Palm Springs touring

I just sort of thought that tour of ps would be lames ville, but I hadn't even analyzed WHY. Turns out all the reasonsi thought itd be dumb were all the reasons it'd be cool.

I was talked into going by about 9 different people who just assumed I was going, asking if I was going. The final conjecture came from new friend but familiar face John. He made it sound the runners off all those that asked, so I said sure, I'd go with him. We didn't even get down there til like 9 and we only did about 60 miles of it which I assume was the metric loop. What a great ride. It was cool to see all the people out on differing rigs of all shapes and sizes just enjoying the pristine weather and far better than average view. We had a blast. The highlights include me passing a dude who was wearing a Belgian nationals champion jersey and I huffed "hup, hup!" at him to which he replied "Hup! Hup!", also we saw dudes on razor scooters with a 700c wheel on the front (perhaps it was 650c), and we got called motherfuckers in spanish by dudes who we pulled along like a freight train engine and never once put their face into the wind. Good times. It was super encouraging and made us feel super fast to be passing so many folks. In the end that was our downfall as we were both digging our tongues out of our spokes. I actually ended up with a little bit of a suntan! Good times for sure. Already planning on doing some more rides like that, cuz it was a blast.

I...I...I just get so pumped....

http://rocklobstershop.blogspot.com/2011/02/unofficial-25th-anniversary-mtb-frame.html

Click on the link if you're a bike person and the sit down and get comfy for some bike ranting....


Ok, first things first, if you said the words, "I wonder how much it weighs...?". Or "won't that be a little heavy" or a similar phrase, please raise your right hand. Now, ball that hand up as tight as you can and punch yourself in the face. And I mean hard. Like you are collecting rent for some mafia don.

Point #1: Who cares?
Point #2: if you are a racer and the difference between winning and losing a race is 2 or so lbs, maybe do an extra interval during your no doubt grueling training regiment, and voila, difference nullified. Or you can remove a half a pound from your wheel set up and voila, difference MORE than nullified. Or you can make a right turn right off of a cliff, and voila, difference nullified.
Point #3: picture two people at the bottom of a the fire road at crafton. Lets say these 2 people are me and the fire marshal of the funless firehouse, Matt Freeman. It's a balls out race to the top. Matt's gonna win right? For sure, because after all, the dude hates fun. Freeman and I ride fairly similar geometry bike, so just for yucks, let's switch bikes and do it again. Who do you think is gonna win. If you think it's me, you're taking crazy pills. it's not the bike. Like, ever. And if it is, it's a loss i can live with knowing I came that close to winning on a WAY cooler bike.
Point #4: Next year when you have a hairline crack in your bb, or your head tube, or you have to have the weight savings of a press in bb x43+, you're getting a new frame. Then, when that one cracks or some other lame component is offered you have to have, lather rinse repeat. See a pattern developing? While you're experiencing the wrath of the math, I'm on the same frame. Classic staying power is priceless.
Point #5: Made in America, by a dude who has literally been building frames as long as I've been breathing.
Point #6: At the end of the day, we're talking about a bike ride. I highly doubt I need to be enforced upon the latest and greatest in aerospace technology on A FRICKIN BICYCLE!!

Do yourself a favor, consciously try and have a good helping of fun next time you ride a bike. Especially if you can't recall the last ride that was in fact fun.

Pain

... Is normally temporary, but my leg hurts worse than when I fell over yesterday. Except when I ride a bike, which is weird. I hope it's not broken.

Project Bike Donkey goes offroad.

Today i took the remedy up to crafton. I don't have any sweet GPS content, cuz i left my garmin at home. Let me just say this. Lugging a 30lb 6" travel bike uphill is SO much harder and less fun than a hardtail.

Coming Downhill however was a different story. That was a blast.

At any rate, can't help but think back to stories i've heard about tinker training with a backpack full of rocks, so i have to think that doing all the fire road and the little trail up to Zanja Peak on that bike will fit into my climbing scheme nicely. Tomorrow will be on the road though, training properly.

Huckin'

I tried full suspension for a little while. It was fun, i just couldn't wrap my head around it for race or fast pace riding. Ditched it. Now, i think fast paced riding has its pace, and i got the bike for it, to the t. But, now i want to have a little more fun. Have a little more leisure time on the bike. i want to jump a bike off a house. What to do, what to do....? I know, i'll get ahold of my favorite surrogate uncle Greg, see what he can set me up with....




BO OO OO M !!

Imma go jump my bike off of.... the world. It's funny, we have full blown 8" travel DH bikes at the shop, and i've ridden ones i work on around to make sure they aren't gonna explode on the patron's next ride, and honestly, going from riding a bike with not quite 4" of front suspension only to this bike. It might as well be 90" of travel man. It's SO rad. Hopefully i live to make another post.

Project Bike Donkey II

So today i just decided to go climb. I had about 2 hours to ride, so i figured i'd just go up hwy 38 til i saw 1:30 on the clock, then i'd come back. I timed it a little sort, as it turns out it took me 2:15 or so. Not so bad for somebody that sucks at climbing. I got the link below in case you give a crap.



Prolly go out with the CVV dudes tomorrow. Their ride tends to be pretty fun/not a total popestomper. Then i'll be digging a sweet ass pump track for Ryder, the the Ayatollah of Agony-a's son. How Ryder talked him into such a fun project is beyond me. Must have been trish's idea.

It's only saturday evening and i have MANY sweet movies viewed. Here's the list so far:

Blow-out: Awesome. Can see why this is a Tarantino fave. How did Travolta go from Saturday Night Fever to Look Who's Talking to Pulp Fiction to Wild Hogs?

Deathrace 2000: I may or may not be getting a tattoo of the flag from the movie. Man, if the year 2000 would have turned out like Corman said, it would RULE!

Cobra: My dad wouldn't let me watch it as a kid. I've wanted to ever since. Prettyyyyy bad.

The Gauntlet: Clint Eastwood seldom disappoints. Especially as a shady cop. The shootout scene at the end.....SUPERB.

I think we're about to watch raising arizona in french, and i'm damn sure watching Machete before the weekend is over. Wife got it for me cuz she rules/we aren't raising kids to watch steel magnolias.

Project Bike Donkey -or- base mileage can be fun

So i went out and did my climbing intervals on thursday for Project Bike Donkey. I'm either doing it really right, or really wrong. I started by doing all the way up sunnyside from cypress, then i did arroyo (that hill is a real rabbi slapper if you've never tried it), then i did serpentine, then a little interval after you get in the clear after alessandro, then the latter half of the walled section on sunset. I finished up, the whole endeavor took a shade over an hour on account of my easy spin in non-interval sections. This all took place shortly after Jason "wildbeard" Reynolds bought ordered pizza for the shop. So when i got back, there was free pizza waiting for me. Now, i realize that pizza ia not the keystone to a healthy diet, but i didn't know it would put it's thumb 4 inches in my ear like this. For the rest of the day i felt like my sould weighed an extra 8 pounds and was trying to work its way out of my skin like this:



Everybody told me what warmed over whipped crap i looked like for the rest of the day. I felt it.

Next day i just did a little easy spinning.

Today, i went to AJ's house, by bike. Prolly just a smidge over 70 miles as i left the computer off accidentally for some of it, but i did it in a little under 4 hours. Not bad. i did it on halloween and it took me 5 but i had a backpack, and there was a lot of lag waiting for flats. It's a good little ride! If Aj were friends with any of my bike friends, i would invite some of them because the whole thing is pretty fun. Its like a 4 hour ride with a single climbing interval that is pretty strenuous going over anaheim hills on this deaconpuncher of a street called serrano. This time serrano really didn't seem so bad, so i guess the intervals are working. I'm also in a little better shape than i was at halloween and i didn't have a backpack. here's a the ride info in case you give a rats ass.