Fatbike +1

It was another hot one last night. 96 degrees when we finished the ride at 7:20pm. Yowsers. The trail is drier than ever, cracked and rutting out. It will take a long steady downpour of rain to fix this. Corners are getting soft, with a powder like silt building up. It caught me off guard last night and almost nearly took me down on the return trip to the parking lot. Took the turn too fast, fat front tire dug into the mound of loose dirt, and I started to slide out. ChrisP was on my tail and I was expecting to go down and be run over like a monster truck does beat up cars. But I caught it and took the alternate route. Whew. One of those get-your-heart-racing split second ordeals.
 
Coming back from north of Fort Street is getting real rutty. I was watching Cody hop in and out of the ruts while trying to control the steering. Either you ride in the middle or you try to ride a on the side. But when you ride the side you hit the lip and your bike drifts to the other lip. Dilemna. Unless you have a fatbike! Greg was following me and we both noticed that the fat tire is just wide enough to not fall into the rut (at least for now). Chris noticed the same. Awesome! I guess if the rut gets wider, I might just have to air down a little bit and float on top like we do with the snow riding. Just have to worry about pinging the rim in other areas of the trail.

Last weeks MNR!

Late! Busy! Exhausted! And now broke. That's how my week has been going. Finally went out and bought furniture today now that I am completely out of the apt and it is clean. I've been sitting and eating off of patio furniture that resides in my living room for the past two weeks. Hey, it beats sitting on the stairs which I've been doing for the first two weeks!

Living the good life...I was tempted to put the umbrella to be funny. 

People at work say that I've been losing weight. I'm still lifting hard, but I've noticed that clothes seem looser and even my glasses keep sliding off. Seriously guys, move from a 3rd floor apt in the middle of a heat wave and you'll melt away those lbs. I've been moving three boxes each trip, one box at a time, avg weight probably 35 - 45 lbs. And I usually move a load after work and then after the gym around midnight. So that makes 12 flights of stairs each day, with heavy boxes on the down trip.
Weightloss miracle!!!

Anyway, back to last week's MNR. It was hot. Real hot. Keep moving and you'll stay cool. Kind of. Nine of us silly riders were out there riding, enjoying the heat. Some riders were falling. Not sure if it was the heat clouding their judgment or just them simply falling. Not going to name names. Trail damage happens when it rains like crazy and people rut out the trail. Well now it is reversed. The trail is so dry that it's actually breaking up the soil in the middle and causing ruts from it being so dry. Never thought I'd see that. Anyway, ride on and drink plenty of H2O!

Premium Rush

Have you guys seen the trailer for this? I saw the commercial on TV. I don't even care if the movie is poor. It has biking in it! Who wants to see this when it comes out?

Just a friendly reminder

During the MNR, a sheriff drove up to the parking area and turned around. One of the riders said that it was the second time that day that he had seen them drive through. We asked why. I guess there were recent break-ins at the Tranquility parking lots. This included the softball field parking lots while people were actually playing softball. Keep your valuables locked up, bring it with you or leave it at home. Simple as that!

Hey, I'm back!

Seriously, it is 96 degrees inside my joint. I have some wet spots at the edges of the rooms from the rug doctor so I'm trying to air out the house. That and three very noisy fans on high and its made for an interesting day and night.

1914 V-Twin Harley

My trip to MI was great. The 9 hour drive sucks, but the pool time, family time, momma's cooking, and museums that I got to see made up for it. We went to the Gilmore Car Museum about 20 minutes outside of Kalamazoo. Very cool place. And now I understand what they mean when a car is in museum quality. You've been to a car show, well these blow them away. Over 300 cars and 90% are drivable. Also went to the Fred Meiers Gardens. Amazing sculptures and gardens, except it was raining all day. Yeah, first day of rain they've had in weeks like us, and its the day that we go to an outdoor museum (with no umbrella)! I'll post up lots of pics eventually of everything.

"Mad Momma"

House stuff is never ending. Apartment stuff is never ending. Hopefully life will have some factor of normalcy in a couple of weeks. Hope to see you guys on the MNR. I'm really interested/scared to find out what happened to Tranquility.

Mmm...Bacon

The piggy kind. I ventured out last Sunday with Dale, Chris, Paul, and Brian for my first ever bacon ride at Platte River State Park. I had heard about this legendary Sunday morning ride, but was either too lazy to get up for it or was usually partying too late the night before. Well alright...I'll go. Twist my arm.

How do we fit two 29ers and two fatties into one vehicle? Million dollar question right there.

Tada!

We were kickin up some dust!

With living between two places, it is really hard to figure out what is where. Bike clothes in this box, sunglasses in another box. Gloves and helmet already in car. Should be good to go. Get going...oh. Contact lenses are at the apartment. Being a Lasik consultant, you would think that I know better!

End up riding in my fat rimmed glasses because I didn't have time to hit up the apartment. Didn't really matter anyway. I was drenched in sweat throughout the ride and at least my big chunky glasses provided me with some eye protection.

Brian cracks me up. I'm not sure if he is purposely trying to look funny or if that's just how he is in photographs?

The riding was good and I only fell once. I overcorrected after sort of going up a tree. Next thing I know, I was standing like a tripod in a ditch. Straddling the top tube with both feet on the ground and my front tire down but my back tire up in the air. Which way do I fall? Falling forward on your face is never good. How about backwards? Okay. No harm done, except that it kinda hurts your pride and confidence because I started riding alot more conservatively and aware after that.

It was only my second time to Platte. Last time was about three years ago with Todd and Aaron. Its hard to ride fast when you don't really know where you are going. I just kept hearing about this part that someone in our group keeps falling at, but I had no clue where it was. And finally, he fell.

Bacon socks, bacon breakfast, bacon ride!

After the ride was the well deserved breakfast at the lodge. One plate with no seconds is what they should give you, but instead its whatever and how much ever you can eat. Sounds dangerous, especially with bacon involved. And this boy doesn't get just one strip of bacon! Cholesterol city!

This was just plate #1 for me!

Idiot!

On Monday, there was a "technician" that came from Millard Lumbar to install two new sliding patio doors for me that were under warranty. The previous owner of the house flipped the two hundred some dollar bill for the install. My realtor was kind enough to let the guy in while I was at work.

Realtor texts me, says the guy is finished and the door locking mechanism is tricky. Call her when I get home  for instruction is what she said. I get home. The doors lock, but only if you push down the latch and pull the door back a little bit. Okay. But if you push the door a little bit more into the closed position, the latch automatically disengages. WTF? But the technician reassured her thats how it is and how all of the other warrantied doors are installed.

So later that night, I tried locking my sliding door. I step outside on the deck and push the door a little bit. It unlocks itself! No way it can be like that. It was late, so I stuck my pair of loppers in the door rail so that the door won't open. Good enough for now. I went to Menards today to look for a new door lock. Lady asked me if they installed it correctly. Heck if I know, I assumed that a qualified technician would know what they were doing.

Buy the new lock, get home and take apart the one on the new door. Turns out that the latch was hitting the door handle, preventing it from staying in position. It would simply bounce back up and unlock itself. That was weird. Try different positions of the door handle. Still not working.

The stupid fool put the lock upside down! Once turned upside down, the latch was able to fully make its motion and keep the lock in the correct position. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? I texted my realtor, she laughed. The tech said that all the doors he was installing were like that. Meaning that there are how many other households with a sliding door that unlocks itself all because of technician error. Jeez!!!

Just one of the bundles of wires in my basement

You say you like to bike AND camp???

Was looking online for a hammock. Yes, I want to buy a hammock. We had one in this screened in patio back in Waverly. You lay down, you fall asleep immediately. While looking, I came across this contraption. Not cheap...but I'm glad that people are using their heads and thinking of new products and ideas. Haul around a folding camper with your bike!

Picture from the Kamp-Rite website. Pretty interesting!

http://store.kamprite.com/catalog/Bicycle-Trailers-orderby_0-p-1-c-250.html

I'm behind!

Been a busy week of moving. I've been moving over what I can with the Honda and friends have been helping me with the bigger stuff. Thanks to those that helped!

Last Monday's ride was a hot one. At least on the books it was hot out. Weird how once you get moving out there on the trail it isn't too bad. Well after a weekend of moving two friends to CB and moving my own boxes from the third floor, I decided I that some biking would do me some good. My legs were good. I stopped as usual to take pics. Before hitting up the south side, I decided to catch up with some friends that I haven't seen in years over at the softball fields. Its good to catch up sometimes in our busy lives.

Dave P had mentioned that after ride was at Chris'. Ahh...but I didn't have my phone on me and knew that Chris lived somewhere over there (imagine me pointing my finger in a general direction). Cruised on by Paul's, no luck. Went home and packed more. Its been a weird week. Food and clothes have been over at the apartment all week, bed at the new place. Slowly coming to a remedy on this!

Platte State Park bright and early on Sunday. Gonna try to make it!

Sooo cool!

If I supply the zero gravity, will you get the water balloons? Those things are boogers to tie!

I feel like I could sell electronics out of my basement. Boxes and boxes galore!

Can you say 1X11

Man, just when you got the latest and greatest drivetrain on your bike, they throw you something new. No need for a big chainring? That's fine, run a 2X or a 1X to save the weight. Well now, SRAM has come out with the XX1. It's their new 1 X 11 due out in October. Useful or just another gimmick to get you to buy the latest and greatest?
 
http://www.singletracks.com/blog/mtb-gear/srams-xx1-1x11-drivetrain-reveal/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=12_07_04&utm_content=SRAM's%20XX1:%201x11%20Drivetrain%20Reveal

Fat bike photo contest

Fat bike contest. Just need to send your best photo with a fat bike in the pic. You can win from 45NRTH and Fat-bike.com

http://fat-bike.com/2012/07/summer-photo-contest-sponsored-by-45nrth/

Slowly but surely

I hate moving! Two nights of moving in until 2am and I'm a tired boy. Funny thing is that last night was mostly moving a friend to CB and his roommate is storing stuff in my garage. I moved some essentials over to my new place, a bed and a grill. Got to think like a man sometimes! Tonight was packing up electronics and fitting what I could in my car. Freaking tall speakers are heavy!  Finally remembered to bring over some beer. Ice cold Fat Tire hit the spot at 2am!

Let me know if any of your guys plan to hit up Tranquility tomorrow. It's been a week since I've ridden trails.