Tour de Lincoln

Due to rain the last couple days, riding has been confined to the city limits. Not the best or most interesting riding, but there are lots of new trails that I haven't seen and others that I haven't ridden for a long time, so it wasn't all bad.

Saturday dawned early with the Havelock Charity run (no I didn't run)...


Afterward Ryan and I met up with no real plan except to explore the city trails and get some miles in. MapMyRide uses way out of date Lincoln maps, so my mileage estimate is rather rough, but I figured 32 miles round trip. Most exciting moment involved a mud induced slide of both wheels through a under-street tunnel....still learning how to ride that Lemond.

Where now? A decision point at Holmes Lake.

Is this Colorado, or southeast Lincoln?

Photo op...

Today, I headed back out, on the El Mariachi this time. Compared to the cross bike, I felt like a monster truck on the mtb. Stable, comfy, and slow... Hoping that the rain would hold off I headed toward Pioneer's Park. Ended up with 30 miles and an even 100 for the weekend. Next goal is consecutive 50 mile days. 55 days till the Laramie Enduro...

A Great Weekend

My uncles Scott and Junior were in from Pennsylvania along with a bunch of other family to celebrate my sister's wedding last weekend. One of the things I was really looking forward to was riding on my home trails with them. We have ridden together several times in PA before, but this would be the first time in Nebraska.

Friday, we awoke to the threat of rain and severe weather. I was quickly goaded into loading up the gear; "If it isn't raining, we're riding" was the cry. Due to uncertainty about the weather, we decided to head out to Branched Oak as it is considerably closer to home than Platte River State Park. The 12 hour race at Branched Oak was held that weekend, so we found some newly added trail and some new detours at Area 7. After two laps of the race course (minus the pasture section at the end of the lap), we decided to head over to Area 1 for a lap. In both locations, the trail was perfectly tacky and the sandy corners were nicely packed. On the negative side, it appears that the log crossings at Area 1 have been taken out.

After church on Sunday, we hit up Platte River State Park. I had been talking up these trails as the best that eastern Nebraska had to offer, so I was excited to show it off. We parked near the horse stables, and shot a quick picture using the self-timer.

As we were about to head into the trails, we noticed a "No Bikes 9Am-4PM" sign. This was a restriction that I had thought didn't start until Memorial Day, and yet, here the sign said differently. A Ranger was nearby and he explained that the horses needed to get onto the trails before the official opening to get reacclimated with being ridden on trails. After explaining the circumstances (uncles from out of town, etc) and giving assurances that we would yield to any horses, the Ranger let us ride. Thanks Greg (I think that was his name)! Two laps later and we were ready to call it a day. The trail was in perfect condition and because this wasn't a race situation, I actually had opportunity to enjoy what I was riding. I haven't posted about it for awhile, but the more I ride my El Mariachi, the happier I am with it. My uncles both remarked throughout the weekend that my bike seemed to be the perfect bike for our terrain. I completely agree!

Overall it was a great weekend for bike riding. In fact, it was the most fun I have had on a bike for quite a while. Races are cool, but the real fun of mountain biking comes when you are enjoying a good trail with great people, something we did a lot of this weekend.

So in that spirit, who wants to go for a ride this extended weekend? Robb and I are heading up to Branched Oak on Saturday morning....any other takers? Anyone want to head to Platte or Lewis and Clark on Sunday or Monday?

Back in the Saddle

This weekend marked the first time I had been out on a ride of longer than 2 hours since Laramie. At some point earlier this year, I had gotten the crazy idea that I wanted to ride my bike out to my in-laws house near Henderson, about 72 miles one way. I had even convinced another crazy soul to do the same. A conflict stopped the other from partaking in this particular ride, but I decided to head out anyway.

The morning started foggy, damp and cold. I left the house at around 7:30 and headed into the wetness with enough food and water to get me to my destination. Once out of Lincoln, I really enjoyed the quiet, just me and my music. And some animals, but they didn't respond when I initiated conversation.

Did I mention that I hadn't done a long ride for three months? About 30 miles in, I thought sure that both quads would lock up and I would be laying next to my bicycle in the middle of O Street writhing in pain. That didn't happen, but it definitely slowed me down and the next 26 miles weren't much fun. I did lay down next to my bicycle in the middle of O Street a couple times; but luckily I was just stretching.

For those paying attention 30+26 does not equal 72. I called in the reinforcements at York. I'd had enough fun for one day.


By the way, did you know that O Street is the longest main street in the US at 59 miles long? I saw the western terminus about 9 miles west of York. Trivia!!!

The El Mariachi needs some TLC. The damp air combined with the dirt from the roads turned my drivetrain into a squeaky mess. Also, ever since the Laramie race, my rear disk brake has been out of adjustment due to pad wear. Time to take her in to the World Headquarters for a tune.

Hard Lessons Learned

Headed out again today for a gravel ride east of Lincoln. The idea was to ride hard for 2 hours. The wind was really blowing today making any riding in the south or eastern directions pretty difficult. North and west were obviously wind-aided, but there was still a very significant cross wind when riding west.

On my way back toward Lincoln I made a critical error, that coupled with another error made for a difficult and painful ride home. Let me break it down for you. Over the past few weeks I have gotten very comfortable on my new El Mariachi. The stability that the 29 inch wheel format delivers has proven to be very confidence building, allowing me to ride hands free easily to adjust clothing, drink, eat, stretch, etc. As I was riding west on Fletcher Ave., near 148th street, I pulled my hands off the handlebars to stretch out a little bit.

Here I will pause to detail my second error. Riding in the city and on gravel roads this spring had made me forget the importance of wearing gloves while cycling. In the summer I like to wear them because my hands tend to sweat alot and they give me better control of the bicycle. This had not been an issue yet this year, and while I still wore them on all my trail rides, I had taken to just bringing them along in a jersey pocket for my gravel rides.

Back to the narrative; I pulled my hands off the handlebars to stretch, and within 5 seconds or so was hit with a gust of wind across my front tire. I overcompensated by shifting my weight into the wind and immediately hit the road at close to 15 mph. Felt some pain in my arm and stood up to take stock of the situation. First of all, the bike escaped without major damage, although I messed up the grip that dug into the road and seemed to have either tweaked the front wheel or bent my disc rotor. I guess I'll be taking it back to MWC earlier than anticipated. As for me, my palms are both pretty tore up (no embedded gravel, thankfully), I'm missing a pretty big chunk of skin out of my left forearm (quite a bit of blood), and accumulated some other bumps and bruises (strawberries on thigh and ribcage, sore knee).

As my bike was still rideable and I didn't seem to be bleeding to death, I decided to ride the final 7 miles home instead of calling the wife. I think I scared several people walking their dogs on the Dietrich Trail. At home, Laura played nurse and applied hydrogen peroxide, iodine, and any other torturous chemicals we could find to ensure that I wouldn't get an infection. Anyway it looks like I will be taking some involuntary time off the bike, for my sake and so I can get it checked out at the shop.

Notes to self
Do not under any circumstances remove your hands from handlebars when there is a 30 mph cross wind
Wear your safety gear.

Christmas in March

Flew back from Los Angeles on Friday and had a laid-back, relaxing weekend. On Saturday I was able to make a trip through Wilderness Park, my first real dirt of the year. It was great, all my worries and concerns about the El Mariachi were gone once I finally got it out in its element. I felt fast, the big meat up front (run at 28 psi or so) kept my hands and wrists feeling great, and the new rear tire felt noticeably more eager to accelerate. Assuming the race this Saturday doesn't get rained out, I am confident that the only thing that will keep me from being successful is my lack of preparation. I didn't want to bring my pack on the ride, so I only got a post-ride picture.


Also exciting was a visit from the T6 fairy. Thanks to Brent and Ryan for the awesome gear. The jersey and t shirt are both super soft and fit perfectly, and of course the graphics are superb. The other schwag is super cool too. I look forward to proudly wearing the label this season as part of Team Twin Six.

For those of you interested in pictures and narrative about my trip to California, I will be posting about that in the coming days. Wait...who am I kidding, not too many people are likely to be interested. Thats cool, I primarily write about food and travel for myself, so I don't forget the meals and experiences that make these work related trips palatable (pun intended).

New Treads

This past weekend I picked up a new tire and tube from the Wrench. I really like the WTB Weirwolf 2.55s that came stock, however with race season approaching, I was looking for less rolling resistance and rotating mass for my rear wheel. The Weirwolf is one of the fattest, highest volume 29er tires available, but is a bit of overkill for the relatively smooth singletrack we ride around here. Nate and Eric suggested the WTB Nanoraptor 2.1, their tire of choice for our local terrain. I did decide to keep the big meat on the front wheel as a bit of suspension while I am adjusting to riding a rigid fork.

Nano on left; Weirwolf on right

I have been lucky enough to have never flatted during a ride, and thus have never actually had the pleasure of changing a tire. Furthermore, I have never removed and reinstalled a rear wheel. I was able to pry the old tire from the rim with no problem, but I had a bit of trouble getting the new tire's bead to seat in the rim. I did some reading on the web and got that fixed pretty quickly. The real problems arose when I was attempting to reinstall the rear wheel. Trying to finagle the derailleur, align the rotor with the brake, and seat the wheel in the dropout made me wish I had another set of hands.

My impromptu work stand.

I finally managed to get it done (with help from the wife) with only minor injuries to my paint due to the rotor being wedged someplace it didn't belong. You can see the gouge I made on the inside of my chainstay in the picture above. Overall, it was a good experience, but something I need to practice if I am going to ever be able to do this during a race. Probably not going to have an extra set of hands available when I am out in the Wyoming wilderness. Any tips for future attempts?

Ready to roll. Looks pretty fast to me.

For those of you who don't habla espanol...

This is my El Mariachi. Nate hooked me up with this bike last November and unfortunately I haven't had much of a chance to ride it yet due to the brutal winter we are just getting over. What I can tell, is that once I get used to the idiosyncrasies of this particular rigid, steel, 29er (all new things for me) it will be a pretty fast machine with me on it. My goal is to train enough to be worthy of its sweet high end steel ride.


It's a force of nature.

A Little History

The past couple years I have really enjoyed riding my bike as a pastime, both solo and with friends. Being a somewhat competitive person, this segued naturally into duathlons and adventure races. My buddy Sam, and I have done several races together, but have always struggled to find the consistent third teammate required for most of the local races. This is cause for great frustration.

Last year I really started to feel the urge to do some XC races, but scheduling conflicts and insecurity about the quality of my 10 year-old $500 hardtail held me back. Sam and I did team-up for a duo attempt at a local 12 hour race, which was a great and humbling learning experience.

This year I have a new steed, a new focus, and a desire to take this cycling thing to a new level.