Two Wheel Blogs

Boy oh boy, the trails over at The Wood (aka Castlewood) are just about as good as they've ever been. Smoking fast to be exact and combined with the cool weather they have made for some uber-fun outings the past week. Friday, I rolled with Matt Grothoff and we rock and rolled the trails until a brief, but heavy rain drove us back to our cars, but not before we tackled the decent on Cardiac Hill. Man, it's been 15 years since I laid a tread on that stretch and the reasons why were brought back vividly. It's steep, it's very technical, and it's boulder strewn.

Sunday, I got out with an old buddy and his friend for a more casual paced ride, but I used the opportunity to work on my handling, body positioning, and line selection. It was a nice change of pace and left me after 2 hours of riding thinking I could have ridden all day.

Last night, I got out with a couple of my teammates, Kent and Bill, and we did several climbs and hard tempo sessions. Kent is super fit right now and pushing a monster gear on his single speed (something in the 36/20 range on a 29er) against my 34/20. I had a hard time staying on his wheel and in many cases just simply couldn't. Nevertheless, we had an unbelievable ride that left all of us feeling like we shouldn't quit.

I did all three rides on the single speed and it continues to be my go to bike. I think I'm going to drop the gearing down to 34/19 for the rest of the summer, as I've been climbing most everything with relative ease. Albeit towards the last few climbs last night, my legs were starting to feel the lag from 3 days of riding plus a hard weights workout late last week.

Get on your (mtb) bikes and ride!!!