St. George Pictures

Chris checking out the trails below Zen

From Zen

Chris on Prospector

KC on Prospector

Recovering from Trees

So I have been trying to recover all week from the trees in Moab. I got clipped or more accurately I clipped two of them. The first was on Porcupine Rim. I hit this tree with my left arm about half way between my elbow and shoulder. It knocked me off the bike, but really just some bruising. No big deal. The thing that stood out the most on this was seeing Chris' front wheel coming towards me, hoping he would stop in time. He did.
Then on the way back from Pothole Arch, I hit my left hand on a tree. This too dropped me. I landed squarely on my right shoulder. When I landed all I could think was "Oh, no!" It hurt so badly. I was not sure I would be able to ride again. Luckily the pain seemed to subside quickly. Chris was ahead of me at the trail head, working on his bike. I stopped next to him and told him what happened. It was then that I realized, for the first time really, that I had hit my left hand and it was bleeding. I took off my glove, but did not think much of it.
While my left hand looks the worst, it really has not bothered me. There is lots of bruising, abrasions, etc. My right shoulder is pretty swollen but no bruising. Similar to my right thumb which is still bugging me. I am a mess.
So I have not done much riding. This really has less to do with how I feel and more my schedule and the weather (cold temperatures) and lack of light. But today we rode the St. George race course, Zen Trail, Bear Claw Poppy, Stucki Springs to Barrel Roll. Then we just rode the dirt back to the car. It was a little over four hour of fun and fairly pain free.

More Moab

We tried to squeeze in the big Moab ride this weekend. We set out with two goals. 1. Not to end up like Chad and end up sleeping on the trail; and 2. Not get lost. It is easy to see how the two are somewhat dependent on the other.
Because we were staying in town, but still needed a food drop we decided to drive to the Bar M trail head and leave a car there. Chris enjoys listening to the radio while getting his stuff together. We did this for maybe ten minutes and then the car died or the battery did. So we tried pop starting it. No dice. So we got it jumped and then we were off. We went directly to Sovereign out and back. We got a bite at the car and then took off up Gemini Bridges Road, Gold Bar, and Golden Spike. In an effort to meet our second objective, Chris suggested we follow the blue dot trail as it was much better (more recently marked) than Golden Spike. Golden Spike was really faded. We seemed to be able to follow blue dot on and off and it seemed to save us some time.

On part of Golden Spike we saw this spectacle. The picture is not really clear but there was a jeep with about four kids standing on the bumper. Granted they were giggling and having a good time. But as Chris stated he seemed to roll his Bronco when he was least expecting it. I don't have kids so I guess I cannot comment on the parenting, but I can voice my opinion on this being not safe.

Potential negligent homicide

Towards the end of Golden Spike, something strange was going on with my cranks. They felt like they were slipping or something. And every once in a while, my pedal stroke felt weird. We stopped and looked at it. It looked fine. We stared going again but I could still feel as though something was off. That is when I noticed it. My crank arms were not aligned. It would move between two different positions depending on whether I was pedaling or standing on my pedals.

Is this normal?

So I limped through Poison Spider, Potash Road, and the old highway back to the car--which did not start at first. We had to push start it. We spent the evening getting the battery checked and a potential fix.

The aluminum insert spun in the carbon

The morning was spent looking for a cheap replacement crank arm. We checked Moab Cyclery, Poison Spider, Rim Cyclery, and Chile Pepper who finally had something we could use. Chris was getting frustrated; he thought it was going to be easy to find something. Thankfully, we were able to throw something on so we could ride today.

A heavy non-drive side temporary crank arm

So we were able to ride Amasa Back and Pot Hole Arch. It was pretty busy with both mountain bikers and jeeps. I got my trashed kicked on the trail. More on that later; maybe the crank arm incident was a sign.

Atop Amasa Back

My favorite view in Moab

Porcupine Rim in November

We rode Porcupine Rim yesterday. It was a great way to spend Thanksgiving. I opted to bring the big wheels down. The shock on my FS seems to be leaking air. The Superfly is super fly though so I am not complaining. Chris was pretty excited to get started.

We rode this trail about a month ago with Dan, Keith, and Adam. There were some icy sections with remnants of snow. This time there was not just icy frozen sections but real snow sections.


Of course we are no strangers to riding in snow, so we took it in stride. What was nice is once we got out of the shadows it was really warm again. It did make some of the climbs more difficult and not worth spending much time on them.


Overall the trail was in great condition. We were not trying to blast through it but we were making decent until we ran into some BASE jumpers landing on the bike path on the way back. It was a pretty fun distraction. It is so cool to hear the chute open up. That is my favorite part. One guy did a flip off the cliff.

A view from the Porcupine single track

At the Movies

Chris and I work for the same company. And while this is the only company I have worked for in "corporate America", I think it is a great company that values it's employees. As part of its employee appreciation, it sent us all to the movies. They rented out a bunch of showing of two different films of which we got to choose--New Moon or Planet 51. Chris and I decided to go to our own movie though and ironically it included Area 51.
We picked the 2:22 pm showing, so we rolled out of work around 2 pm. We went to our favorite "theater" Timp Park. It was empty except for Racer who was just leaving. He watched a film on mushing. From there we watched one of our favorite films. It is one that we have seen several times. In fact this one we saw this exact same movie on Wednesday last week. I chose a different "seat" though so my experience was a bit different, better. This "seat" was not as plush but equally comfortable and a bit more enjoyable.
The thing about this movie is you actually feel like you are in it. Almost like a ride at Universal Studios. The movie is an outdoor film, some might call it a documentary. We watched the hero and heroine climb steep sections of trail, traverse side hills, descend fast flowy sections. The theater was temperature controlled, but it got warm some times and cool others. It ended almost cold. My toes were feeling it. There were snowy sections and the heroine had trouble climbing some in the snow. She could not complain about her experience though; she seemed very grateful for the opportunity to just be outside.
More people showed up during the movie, but we were so into it we didn't even notice until we were leaving. There was even that couple that makes out through the whole movie. Luckily, we did not have to witness it this time.
I can't wait to watch the sequels.

Snow Hurts

We tried to sneak out between storms. It started to look really nice, but we waited too long. We hit Bonneville Extreme South (ES) up by Slate Canyon. The sun was out; things looked good. About 30 minutes into the ride though it got dark. The wind picked up and started throwing little ice crystals at my face. I can handle snow, but this stuff just stung like crazy around my eyes. We were heading back from Springville and the wind was mean. It was not so much that it impeded forward progress, but it made it difficult to see and breathe. It ended up being another short ride. I am going to keep trying though. I know if I persist I will get a good ride in.

Chris not enjoying himself so much

Snow accumulation on my bike

Snow falling on single track

It got cold

I think winter is starting to settle in. I guess I cannot complain too loudly; it is mid-November. I still hate to see it happen. Today, I tried to squeeze in a ride. I was semi-successful. I got a ride in, but it was a quickie. My toes got cold. I was good climbing, but maybe that is because the ride started out heading up. The trail was wet but not really muddy. I had a tentative plan, but then deviated from it. I was not going to go to the altar, but I just kept climbing and ended up there.

Just below the altar

A bit of snow

I then turned down Frank's. I chose my single speed this morning in anticipation of mud. Gears would have been safe, but I was not sure how much moisture the trails got or how much they would potentially dry out. The one speed was not a bad choice, but rigid really bothered my thumb. It is still giving me grief.

Top of Franks

I took it nice and easy down Franks and Dragon's Back. Not just because of my thumb issues, but it was wet which can equal slick. And while Chris was not there to tell me to take it easy, I still heard him say it in my head. I was only out for an hour, but it was better than nothing. I got back to the car before I even needed to turn my light on. I am a pansy, I know.