Far East

Greetings from Penang, Malaysia. Yep, it's hot & humid here. The summer vacation is in full swing. Sitting here in front of a Starbucks (Much like McDonalds, some things are a constant almost world-wide....), since my cheap-ass budget hotel wants US$10 a day for Wi-fi access. Some things have NOT become a world wide constant. I am working dillegently on my previously noted training plan of a 4 week killer hard block of LT intervals, followed by 3 weeks of sitting on my ass, eating a lot and ingesting beer. so far, I am fully on track with the second part of that plan.

A bit of bike-related notes from the Far east here. 10+ years ago, while doing a lot of "factory-sitting" here in Penang, A couple of us sent over mountain bikes and rode all over the place. At the time, we only saw a VERY small handfull of locals riding for recreation. As late as 5 years ago, did not see hardly any "recreational" riders here. This trip, I am seeing a LOT of riders, Bike racks on the roof of cars (unheard of 5 years ago...) and some serious, high dollar hardware under a lot of lycra-clad asians. Even saw a fully loaded Yeti 303 Downhill rig on the roof of a car here. I guess the riding bug is spreading across the pacific now.

We came here via Vietnam, a short visit. a crazy, hectic place. There I did NOT see high $$ bikes, but a lot used for transportation & work. Mostly, you saw people rocking the normal, rocking Vietnamese cycling "kit"
But then one morning I saw this guy
I guess no matter WHERE you are living, the appeal or riding a bike can get you out and going. It's cool to see the passion showing up all around the world.

Summer

Well, I have not managed to post up much here lately. Turns out life can get in the way of many a good blog post ending up becoming actually PUBLISHED on a blog.

Just plain a lot going on. Seems like the employer actually wants some of my attention span (Who the hell do they think they are?) Geez, it's like they pay me or something. We've had a couple of projects around the homestead here that have drained my energy and motivation, AND The wife and I are headed out for a little family visit. Now, when your wife is from Malaysia, that becomes a bit different than hopping in the car and heading down to Denver. We'll be in Asia for a couple of weeks, so I am not thinking my posting will get any more frequent.

The plan is to try my best to eat and drink a lot, exercise little, and see how my fitness does. Have not found the "4 week hard training block then 3 weeks of hanging out eating" training plan documented anywhere, so I'll take one for the team & see how that works. Hope to get a little news in from over there if I can. I'll try my best and suffer the indignity of being in the tropics. (Yep, I'll be on THAT beach...)

I hope all of you "beer-drinking-dads" have your own issues to keep you off the bike while I'm gone. Don't want anyone else "stealth" training on me now, Hear?

Crits

See a LOT of comments over on 303Cycling about the City Park Criterium. Seems to be a lot of angst in the road racing world about turnout, growth, pulling lapped riders and that sort of thing. The comments about getting dropped, getting lapped, and the harshness of racing road bikes in general got me thinking about why I have no interest in road racing, and why the road side participation numbers are stagnant at best, and may even be dropping.

When I started racing, I had a solid year plus of getting dropped and lapped in the Cat4 races. For SOME reason, I stuck with it, got faster, and finally started to be able to stay in a crit or flat road race, and even RACE a bit here and there. It was a long, tough and very demoralizing road to travel. With a shift to "older" participants, and the reasonably high cost of racing a bike, bike racing is turning more into a "rich old guy" hobby, rather than the feeder system for the Olympics and Pro ranks that it might have once been, or maybe IS in Europe. With it competing with many activities, I can see less and less people being interested in the struggle to "fit in" and be able to even finish a road race in the pack. Lots of other things out there to spend your leisure time & money on that do not slap you ego around quite so hard.

There is a distinct and relatively high "Entry Fee" of skill. Speed and fitness needed to race on the road. Fall short of that, get dropped, and you are now in the "You Suck" category in a hurry. Go home. Leave NOW! it screams. Not a lot of fun, it hurts your ego, and no one wants to be there. Maybe that's why Cyclocross is growing SO much faster than road racing. While you may not be at the true pointy end of a race, you never fell "dropped" and left for dead. No one expects to be pulled (at least in the local races...) and have that lingering "you don't belong" feeling confirmed in Cross.

So, do the new Road Racers now have too high of expectations? Is there a need for an even slower "starter" group (Anyone remember Cat 5??)? Do they need to HTFU and race more, no matter how hard it is? Is pulling HALF a crit field a good thing to do? Is road racing on yet another cycle of decline? Is the ease of posting on the internet just make it too easy to whine? I don't know.

I DO know that even after all the years I did put in to racing on the road (Badly... for sure...), I have ZERO interest in getting back in there to race on a road bike. Riding the road for "training" is hard enough to motivate for. Frankly, it is just plain boring, at least for me. Even racing, while "tactical", no longer has any excitement for me. Guess I need the added challenge of having to drive your bike, corner well, and ALSO race, rather than just see who can mindlessly churn out the most watts for an extended period of time. Course, that just may be because I happen to SUCK at churning out a lot of watts for an extended period of time. Oh, and I HATE hitting pavement at speed, especially if it's not my fault. WAY too much chance of that in road racing. At least when I crash in Cross or on the MTB, it's usually my fault.

Hats off to the roadies out there. Go get 'em. For me? Cross season is "just around the bend".

Dinosaurs!

Bikes & Dinosaurs? Really?

Well, only connected in a very distant way. The wife & I did a quick overnight over the Memorial Day weekend. Wanted something that would not be too crowded, was not TOO long of a drive, and "different". So we ended up heading to the "Largest Dinosaur Track-site in North America". Located in Colorado, just south of the scenic, thriving tourist trap of La junta.

La- What?? you say?? Seriously, there is SOMETHING to see on the South East plains of Colorado. Maybe not the end all attraction of the world, but something lurks out there in the grasslands.

Picketwire Canyon is a strange little canyon, dropped below the TABLETOP flatness that is eastern Colorado. Below the flat nothingness is a relative oasis of Pinyon trees in the canyon of the Purgatoire River. Deep history of Ancient "Picketwire People" along with very early Spanish influence, and it being a shortcut on the Santa Fe trail leaves a lot of weird history in the mix with the dino tracks.

The Canyon has limited motorized access, so hiking, horses and bikes are the only ways in. With no horses, and not wanting to hike an 11 mile round trip, we elected to use the bikes. A STEEP, loose drop down into the canyon, then a nice, smooth double track spin past some old cabins, pictographs and of course, like everywhere in Southern Colorado, the remains of an old spanish church.

The Dino tracks were pretty cool. Unlike most of the tracks I've seen (mostly in Utah.…). These were not isolated prints, but tracks extending for almost hundreds of feet, wandering about in singles & pairs. Big Brontosaurus tracks, too, not little things.

While this was really not the vacation of a lifetime, it turned into a cool little getaway. OK, it was not really THAT scenic, and driving out there is only interesting in that "good god, there is NOTHING out here" kind of way, but it was indeed "different". Just one more example of the MANY kinds of things we have here in Colorado to experience.

It's summer.

Get out there.

Behind the Gates

One of the many reasons to love this time of year is that the gates are still closed. Some of the best riding in the "lesser-known" areas of the front range is located behind some Forest Service gates on various 4 wheel-drive roads. Our friends in the U.S. Forest Service usually don't open these gates till Memorial Day. For a few weeks, the areas behind those gates are both Snow and Redneck-free, making for a great time to wander areas that otherwise start feeling more like Kabul than the Colorado mountains, given the internal combustion & firepower usually on display.

Today, I was unable to dredge up any accomplices, so went and did a solo ride, getting off the beaten path, and behind those gates. Seems like the monsoon rains of last week were more like monsoon snows at anything over about 7500 feet, as I ran into more snow and wet than I expected after 2 warm & windy days. Ended up cutting my ride a bit short to not ride in the snow & mud, but was a great day out.

Course, the best part was being here at all, since the Rapture & Judgement Day was supposed to be yesterday. While we spent what was to be our last evening before the end of the world at a Roller Derby Bout, it seems that MAYBE, Just MAYBE the whole thing was bullshit, and the guy spouting it was just a quack (or a scheister... hard to tell the difference sometimes....). Turns out Mr. Camping was originally from the Bubble. Explains a LOT.

And, since we sinners are still here, and can't entertain ourselves with suffering along the end days, nor watch the chosen ascend, I'll leave you with the full Vernal video "production" for all of our worldly entertainment. Audio ON.

That was close....

Turns out I was very lucky to have gotten our little MTB trip to Vernal in when I did, since the world is going to end on May 21st. At least I got in some good single track riding in before the end times come. It's been hard to come back and go to work and all that other "normal" stuff. Course with the Rapture upon us, I have sold everything, Quit my job, told off my boss, and run all my credit cards to the max. Seems like the thing to do at the end of the world, Right?

As promised, a few more pictures & tidbits from the Greater Vernal Metroplex here. Parts of the greater Vernal-Rangely area have not quite yet seen the economic benefit of the natural gas boom that seems to be fueling the area right now.

Seems to be a high level of local popularity in poking holes in the ground in them there parts. They love their drilling up there. (and who doesn't??)

Besides the Drilling, there are some nice camping to be had. Again, not the mind-bending scenery of other areas behind the Zion Curtain, but quite nice.

Course, we managed to get there at the tail end of the latest effort by winter to prevent any kind of spring to be had. What's a little camping out with temps in the teens at night and a ride in the snow, when you are a hard man of cross, anyway?

But then the weather perked up, and we began to sample the wares of the area. Turns out, when mountain bikers build trails FOR Mountain bikes, you pretty much end up with some really fun trails to ride. Good mix of fun, FAST twisty-bit desert trails, to techie, ledgy stuff, to even some nice slick-rock are all available.

They have named the trial in fairly amusing ways out there. While "More Hoes" MAY have been named for the mangled tools needed to build it, "More Pimps" seems to say the names may have alternate meaning. It was on "More Pimps" we began to see the local custom of "decorating" trails, something I've really not seen anywhere else. From Kokopelli sculptures on ridge lines in the middle of nowhere, to multiple Bowling Balls half buried trail side miles out, to bike windmills, There is quite a bit of "art" spread out in the area. "More Pimps" had a whole lot of Vegas "hooker cards" decorating the bushes and rock crevices along the route. Trailheads were easy to verify, and nasty drops tended to be "marked".

Some spots were more"creative" than others with what was going on in the rocks....

In General, a really good place to ride. "Different" than the usual vibe of Moab or Fruita, or even Gooseberry or Red Canyon. Feels like a hidden, secret place, even if it's really not that secret. The boys had a great time.

We were protected by Sean's Cock the entire time, so no bad Ju-Ju befell the group. Though he did let his Cock loose a BIT too much at times.... (And Many thanks to Sean B. and his Cock for all the pics here...)

Now if it will stop raining and snowing here, MAYBE we can get back to riding some of the local goodies. So far, it's been JUST enough to get a tease of the good stuff. Maybe soon. I guess it BETTER be soon, as we are all running out of time.

Yep, Vernal

Nothing to see here folks. Move along.......

OK, turns out there really MAY be some good mountain biking in Vernal, Utah. In spite of some "iffy" weather for the first day, we had a ripping time in a very unexpected corner of Utah.

First off, there really IS a 30 foot high pink dinosaur at the edge of town. And one with cute eyelashes to boot.

Decent camping in the red rocks north of town, conveniently located adjacent to the trailhead for 4 trails. Kinda handy. The scenery is not as mind-blowing as Moab, or even parts of Fruita, but still worked out OK for us. Someone even brought a beer-drinking cock. It was always getting loose.

Have a bit of a conflict about saying ANYTHING about Vernal and riding. The riding is VERY much like Fruita 15+ years ago. No one around, fun, ripping and NARROW trails built FOR bikes. We saw 10 other riders TOTAL (counting parking lots..) in 4 days of riding, and only 3 of those actually on the trails. 6-8 inch wide trails, snaking around the desert, with the odd bits of rocky technical goodness thrown in. Part of me wants to just say "nothing to see here, folks... Move Along". The Local bike community there is still trying to attract riders, and is INCREDIBLY friendly. Troy at Altitude Cycle goes out of his way to orient visitors, help send you to the good rides, and fill you in on the latest goodies. A strange and refreshing change from the Front Range, and most "destination" riding areas. I've never had the local shop owner give me his cell phone number since the shop would be closed the next 2 days, "in case we had any questions". Even had a "monster", semi alpine, downhill shuttle run to send your buds to their death on

I want to see their riding scene thrive there, but am not sure more of the "swarm" of spring/fall visitors will be a good thing in the end, given what seems to happen to places like Fruita. Anyway, all my paranoia aside, had a GREAT 5 days out there, LOVED the trails, and would have NO qualms about a repeat visit.

Worked pretty well as a "spring training camp" for me. I managed to ride myself into complete meltdown in those few days. Fixed my lack of spring riding all at once.

Should have more pics and some seat/bar cam video later, but till then, some comic relief from the trip. Those NARROW trails seem to have a bit of a "soft shoulder" at times.... Enjoy