iRide

So my afternoon ride got washed out because Dyl was the recipient of a rather impressive gift from a family friend and he “twisted my arm” to build it up right away:

Yes, it’s a Giant Trance. The frame was given to us and I built it up with spare parts: Splice fork (an inch too much travel I know, but it won’t hurt the kid and the kid won’t hurt it), LX rear der, Deore front der, Race Face Evolve XC cranks, Hayes 9’s, XT shifters. It still needs a chain and to have the cables ran. I’ll get to that later this week. I wish I had bike like that when I was 12!!!!

So since I couldn’t get a trail ride in, I decided to take the boys and one of their friends to the local elementary school and play around.

My crew

First up, I decided to huck the stairs–always fun and Dyl makes an alright camera man

Droppin’ down–pretty bumpy on a rigid BMX bike. The smooth line is in between the bushes, but they insist on taking the rockier line by the fence. Oh yeah!!

A bit more smootherer

The kids take flight

Just missed the air

Get down off of there you heathen kids!!

We then had a distance jumping contest. The kids couldn’t figure out why I kept going the farthest. I told them it’s because I have awesome skill and am “The Man”. Sure it’s a blatant lie, but it was easier than explaining that gravity just carries my fat @$$ farther.

The camera batteries had crapped out at that point, so I didn’t get any pics. We headed back since it was getting dark and I wanted to get them the 3 blocks back home as safe as possible.

This was about the tenth time in the last 3 weeks we’ve done this little ride. The boys would do it everyday if we had the time.

Hope you enjoyed!! I know we all did. Thanks for coming along with us!! Until next time, seek your bliss.

Ride lots…

I guess it’s been a little while, hasn’t it?

Things have been same old-same old around here lately. I’ve been riding all the usual spots and generally loving life and riding.

Sean and I have knocked out some more rides here in Ramona. We have a pretty fun “go to” loop we came up with. I have ridden it solo a few times myself.

I also discovered how much fun the local elementary school grounds can be after hours and on weekends. The stairs make for good huckage and rolling them is fun too. The boys like to ride along on their BMX bikes and there’s lots of cool stuff to play around on. Plus, it’s literally 3 blocks from the house, so we can get there in just a few minutes.

Mark and I knocked out a pretty good ride in Fallbrook today. We rode over by Red Mountain. I haven’t ridden there since I gave Hack the tour last March. I was a little worried that the trail would be in bad shape due to the fires last October. Fortunately, they were in great shape. It was a long ride with lot’s o’ climbing, but I was glad to get out on those trails again. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again–I need to get out to that part of the SMaRT network more often.

I didn’t take any pics during the ride (shocking, I know). I did get a good pic at the end though. It sums up what kind of ride it was–at least to me:

Yes the legs were tired AND dirty!! It was an awesome ride though.

I almost forgot. I’ll leave you with this, make of it what you will:

*cough*backupbike*cough*

Hopefully this week I’ll get in all the usual stuff. And hopefully I won’t wait 3 weeks to do the next update. Until next time, seek your bliss.

Ride lots…

Yesterday, Mark, Sean and I decided to hit up Noble Canyon. The planned route was to shuttle up to the top, loop BLT and then descend Noble. Sean met me at the house and carpooled with me. We picked up Mark at the bottom and prepared to head up. While we were loading up Mark’s stuff, we saw Steve. We chatted for a bit and he said he was meeting up with the usual Noble crowd and maybe we could hook up at the top.

On the drive up, Sean mentioned he’d like to do a bit of exploring on a trail he was looking at on a Topo map called Garnet Peak. It was right up the road from the BLT trailhead we would be parking at:

It sounded fun, so Mark and I were game.

The trail started out good enough, but as it turned skyward, it also turned to mostly unridable rocks and shale.

We ended up hike-a-biking just about the whole way up to the top.

We ditched the bikes for the final, short hike to the peak:

The whole hike-a-bike up wasn’t too bad though and the view was worth it, as was the subsequent DH back down.

Mark and Sean walk down to the bikes from the peak/viewpoint:

Looking at the techy DH back down. The hike-a-bike was worth it. The DH ROCKED!!

Can you spot the riders?

We then cruised back to BLT and enjoyed the awesome singletrack. It was starting to get pretty hot, but there was a nice breeze blowing as well.

By the time we finished looping BLT, the day had warmed up considerably. We headed back to the car so we could rest for a bit and put on our armor for the ride down Noble. We saw Steve again at the top, along with Francesca and Ann. I hadn’t seen them in awhile, so we sat around for a little while and chit-chatted while snacking on Clif Bars. They were just setting out to loop BLT and then descend, so unfortunately we didn’t have the chance to ride with them.

We threw on our armor and headed back down the mountain. The DH down Noble was fun as always, but it started to get REALLY hot, REALLY quick. The forecast called for a high of 87, but it was at least 10 degrees warmer than that. So, we didn’t really spend anytime sessioning Noble like we planned. We just wanted to get the heck down the mountain as we were all getting fried by the sun. It was sapping our energy so bad, we didn’t even climb up to hit Extra Credit at the end. We opted for the easy way out and took the road back.

Mark was smart enough to leave a 6-pack of Gatorade in a cooler in his car at the bottom trailhead. We all immediately downed 2 bottles each and felt a lot better. Mark–you are a gentleman and a scholar!!

We then had to figure out a way to get 3 bikes and they’re riders into Mark’s Honda Accord for the ride back up to the top where my car waited. We figured out that by taking the wheels off, we could hang all 3 bikes out the trunk. I don’t remember if it was Mark or Sean who came up with that brilliant idea, but it was just that–BRILLIANT!! A few extra tubes helped secure the precious cargo.

Those who know, ride Fox forks. REPRESENT!!!!!

Nothing like having close to $12,000 in bikes in the trunk of the car. The bikes rode securely all the way up to the top. We should patent our set-up for others to use as a shuttle option. Why, we could make millions…..or not.

On the way back up I felt like I had something in my eye. I must’ve caught something on the way down, which was weird because I was wearing eye protection/sunglasses–my Oakley Radars. It bothered me all the way home. I thought for sure it was a piece of debris of some sort. I couldn’t get it out and it was killing me!! I realized when I got home that whatever it was came out but had scratched my eyeball in the process. It currently feels like I have a Buick in between my eyelid and eyeball. I hope it doesn’t take too long to heal. It’s awfully annoying.

I should have my usual rides this week. Here’s hoping!! Until then, seek your bliss.

Ride lots…