Riding weather :)

quick update since I haven't since KC Cup....let's see, Mason came up and spent the weekend a couple ago...it unfortunately rained about .1 inch early Saturday morning...we scrapped the blue river idea and hit swope for one lap...Mason made the call that one lap on the slick course was enough for him and I wasn't bitching. We instead had a nice little urban free ride session around gillham park, art institute, and westport areas, followed by some delicious pitchers of beer at McCoy's...introduced him to the raspberry wheat and ginger shandy...needless to say, Elizabeth led the straight line home, cause neither him nor I could ride straight.

Sunday afternoon we hit up Landahl....goddamn it was fun! nothing like ripping some perfect trails on single speed glory with an old buddy. Here's the path we took (I think): Straight down tasty the whole way :) (Oh YES!), throught the camp, up the middle trail to Rim and the 5-way. family and tech offshoots, scottys gunbarrell!!!!!! (interjection, we found out the hard way that scotty's is TRULY an out/back now...cutting through the range/prairie/woods was a terrible idea), until we found the family trail again along the new fence, back around to dave's maze, down daves to will's then I crashed and tore my belly th shreds, literally...front wheel caught between two rocks, twisted my handlebars straight into my tummy, and I immediately fell on them...LAYERS of skin gone from my belly button to my pubes...still healing right now, it's gross...needless to say, I cried like a bitch, so we turned around on Will's cause we weren't very far, and took family out to the western double track, where we tailed it back to the car. Got back and it looked like I had a bloody vag on my tummy, hahaha.

then the week came and I had about 4 exams/papers to do that week, good time, not.

hmmmmm....I went to swope sometime later in the week, hmmmm, oh!, friday afternoon, and did a few laps by myself. always fun...the more I ride there the more I want to ride my full suspension as an XC bike again, some of the swithcbacks/off camber turns are killer on the big wheels.

Saturday was the "inagural" Blue River-Swope connector workday. Elizabeth went out with me and we worked for a good long while 8-12. I did a lot of stuff--destaubing, raking, bench cutting, being a beast on this tree that was growing straight down in the middle of the trail. Elizabeth did some lopping, some honeysuckle removal and was eye candy for all the guys. Got a good little bit built up, the connector will be sick!!!!!

Went home, got some McCoy's, went northland shopping and took the bikes over to Stocksdale Park in Liberty for Elizabeth's first real mountain bike ride. We started in the field loop so she could get her wings under her, and she was getting bucked like a bullrider...I realized that the air shock on my full sus was still set to my fat ass and not her tiny-ness, so I popped some air out for her and she loved it! we did another field loop before going into the woods at trail 3, working our ways clockways back up to the car....that little loop and she was pooped and I was feeling great. went home and crashed out hard, the both of us.

upcoming: it's supposedly cross season, or something like that I've heard, but I am joke broke and will not be racing anytime soon. Good news (badnews?): this may mean the end of smoking so much herb, so I may be getting some lungs under me...that and I got a physical yesterday and I was not happy with myself (184 lbs, 64 resting pulse, 139/78 blood pressure) I remember the days of 165 lbs, 43 resting pulse, insanely perfect blood pressure numbers, 7% body fat and being able to run 8 miles+ at a time....I kind of miss wrestling for that. You'll likely see me still at some cross races, with canned beer and trombone in tow. I really think that if I quit being a pussy and work myself back into shape that I could be up with the top area guys: Cam, Garrett, Shad, and even probably do some ass kicking on the road.

We'll see...

peace and dirt!

PS--halloween ride at BuRP.