Pre-Rideness

  Hello, and Welcome to a new day in the life . I went out and pre-rode the race course for La Tierra torture.It is a good SingleSpeed course. It should be good times. The course has a good mix of stuff: jeep road, loose rock, tight singletrack, arroyo crossings and a boat load of loose sand. Especially if you go off course the least bit.I went up there last week solo. As i was getting ready Black Sheep Paul pulled up. Which was a nice treat to ride with someone. So with map of course in hand we set out to ride the course. We went down the fire road and came across some cool gap jumps and table tops and burms out near the course.

This was a nice gapper

So off we went to the start/finish area and got our bearings and found our way pretty well through the course. I took a few pictures from the ride. Anyone else out there racing this weekend? anywhere? I much rather just ride but once in a while I like to do it.





Paul enjoying the arroyo crossing


Paul blissfully unaware that there is quicksand ahead

That white band behind the black Sheep is energy sucking sand.

This is the last section coming back to the start finish.

  I rode the 26 incher that day and was planning on riding rigid and all that jazz. I am now thinking about racing with the 29er. I rode there again early in the week and it rolled a lot better through the sandy stuff. So I think I am gonna ride the RIG. All right everyone hope you all had a nice Memorial Day Monday. What is in your audio player? I have been digging in the crates again and have been rockin to The Accused-Straight Razor.
  I saw that back in my home town(Bawlmer) they had Bike Jam. It always looked like a good time. I never made it to it. :(

Cheater Bike

  Wow! That was a lot of people. I finally rode a Century Sunday. The Santa Fe Century to be exact. What a good time it was. I met Anthony at 6:30 at the hospital where the century started and ended. There were around 2800 people riding in this century. The weather was looking perfect. Anthony and I decided to get started at 7. We got our goofy lycra on and departed right around 7:05 am. We left the hospital and headed towards 14 to head down towards Madrid which is around 25 miles away. We made it down there in around 10 minutes it felt like. It was a great warm up being mostly pointed downward till there. Anthony filled the water bottles and off we went. We figured we would stop after heartbreak hill around mile 50. So up heartbreak hill we went. That hill is a steep one but short. All kinds of people were strugglin on it. We then proceeded to Cedar Grove to the food stop there which was right at mile 50. From there we continued on till Galisteo which was mile 82.4 I was supposed to meet Ella and Autumn here but Ella had a virus for the last few days so they opted to rest one more day before the week started. Galisteo is a cool little town. There was a pueblo here. We stopped for the longest break of the day here because I needed too. Ate some food and departed again for the rest of the ride. Anthony was feeling great and he pulled me a good bit especially when we climbed up from Galisteo to Eldorado. Thanks Anthony! At the end of the ride they take us onto 25 which we thought was ridiculous instead of taking us onto Old Las Vegas which is a nice more friendly road which parallels the highway. We got back to the car at 1:07, 104 miles later. Now you will see I was riding a cheater bike. I have not as of yet built a SS road bike. My goal is to do this century next year on a SS. One observation I had during the century was there are some really nice people,But a lot of roadies have this shitty attitude. This is one reason I love MTBing the people are soooo much nicer. I took a few pictures. all at food stops. After the ride Anthony invited me back to his pad in Arroyo Hondo for a Tub soak and some beers. After the soak he cooked up some bacon and blueberry pancakes(which rocked).
pre ride pose


This is once we got started at the first traffic light about a hundred yards past the Hospital.


Madrid the first food stop and a nice little town we had some climbing after Madrid.

Cedar Grove food stop randomness

Anthony making a call

the road surface

I believe this bearded gentleman was at the foood stop in Stanley.

on the phone in Galisteo

I looked for SS/fixed riders all day and saw none that is except this tandem bike a couple rode on the 50 mile out and back route.

I give the peace symbol as we prepare to ride the last 20 miles to Santa Fe

  So there you have it some rest stop photo's of the Santa Fe Century we both really had a good time on this. I hope I get a SS together for next year. The night before the century I had a tasty brew from steamworks brewing

  What is in your audio player? I have Damian "Junior Gong" Marley Welcome to Jamrock in my player courtesy of Bradleee in Jackson Hole who sent me a pic of him paragliding in HI this past week. Looks fun. He said you can fly a paraglider for 2-3 hour flights from this place in HI.

I also came across this picture from a Glorieta ride a few months back it is of Pauls Black Sheep SS

  As I was driving back from Arroyo Hondo yesterday I saw there was a fire happening in the Jemez it turned out it was right around Bandelier. I hope this doesn't effect the next installment in the NM Endurance series- the Tour de Los Alamos. Sounds like a good ol time.Good bye till next time.

Summer Time!

  While I guess Summer time begins around Memorial Day It has been feeling like Summer here. With Summer in Santa Fe comes the tourists. There are a LOT of them milling around town. I had a SSweet ride on the Winsor the other day with Jay and Todd Jay GPS'd it so here is the Stats.As I sit here and type and drink my Peets coffee the skies look as if it may rain today. Lets keep our fingers crossed. We got a good shower here yesterday too. Hopefully it will make the trail less LOOSE. Looks like New England is getting some big rain amounts. Autumn and Ella and I where going to eat at Del Charro I decided to stop into a shop by there called Mellow Velo they where really nice guys. They also had a few really nice Vicious bikes built up. One guy there is racing the La Tierra Torture on his vicious fixed. I am racing in this race as well so it will nice to see how he does all fixed up.
  All right, here are a few pics from our ride up on the Winsor trail.
Me getting all chatty on the saddle with some hikers

Aspens


Taking the time to give thanks


Trail is Good

The Burn... find the biker



  What is in your audio player? I have been diggin in da crates, i have been listening to a nice bootleg of Sonic Youth at the Dusseldorf Easter Festival from 1996. It was broadcast on German tv. All righty i am out.

Rio en Medio....Chingone

  A good day to you all. The sun is shining on another day in Santa Fe. I have been getting some road rides in as of late to get ready for the Santa Fe Century. It is coming up quick. It should be good times. A couple of good dirt rides too. Matt, a guy I have never ridden with is putting on some really cool long distance dirt rides/races this summer.He rides crazy amounts. The next one coming up is the Watermelon Death Ride on May 13th. This ride they are doing seems like a TON of FUN but I just don't have the time these days to squeeze it all in. I am hoping to do the one they are doing in Los Alamos though. I wonder if they are gonna have one here in Santa Fe. A lot of singlespeeders have been joining in on the fun on the rides. Here are the rest of the pictures from the ride up high, most of which where taken by Anthony. We have a birthday party for Ella today.
Aaron riding into the sunlight

A lovely waterfall
I really liked

trying to stay dry

Aaron and Todd come down a nice section

Andy just riding along

I love ridge singletrack. As you have seen from my blog Santa Fe has lots


Todd enjoying some New Mexico air

Coming up to that spot where I took a picture of that cactus from the last post. It was a nice spot for a rest.

another killer section of trail......


one of the beautiful meadows you come through on this ride

Todd enjoying the meadow

Ridge goodness

A little sunny spot in the forest



This was a sweet section of trail one of the best parts of this ride is that it goes along 3 different rivers the Rio En Medio, The Rio Nambe, and Rio Capulin. So you get lots of river features during the ride

looking determined

Todd was getting a little hot on the ride so.....


Todd drafting Andy

Aaron pushing those flat pedals

The Kona enjoys the Rio En Medio

Aaron says, What a ride!

Back at 412 before the climb back up Pacheco Canyon rd.




Having fun on 102(Pacheco Canyon)

Back from where we started

  I love getting up to the top part of the mountain. It has so much more tree coverage.
  What is in your audio player? I got Jerry Garcia and David Grisman-Shady Grove in mine. Getting all Hippy on ya. K everyone have a SSweet day, or night as the case may be. Sounds like they are gonna be closing some forest round here soon.....WEAK!

       PEACE!