They Gots Skillz

Saturday, a couple of us fellas headed out to the Whitewater Center to help the Dirt Divas with one of their skills clinics.  I always enjoy helping the ladies out on the trail, but honestly this time I didn’t feel like going.  I’d been sick pretty much the whole week and I just wanted to stay in bed.  Luckily I dragged my ass out into the morning sunshine and drove out the meet the rest of the crew.

We divided up into groups depending on which sections of trail the ladies wanted to ride.  Good Guy Greg and I took one group, and we worked on a couple of sections on the Carpet Trail.  When the girls were satisfied that they could ride the obstacles, we rolled out to Goat Hill.  It was there that we found a random rider to take a group shot.

We took quite a bit of time climbing the rocky, rooty switchbacks.  We met up with another group and we sorta just merged together into one big, happy group.  The fellas were happy to help the ladies.

And it was such a nice day to be out in the woods.

After spending a little time working on the steep climbs of Goat Hill, we bombed the downhill section and rolled out to the river… 

Photo credit:  Allison Foil

Where Little Miss Sunshine conquered a rooty climb that usually gets the best of her. 

We worked on that spot for a while with all the ladies (and even a random little boy that happened to be rolling by), and then we took the rest of the trail out towards the parking lot.  There was one more tough feature to tackle though:

This section didn’t used to be difficult, but a severe lack of trail maintenance by the people out there has made it a little more challenging.  The ladies kicked its ass though, and eventually we wrapped up and headed back to the parking lot.

And right to the post-ride festivities.

Photo cred: Allison (again)

Helping out at these skills clinics has got to be one of my favorite things to do.  The ladies put their fear aside (and put all their trust in us smelly boys) to conquer the trail like professionals.  They ended the day as better riders, and it makes those of us that get the privilege to help feel pretty damn important.  You know, much more important than being a kinda famous blogger on the Internets.

Oh yeah, that was ride number two on the geared bike.

Stay tuned.