The SS

No, not that kind of SS. I'm talking about single speed bicycles. Still, I like the Nazi Zombie look. Oh, and if you Google Nazi SS, you'll get some very disturbing images.

It all started when the Worm lent us his Voodoo and we were able to borrow a Niner from Higher Ground. Both single speeds, both fun. I had to have one. Of course as long as B is in the house I would never get any peace if I just bought one so using the "found money" from the sale of the dirt bike I bought 2. I know that's a little extravagant but I'm at the stage in my life where I am acutely aware of how quickly time passes. I know that's a weak rationalization for buying two bikes but just you try to get through the day without a juicy rationalization. Anyhoo that's a topic for another time, back to the new SSs.

They are both Specilized Rockhoppers, normally a geared bike, 29" wheels, and hard tails. The shop converted them to SS for us and even though they are a little heavy they're still fun. If you already have a SS you already know how different they are from a geared bike. They are quiet, no chain slap, the big wheels help a little with not having a rear shock (well that may be a stretch), and not having gears makes the ride both challenging and relaxing at the same time. They are a perfect bike for rides to the restaurant on Friday nights, fam rides, beginner rides, and solo rides when I just want to poke along and enjoy the woods. I've found that SS riders are like vegetarians, if there's one in the crowd all you have to do is wait and they'll let you know that they're there. Now I kinda understand why.

I'm getting to like the way my shop looks now. I think I have room for a couple more. By the way I have a huge dog, a security system, and a retired cop for a neighbor so be forewarned. Not that the 5 people who read this would do anything like that but you never know.

Oh, and by they way, did you happen to notice all the trophies discreetly placed in the photos? No? Well here's a better look. Just don't focus on the dates. Yes, I was a legend in my mind.

No Race Report

I'm sure it will be better covered by other local bloggers, both those who finished in front of me and the few that finished behind me. The Redbug Challenge was fun even though I didn't do as well as I should have. If you'll look at the picture above you'll see I am standing with the women's class. I mean no disrespect to the ladies but it was not the place for me to be at the start. Suffice to say they got out in front of me due to my timid starting procedure and their urge to crush each other. I had listened to my "friend" BJS when he said "a 25 minute lap time should be about right". Of course he went out and turned 23.66 minute laps and blistered the whole class. Oh well it was a blast anyway. It was a "C" race for me since I'm the only one in my class WHO IS ACTUALLY RACING A SERIES. There, that's my excuse and I'm sticking with it. By the way I'm proud of B, he bumped up to the older class and had a good ride. He actually showed some emotion when he crossed the finish line. Most of the time he reminds me of Dr. Spock on the old Star Treck series. Must be a teenage thing. Of course it may not be as wonderful to be my son as I think it is.

Local races are so different than out of town events. Here everybody yells at you as you go by. Even though it's not always complementary (not when I go by anyway) at least it takes your mind off the suffering. There was a good vibe after the race since most of us know or have at least seen each other before. A large group ended up at Moe Moe's Pizza after the ride. We ate and drank outside under the trees. I was sorry to see the day end. I went home and fell asleep on the back porch like a happy dog.

I got the stitches out the other day so for the first time in maybe a month I don't have anything to complain about when I ride. It was a relief to walk out of the doctors office knowing I was free of that crap for at least a little while. Whenever you get two or more guys over 50 together the conversation invariably turns to medical issues. Don't think you'll be like that? I didn't either.

Seven Days

Yep, that's how long I've been off the bike. It seems like much longer. From a career in the sunshine I get these little presents that pop up on my arms almost every year. My dermatologist seems to get a kick out of slicing and dicing these things off of me so with 6 stitches I figured I better not ride till it got closed up a little. On a positive note the time off allowed me to do some things I had been putting off. I cooked more, cleaned the kitchen, and even slept better. But I found myself looking out the back door wondering if this is how the rest of the world lives their days.

I went to Munson Monday this week and was surprised how good it felt to be riding again. I am addicted to cycling at the present time, in the past I've been addicted to running and to motorcycles, but it's bicycles now.

It left the house in the back of a black Ford F-250 pickup. I have had one since I was 11 years old (except for a 4 year break for college and marriage) and this is the first time in all those years that I'll be without one. The guy who bought my Honda 450 got a good deal. I knew he was leaving with the bike when he saw it and said "wow" as he walked into the shop. After he left I had a beer and just stood in the empty space the bike had just occupied. All those years, all those miles.

We've got a busy summer coming up. The Red Bug Challenge is this weekend, then we have 3 more rounds of the Georgia State Series, plus Bump and Fools Gold. We made a commitment to do the Georgia Series and with gas at $4.00 a gallon I don't know how many of the other over night events we'll be able to do. Heck, ya know, maybe we should just do them all, you only go around once right? They say they only regrets you'll have are the opportunities you missed. Besides I'm tired of staring out the back door.

Race Weekend

It was a solo adventure this time around as B came down with Strep Throat the week before. I'll admit some trepidation about going by myself since the race was 5 and a half hours away but I had made a commitment to this little series so I headed out Saturday morning. The trip up was pretty uneventful except for a traffic jam on I-75 and not being able to find Yargo State Park when I finally got to Winder, Ga. I stopped at a Walmart (of all places) to get directions and then had to stop and ask again when I got into the park. I had a nice headache by the time I got registered and unloaded my bike. Two other riders from Tallahassee, Dan and Paige, had already made their practice lap before I even started mine so I made sure they knew I was there just in case something happened. You begin to think about those kind of things more often after you turn 50, things like: where my insurance card is, and who could drive me home if I couldn't drive. Anyhoo the practice lap was relaxing, the course was beautiful (the local club had swept the trail), and I was able to find the Jameson Inn without too much trouble.

I found Paige and Dan again at the hotel and we went across the street to a Ruby Tuesdays for dinner. Other than the waitress forgetting Paige's order it was about what I expected for Winder, Ga. on a Saturday night. The Jameson Inn was, well, let's say different, than the Hampton Inns I normally stay in. I remember hotel rooms looking like that in the 80's when I was racing FTR hare scrambles. In fact my room probably had the same furniture in it that it had in the 80's, including the bed. The train tracks ran right by the hotel so 3 times during the night I got jolted awake by the horn as the train crossed the highway. My fear of bed bugs kept me thinking I felt something crawling on me but when I turned on the light I couldn't see anything. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

We made the trip into Athens, Ga. after dinner to see the Twilight Crit. Just finding a parking space was an adventure. With 55,000 people, most of them drunk college kids, the race was fun to watch. I did get a little tired of hearing "oh mygod!" and "hey man let us across the street" while they chain smoked cigarettes. I have no idea who won, I had to call BW and find out how the format worked. I'd like to watch it sometime when I didn't need to get up the next morning and race my mountain bike. We got back to the hotel around 11:00.

Race day was a cool 60 degrees with some light clouds. After a "breakfast" at the hotel I left for the park. I just don't sit around and wait very well. I missed not having B with me. He enjoys these races and it just wasn't the same without him along. I warmed up and went to the line. 16 old guys in my class! We were lined up two deep. Fortunately I had a spot at the front and got off to a 3rd place start. I knew the riders in first and second had finished behind me at West Point so I settled into their pace until we got to the first open section and I went to go around. Just as I moved left another rider came by me, pushed me back in line, passed second, then first, and put me back to fourth. Crap! We freight trained through the next single track section and as soon as we came out onto the gas line climb I passed third, then second, and got onto first place's wheel. Unbeknownst to me I had brought another rider around with me and he was right on me as we started the climb. Now I thought the rider in first had introduced himself to me on the line as being 68 years old. So I thought "he can't keep this pace up, he's gonna blow soon". Wrong. I was the one who was gonna blow up if I didn't back off. I never saw the guy again and no he wasn't who I thought he was. Third place had finsihed just behind me at West Point and he kept me honest until about the half way mark where I was able to get a little breathing room on a couple of climbs.

I managed to stay ahead of third place and had a comfortable margin at the finish. I won some neat stuff and didn't feel as guilty (now why would I feel guilty?) about racing the base class as I did after West Point since I had gotten beat soundly by first place. I stuck around and handed water to Paige and Dan who no doubt have their own race stories to tell. I left before they finished as I was itching to get on the road to home.

The promoters wife asked me "where are all the other Bikechain guys?" to which I could only shrug and say "I don't know".

It was another great weekend. I love the trails we've ridden so far. They are so much better than some of the stuff we ride in Florida. I hope everybody is healthy for the next one.

It's Just Too Much Trouble

I pulled my dirt bike out of the shop for the first time in a year last weekend. I'd been putting this off for a while but the time had finally come. I cleaned it up, put some air in the tires, checked the air filter, and gave the kick start a good whack. Much to my surprise after about 7 kicks the thing fired up. This was going to be harder than I thought. It settled into a steady idle, looking all clean. I felt a twinge of regret. Maybe I should just keep it, you know, just in case I get the urge to ride. But that hadn't happened in over a year, which is still hard for me to accept.

Well just load it up right now and take it up to the track I told myself, go ahead, it's running great. Maybe you don't really want to take the pictures, write the add, and put it for sale on Craigslist. Then I thought about loading the gear, the gas can, the pop up, and pushing it into the back of the truck like I've done thousands of times in the past, and I just sighed. It seemed like too much trouble. Is this how things end? After 41 years of moto will I just go out with "it's too much trouble"? Come on man, you knew this was coming! My moto friends and I had talked about this day years before. We wondered if we would be forced off the bike by injuries or just get too feeble to ride. One of them suggested we'd just stop wanting to go. I always said they'd have to pry my cold dead hands off the handle bars, looks like I was wrong. I shut the bike off, pushed it in front of the garage door, and took the pictures for the add.

It's amazing all the stuff I've collected over the years while pursuing my moto hobby. Until I started listing it for sale I never realized I had so much junk. I'd kept records of every race, how I finished, and anything that happened that was worth remembering. As I read them I could picture the day, who was there, whether it was hot or cold, and even how I felt. Most of these events no longer exist. Public land for riding has disappeared and the places that are left are no fun to ride on. I have pictures on the wall of my shop from the 80's and trophies from races located on land where you can't even ride a motorized vehicle today. 4 wheelers and just too damn many people moving into the state eventually killed the best places to ride. So I typed the add, uploaded the pictures, and pushed the post button. When will your last ride be? Will you enjoy the last day you swing your leg over a saddle? Will you go out with a bang or will it just be "too much trouble"?

Enough of that melancholy crap! B and I borrowed a couple of single speeds last Friday just to see what all the excitement is all about. Now I get it! It was fun, different from the geared bikes, and so now we want one. Only problem is we couldn't just get one, we'd need two of them. So we're shopping around.

In my beautiful little town of Havana there's a restaurant T and I enjoy called Oscars. It's no big deal, just a little Italian food and a nice courtyard. We rode the bikes up there the past two weekends and after a couple of Becks I had a great idea. I should get a group of local cyclists together for a Friday evening tour of Havana. We could start at someones house for drinks, go to another house for more drinks and maybe some snacks. Then on to a restaurant for well, more drinks, and maybe something to eat. Sounds like fun huh? Would be great except I can't think of more than 8 people in town who ride and of those 8 only 4 of them could ride more than a few blocks. Anyhoo it was a good idea while it lasted. Maybe I could recruit some folks from out of town. Interested?

Not Talking About It

No, I'm not going to mention my horrific crash. There will be no gruesome injury pictures (even though I could provide some). I will not recount my childish display of temper as I rolled around on the ground in almost inhuman pain. I know I called up the bad mojo by mentioning earlier that day that I just didn't push hard enough to crash. Anyhoo I'm not talking about it so on to other things.

After last Tuesday's "incident" I felt compelled to take it easy for a couple of days. So when Sunday rolled around I still hadn't set up an afternoon ride. I had been wanting to go back to the Lines Tract Trails on the Gadsden Co. side of Lake Talquin for some time but for some reason most of my regular crew is afraid to leave Leon County to ride. It was such a perfect day I just had to get out, so after church I loaded up by myself, grabbed my music, and headed toward Quincy.

I wasn't surprised that there was nobody else at the trail head. I do question the logic of putting this system way out here, don't get me wrong, I appreciate the DOF building and maintaining the trail, but it appears to be very underused. The covered picnic tables, the grill, and the chemical toilet (I didn't really look at the toilet I just assumed) all looked like they hadn't been used in a while.

Yes the trail is there somewhere

The beginning of the trail is across a sandy hill that reminds me of the old Munson. I saw little evidence of bike tracks and in places the vegetation had grown across the path. After it dropped off the hill into the pines it was a little easier to follow until it started down into the hardwood hammock along the lake. I could see the blue blazes every now and then so I never really got lost but I admit I had to stop every once in a while to make sure I hadn't started bushwhacking by mistake. The views of the lake and the huge hardwoods made this my favorite section. If the trail had been beaten in it could have been a fun ride as well as scenic.

I was (am) still a little skittish from the "incident that I'm not talking about" plus being by myself made me ride even more conservative. But that was alright. I had good tunes, the sky was blue, and the woods were free of other people. After 9 miles I was back at the truck. It had taken me a little over an hour and I was wishing there was more to ride. After I downloaded the route onto Goggle Earth I could see plenty of room to expand the trail, the mileage could easily be double what it currently is. But why put in more of what nobody rides. It's a shame. There is so much underutilized state land on that side of the lake, if it were all tied together it could make epic trail system. But I don't know, maybe it's better this way.

West Point

It didn't feel as good as I imagined it would. I got more of a rush getting third place at the Tom Brown race in last year's Florida Series than I did getting a first this past weekend in Georgia.

The trail at West Point (which is just outside of La Grange Ga.) couldn't have been more perfect for me. And I'm not just saying that because I did well in the race, in fact I commented Saturday afternoon after our practice lap how much I enjoyed the ride. It has a hard clay surface with quite a bit of elevation change. There was a brand new section about a mile in length that looked like it still had rake marks on it. No it didn't really flow that well, it was like Red Bug without all the roots. The thing that made me the most relaxed was the fact I didn't need to get off my bike any where during the lap. I know you're surprised that a rider of my caliber needs to push once in a while but it's true.

Truth be told any little bit of scary looking technical stuff sends me to my feet so I was confident and happy after Rupe and I finished our lap on Saturday evening.

Aesthetically it would be hard to find a prettier place for a bike trail. It's situated on the edge of West Point lake, they had just done a control burn so there was no underbrush on the edges of the trail, and it had just enough roll to it to make the climbs a challenge. I took the whole fam up with me since most of the crew had elected to drive up Sunday morning. We got a room at a very expensive Hampton Inn in La Grange (I have a fear of bed bugs from lesser establishments) and after getting cleaned up we found a Long Horn Steak House and proceeded to consume mass quantities of red meat. The big meal combined with a couple of beers meant I didn't watch much of the movie back in the room before I was sound asleep.

Sunday was cloudy at first and a very pleasant 58 when we left the hotel after eating breakfast with all the folks at the Hampton. The Hampton Inns do seem to attract an older (yea than me) clientele that really do like their breakfast bar, they get a little aggressive if you get between them and the bacon. Scary.

The white wave (us slower riders) were scheduled to go off at 11:30 so we watched the more talented Rick, Tim, Danny, and Paige ride in the 9:30 race before we started warming up for our start. This would be Rupe's first race in the Junior 15-19 class and the first time he would line up right behind me, or so he thought. Somebody in our class hollered "let the juniors go first" so Dave took a vote, nobody seemed to mind so he moved them in front of us. I just knew I'd be able to catch him even with a 2 minute lead. Or so I thought.

"15 seconds" my mind goes blank. "Go" and then I spend 5 cranks of the pedals trying to get my other foot clipped in while everyone else gets in front of me. Fortunately it was a quarter mile dirt road before we hit the first single track. I was surprised as I moved to the front that nobody challenged me. I hit the first turn with only 1 other rider close on my wheel. My plan had been to go at almost my maximum pace for the first couple of miles then back off a little in the new tight section. My "plan" didn't take into account my thighs getting a good burn going so at the second road crossing I let the guy behind me go by.

Okay, seconds not so bad I thought, BJS and SteveA said I should be able to win easily but what do they know? I couldn't see anyone behind me as I started to catch the Clydesdale's, then the Juniors, then all of the sudden I was on first place's wheel. How did this happen (he told me later he just went out too hard and popped)? He let me by right before the new section.

Every now and then I could see Rupe through the trees way ahead of me and every time I started to catch a black and white jersey I thought it was him; but I never caught him. On the last big climb from the lake the locals call suicide hill I got a little queasy at the top of the power line. I knew it was only about a mile of tight single track to the finish so even if second place managed to catch me I planned to just ride wide until we hit the paved road to the finish but he never got that close.

So I won. Rupe beat my time by 30 seconds, which is the first time that's ever happened. He finished 6 out of 11, just one place away from a medal. That's the first time I've ever finished first so I don't know why I'm not more pumped about it. Anyhoo, I enjoyed the ride and we're both looking forward to the next round in Winder.