylan, looking more like a man everyday:

Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho, it’s off to hike we go:

It wasn’t long before we got to the first section in need of some major work. Like I said–pretty overgrown and nasty!!

Before:

After:

Onto section #2:

Before:

After:

Onto section #3:

Before:

After:

And onto section #4–the biggest task of the day!!

Before:

After:

That’s more like it!!

Great views and awesome weather!!

All told it our hike lasted 3 hours, with at least half of that spent on weed abatement. It will pay off quickly though–I’m riding there tomorrow!!

Ride lots…