Mountain Biking Kickoff

After spending much of the day at the office on Saturday, I got out for an abbreviated version of the ride we had pencilled in, a 'round Bragg ride that featured the gravel powderface trail at the "rear" of the loop. Nothing like riding my rebuilt 14 year old Stumpjumper on gravel to tune out and think, it's brainless to pilot on gravel relative to a 'cross bike, so I can daydream along. Beautiful area back there, good return to the bike after skipping last weekend to party, and probably better to do the loop next weekend anyway after one more week of warm air temperatures and wind - it's passable, but annoying in spots where it's still wet. Here was the point where wetness and snow seemed to start making up the majority of the road, I had just come through a few hundred meters of it too.

After another reasonable chunk of office on Sunday, I head out for some real mountain biking, with a real mountain bike. The Scalpel always feels like home, and Pneuma is like a trail to heaven, I'm not sure how climbing twisty single track could be better. My goal on the way out was to focus on traction, control and skill over just pounding up the hill as hard as I could.

Before I get to the biking, I was recently described as a "speed freak" - which I mostly deny. I don't like the consequences of wiping out at speed. This was in reference to a compliment I received last week (note, there's only a couple categories of compliment I'll even acknowledge or like, and trust me, I'm not the subject of many compliments). Anyway, an individual whom I drove dune buggy's in Mexico 5 years ago was recalling the Baja stories to his friend, in advance of our upcoming trip. He explained how he'd never driven one, started out down the gravel road with little instruction as per the norm, then observed he was doing 75mph and having a blast on terrain that blew his mind. He recalled how we stopped for a snack, rotated diving partners, then "learned that all morning I had no idea what those machines were capable of until I rode with Erik". He never told me that then, but has been carrying it in his mind for the last 5 years... now that is a compliment I like : ) The point of all this being that I still disagree on the speed freak thing. I'm conservative and don't like the pain of wipeouts. What I am addicted to is traction limits and control. Its a fine line, a dynamic line, and just happens to be more necessary to monitor at increased speeds. I'd argue that's what attracts me to the downhill snowsports, bike sports and motorsports trifecta.

Traction at points is offered up in quantities more than you'd ever need, and in some parts is scant, leaving you begging for every bit you can eke out. Traction only has one use when riding - to facilitate acceleration - where acceleration encompasses the positive (climbing), the negative (braking) and change of plane left and right. Dry loamy soil to ice slurpee over top of ice sheet, with random wet roots and rocks (it rained) was the name of the game.

Maximizing traction is relatively easy on two wheels - it's being dynamic on a bike, having a feel for the machine, pedalling smoothly, using corner knobs on your tires, squeezing the brakes rather than slamming them, etc. I'm ok at it. I know guys who blow me away, plus have smaller bodies that therefore demand less traction (ie. everyone I bike with).

Maximizing what you can do at any given point with the traction available is another thing all together. Descending steep choppy rocks mixed with mud-ice-slush actually doesn't need any traction as long as it's a straight line, and Race of Spades has a few of those sections... you just need 2m of traction prior to the corner at the bottom to scrub off the accumulated speed. Traction for corners is only needed enough to keep you on the trail, which can be further minimized by smoothly planning the corner and seeing past it to the exit. With this in mind, and with the qualifier that it was the first mountain biking of the season, I let it rip.

Biking without others where I'm gasping to keep up lets me focus more on the soft skills, which I like just as much as gasping to keep up to others... and today just felt beautiful to be riding a mountain bike. They're masterful machines, and I enjoyed every minute of piloting it around. Yes there were a few dismounts on the uphill, but I'd qualify that 2' high fallen timbers across the trail, and a few muck chute hairpins were likely "impassable" by bike. There were a couple others that I should have made... but all in it was introspective fun trying to polish up the skills. I'm sure if Jon, Craig, Devin and Shawn were there, they'd wait a half hour for me at the top while I wallowed in my crummy attempt at uphill elegance... but at least it felt good to me.

The way down was a riot. Everything I said about traction is BS when referring to wet skinnies with snow on both sides, that's a traction game a mudded up Racing Ralph 2.1" isn't likely to win... but the rest was trying to do my best Jedi rendition of that trail, which totally lends itself to the Jedi blasting through the forest feeling. I'll withhold any reasoning around doing this solo, on an evening, without a cell phone, in the rain, with only shorts and a jersey on, when it was only 12C in the parking lot... but hey, the day I bust my leg out there wasn't tonight. And depending on the day, if I were out with the above mentioned group of buddies, I may luck out and not be last at times.

Today's lesson to drill into my mind: brakes are a tool that reduce speed such that you can navigate corners with the [estimated] available traction on approach. They are NOT weenie comfort devices.

Picture here just above the Race of Spades entry of the showers that got me on the way up, hadn't been out to Moose for a while, so decided to spin up to the top just to check it out before hitting the descent.