Opinion

I rarely get into the FB rants regarding our local trail rehab, maintenance, building, or layout.  I do admit to being amused by the reactions.  It's not that I don't care, I love the trail systems your local and our state/ federal governments allow us to have.  As long as nobody closes them or we get less mileage I'm a happy camper.

I must have put in hundreds of miles of moto trails during my career riding gas powered two wheeled toys.  Not only on public lands but on land a group of us leased.  Plus I promoted races where I set up the trail, mostly with the help of The Kid and one other friend.  The profit (there usually wasn't any) all went to either the club or the track owner.  I just loved to lay out trail.  Plus I wanted to "give something back".

After spending hours of my personal time, gas money, and sweat to put in trail, there was always somebody who didn't like something.

"Why'd ya take out the doubles?"
"That creek crossing is too deep."
"It's too tight."
"I'm afraid of a mass start."
"Oooh somebody might see how slow I am."
"You want how much to race?"
"I don't want to race with that class."
"Why'd ya put the doubles in?" (this was usually me)
"It's too wide open."

You get the picture.  The very first enduro trail section I ever laid out in the ANF apparently wasn't good enough, they came along behind me and took the arrows down.  Pissed me off.

We used to have the run of the ANF (Apalachicola National Forest) back in the day.  We had literally hundreds of miles of trail.  Then one day the Feds asked us to GPS it for them.  You know, just so they could get an idea of where it all was.  After we did countless hours of work for them, for free, they thanked us by closing 95% of our trails and basically forcing us out of the forest.  Good thing I'm not bitter, bastards.  They have since instituted an annual permit system which costs money to ride.  Then they spend nothing on trail maintenance.

So we turned to leasing land to ride on.  Which a group of us paid annually for.  Local MX tracks started having practice days.  One even put in a trail system.  Of course you had to pay $10-$20/ day to ride.

Anyhoo, my rambling point is as mountain bikers we are spoiled.  Take a look at how far we'd have to travel to find anything as good as we have here.  Most other recreational activities "pay to play".

So if a group of kind hearted individuals want to spend their personal time doing trail work they have my unending gratitude.  I get it.  I've done it.  If it pleases the entity that controls the access and keeps the trail open, God bless em.

Don't think the same thing that happened to moto can't happen to MTB?  Just wait.

Hammerhead

Since my XC season has fallen apart I felt the need to find another way to satisfy my urge to compete.  The Hammerhead 100/50/25 by Gone Riding sounded like just the ticket.

The Kid and I rolled out of the house in Beautiful Downtown Havana around noon on Saturday, went by Publix, found out I had forgotten my phone, went back to the house, stopped by the shop for race eats, and finally hit the road.  He immediately plugged in and fell asleep.  No matter, with his noise cancelling head phones he couldn't hear me singing to The Who most of the way.  His loss.

I got nostalgic thinking about all the Saturdays I had spent heading to some type of race or another.  Meeting friends, loading bikes, arguing about where to eat.  The nerves and the chatter of people who share a common interest.  Racing, you either get it or you don't.

I did a little bird killing (you know, the old saying, "kill two birds with one stone") and spent the night before the race at my brother's lake house near Starke.  My parents were down there also so we got to have some family time.

Watching your parents get old, with all that that entails, isn't an easy thing to do.  It left me thinking about enjoying the time we have to be able to do the things we love, and had me looking forward to pushing my self just a little harder on race day.

Race Day

The Kid and I got up at 5, stumbled around the strange kitchen trying to get some coffee, hit the road, and got lost on the way to the start.  Fortunately The Kid can use his phone to guide me.  I guess I'll just wander around after he goes off to school.  At least he's pretty sure I will.

We had signed up to each do 50 miles and joined the 200 other riders in line for the start.  There was a neutral roll out behind the motorcycle until we got to the first section of single track.  It didn't help break up the pack much and we got caught behind a loooooong line.  The pace was casual and combined with stopping at nearly every root we weren't putting out very much effort.  Still the trails were amazing and the temperature perfect.  I had seen the average speed of the top guys last year to be in the mid teens.  We were doing about 9.  I became concerned.

Well we lost a few, passed a few, and finally hit a lime rock road.  Most everybody in front of us sat up.  I told The Kid to tuck in and we time trialed till we hit the single track again.  We must have passed 20 riders.  I had a scary moment when a rider all of the sudden jerked right as I was about to pass.  It reminded me there were all sorts of skill levels out there.

The trail, ah the trail, it was 90% flowey goodness.  I can't say enough about this system.  It made the miles go by quick.  We never got passed on the way back to finish our first of two laps.

The Kid was going to take a long break at the half way point which was at the start.  I filled bottles, grabbed something to eat, and headed out all by myself.  It became difficult to keep the pace up with nobody around to push me.  The trail was so much fun I caught myself just cruising.  It's hard to believe you can be alone in the woods for so long with 200 other people out there.  I passed a few on the single track.  At about mile 35 I put my foot down to pivot around a sharp turn on top of a pile of rocks when I felt the first twinges of a cramp.  I knew I had gotten behind on my hydration, having only consumed 1 bottle during the first 2 hours, but I had a secret weapon, mustard.

I hit the road section again and picked up a rider (we'll call him Green Shirt) who was also trying to make up some time.  I asked if he would like to work together, he took the first pull.  We caught quite a few groups, some would latch on for a little while but nobody really stuck.  At the last section before the land bridge we picked up a rider on the Swift Team from Gainesville.   He made a move to jump in front before we went into the final single tract section but overshot the turn, allowing both me and Green Shirt to go by.  We eventually dropped the Swift rider and caught another rider right before the final road section into the finish.  He let us by only to latch back on once we got out into the open.

Green Shirt moved over and slowed down, New Guy started around me, I got back in front, and picked up the pace.  I remembered a small clump of trees on the inside of the last right hand turn leading into the finish chute.  I moved over to my left, leaving a bit of room, they took the bait, I stood up and moved back to the right effectively pushing them into the bushes.  We all three hit the chute and I got them by a wheel.  We high fived and had a good laugh.  None of us knew it at the time but we were all three in the 45+class.

As soon as I got off the bike both legs cramped.  I walked a few feet trying not to let it show.  Then I remembered the mustard packets I had been carrying all day.  I tore one open, stuck it at the back of my throat, squeezed, almost gagged, and took a drink.  And the cramps disappeared!  No kidding, they stopped immediately, quit, and never came back.  Not the most pleasant thing to do but it sure beats cramping.

I ended up 13/ 37 in the 45 plus class and 46/ 127 over all in the 50 mile class with a 3:58 time.  A top 10 in 45+ is doable but I doubt I have much more than that in me.  All in all a great day at the races.  The Kid got 66th overall an also had a good time.

After a Joey Bag of Donuts at Moe's we made the 3 hour drive home.  Happy, content, and tired.  That's racing and I love it.

Group Ride

I am training, for what I'm not sure.  I enjoy the structure of my LW training plans, I don't seem to be able to leave the house and "just go for a ride".  Is that a problem?  Apparently.

Big Jim says "the old man's always training, he's been training for 2 years straight".  I can't help it I don't have the natural ability to build massive horse-like calves in just a few short months.  He accompanied me on a training ride earlier this week, we were doing 3 minute intervals, my gosh you should have heard the whining.

Jim: "How long before we start?"

Me: "We've got another minute."

"Ok, let me know when it's 30 seconds."

"Beep, beep, beep" (the sound my Garmin makes when it's time for the interval to start)

After interval finishes:

"How many more of these do we have to do (pant, pant pant)?"

"Three sets of three".

"How long do I  (pant) get to (pant) rest?"

"Three minutes."

"Oh my, ok, tell me when we get to 30 seconds.  I am soooo out of shape."

This repeated for all three sessions.  When you read it, put that little whine in it.  You'll get a better picture of how it went.

Thursday Night

Rider 1's new bike was finally ready, or so he thought, so we agreed to meet at Higher Ground at 6 for a group ride.  I had a short interval planned for the ride, just to wake my legs up for the Hammerhead 50 coming up Sunday, but I didn't bother to share this with the group before we started.  But first we had to get started.

When I got to the shop both Rider 1 and Rider 2 were sitting at the counter, their bikes in the work stands being worked on.  I won't go into the specific issues but suffice to say someone was having teething problems with his new ride and the other guy, well, his bike was making all sorts of squeaking noises (probably due to the increased load it was being required to carry).

After getting the bikes sorted out someone still had to go home and change into riding gear, and Rider 2 had to take his usual 20 minutes to get his kit on.  I think we rolled out of HG about 6:20 for a 6:00 ride. 

When we met Silk at the power line, Rider 1 was no where to be found, Silk headed toward his house to try and find him.  Five minutes later both show back up.  We form the usual conga line and head up the Silk trail.

After a long warm up my Garmin alerted me it was time for my little interval.  Since I was leading the ride I assumed they would just fall in behind me.  After all the pace wasn't anything difficult (for them).  At 5 minutes into my 10 minute interval I looked back, I was all alone.

Now if anybody else in that group had taken off the front, they would have all pursued.  But let me do it and nooooooo, we want to ride and talk tonight.  I happened to run into them again at the lake and fell onto the back of the line.

I decided not to use the names of my fellow riders for this little story.  I do enjoy group rides and would hate to be ostracized (again).

Anyhoo, moral of the story, either do a training ride or a group ride.

Up next, race report from the Hammerhead 50.

Well that and the fact that I'm slow.

The Oldest Guy in the Room

The Lovely Wife and I attended a surprise birthday party for a much younger friend of mine this past week. Though his is entering the stage of life that is past 40 I still consider him young.  Funny I can easily remember when I thought 30 was old.

Anyhoo as I looked around the noisy room I came to the realization (again) that I was by far the oldest person there.  This seems to be a recurring theme with me.  I guess it doesn't really matter as long as they enjoy having me around (and how could they not) and I enjoy their company.

The jokes about knowing Noah personally and looking like Santa (I still don't get this one but it seems to keep coming back) don't bother me.  I figure age is just one of the things we can make fun of.  This crew has a long list defects to pick from so I rarely run out of ammo.

The Past

I had a whole nuther set of friends from my moto days before I graced this new group with my presence.  And no, I wasn't the oldest in that group (by far).  But slowly they stopped riding as much, couldn't go to races (or didn't want to), or just faded out of the group.  I'm sure they miss me.  We did the birthday thing and had loud drunken parties at the beach.  So all of this is starting to look a little Deja Vu.

The Lovely Wife has ridden a lot of mile on some pretty uncomfortable bikes, and never complained.  Well maybe a little.

See, my hair wasn't always gray!

The Hammerhead

The kid and I are planning to do 50 miles of this race next weekend.  We're not sure if we'll solo or team.  If we team it'll make for a long day.  I'm not really taking this as a race, more of a tour.  It helps keep me focused to have an event like this to train for, even though I'm not taking it seriously.  

We did a forest loop last weekend which helped me get my hydration and nutrition down for 55 miles.  Grinding along those soft forest roads into a headwind got the hate flowing.  The single track sections were fun though.

I'm just happy they let the old man tag along.