Good Rides & Good Eats

Two weeks now of close to proper ride time and intensity has left my legs fatigued and my ride desires satiated. Thursday night saw rides with my Bath buds in the Schmid Preserve followed by mass quantities of homemade guacamole, brats and beer around the fire pit.

KillBill and Channing digging in.

yum-o

Saturday saw me prepping my father and brothers' bikes for their maiden voyage on clippless pedals. Because of my father's earlier arrival, he had a bit more "get to know you" time on the pedals. Ride one consisted of riding half way down the driveway, turning around, getting back to where we were and then promptly executing a perfect slow-motion crash/dismount. Beautiful. Ride two included a short jaunt on an old road. It's soft and muddy in spots but plenty wide enough to allow for the forethought required for a newbie clipless rider to prepare for a stop. Unless of course he hits a slippery parallel ridge and gets thrown to the ground so fast he doesn't even have time to think. My only regret there was that he narrowly missed landing in a swamp. Landing in swamps is much funnier than landing on the side of a road.

Ride three was when my brother finally showed up. He got zero practice time before hitting the trail but he has more bravado than brains so he did quite well until his first fall, a double log hop that is spread just wide enough apart that you need to lift your front wheel to get over the second log just as your rear wheel is coming off the first. A very tricky maneuver if you're used to your bike. Pure hilarity if you're not. Darren spent a couple of minutes on the ground afraid to get up because he was surrounded by prickers. Good stuff.

I have more to gab about but forgot the camera with the pics so the rest will come tomorrow.