Big Bikes

Freakin' Photo Friday

Met up with three bad dudes called Kevin, GTL, and Will for a guided tour of The Blue Hills Thursday. Will was the guide, he knows the dope loop, the sick trails, he can lead an epic like you wouldn't believe out there. He's one of those very special riders who, while he doesn't hold a USAC license at all, can put a mean hurt on dudes with impressive race resumes...and me. When I first met him last season he was riding a two ton Surly 1 X 1, now he's on one of these things and the guy is un-frickin'-stoppable. In fact he came out to race last Sunday and finished in front of some pretty fast blokes in the elite class.

The above shot there, that I took after I gave the boys some lead time on the descent off Buck Hill. I heard a "Yo!" from Montello as I came crashing blindly down the dense-shrubbery-lined trail. I screached to a halt, having to half wheel him to avoid a collision. There had been a bobble up front causing a pain train delay.


The ascent of Buck Hill is a tough one on the Single-Speed, but according to Greg "The Leg" it's "easy on a geared bike". Riding up a hill on a geared bike...you might as well get a cycling game for your Wii. Coon Hollow is even worse. Last week I was out with Will and I didn't even come close, getting knocked off first on the gravelly mess before the steep corner, then on most of the technical, rocky lunge sections above that. It was a nice walk as I watched Will just about clean it. This time around I ran a 34 X 19 instead of a 34 X 18, that and a more cooperative pair of legs and lungs made all the difference. I missed one move, and all I can think about is revenge! Next Thursday bastard bitch Coon Hollow...next Thursday.


It was a great ride, the day was sunny, hot on the climbs and cool on the descents, I'm still smiling and my legs still hurt. The end.

The photo below, that's my car tool kit, the "B Tool Kit", housed in my Great Grandfather's antique tool box. It and its contents were sunning themselves after a totally full 2.5 gallon water jug became upturned behind the passenger seat of the car. The liquid cascaded through the box on its way to saturating the floor of the car. When I picked up the much too light jug, that awful sinking feeling washing over me - "this should be much, much heavier...oh shitake mushrooms!". After a day in the sun most of the tools were OK, some received Tri-Flo rub downs before being returned to their natural habitat.

Funny thing is, a few weeks back while doing support for Pan Mass Challenge, we were working under a wind blown pop tent in an absolute deluge. By the end I had two inches of standing water in my Pedro's Travel case soaking the "A Tool Kit". Luckily on the second day of Pan Mass, down at Mass Maritime it was dry and sweltering (I'm sure everyone else thought this was "lucky" too), I dumped my kit out on the oven-hot pavement and pulled the foam lining out of the case so it could dry. People thought this was an odd but impressive way of displaying my tools. Some of them stood over it like they were looking at installation in an art museum.

The weekend plan was to race The Root 66 race in Connecticut, but I didn't realize until too late that it was on Saturday not Sunday. I'm booked to do a NEMBA Explorers ride Saturday AM. However a hurricane's coming in and rain seems inevitable, which kind of sucks, it's been hell trying to get these rides going this season with the weather. On the more positive flip-side, if it does indeed rain, the shop will be dead, I won't be leading a ride, and I can go race in awesome conditions for me and The Superfly SS. Oh, and for those of you who might suggest that I go to The EFTA race in Maine, it's just way too far away for a 10AM start.

I guess you'll just have to check in Monday to see what happened.

-t