G County Cruisin'

I meant to be here yesterday, but I had to leave super early for work.  Who gives a shit.

I'm here now, talking about the riding I did over my three day weekend.  Since I moved closer to the Catawba River, a lot of my rides lately have been in Gaston County.  I dig it.  Sunday, I rode with the Z Crew and the Dirty Party Cycle over at Rock Branch.  It was fun to get out in a group in the dirt.  They took rad pictures.  I'm too lazy to get them from Facebook and put them here.

On Monday, I had a day off while a lot of people had to go to work.  I figured that it would be a prime opportunity to get out for a long road ride.  Plus, riding on the road would give me time to do other stuff later in the day.  I slept in a little, hung out with the dogs, then hastily plotted a route that took me into the heart of Gaston County.  I grabbed some water bottles, a few Honey Stinger goodies, and hopped on my road bike.  Three miles later, I made it to the river...

I quickly passed through Mount Holly and headed north on a normally busy road.

My first destination was the town of Stanley, not too far away (12 miles I think.)

Although I was in the town limits, I wasn't quite "in town" yet.  I pushed on, and made it to my "real" first stop.

I took that picture, and turned around to get back out of town.  The roads were much less busy.

I headed deeper into the heart of G County and I started to get hungry.  Not knowing how far I still had to ride, I passed on what could have been some pretty good food.

I probably would've regretted street tacos on a hot road ride.  There were no bathrooms anywhere along my route, unless I wanted to share a roadside squat with these goats.

I had a short conversation with these two and headed on my way.  The route got a little climby at this point, but I toughed it out.  Then, I had the most glorious downhill.

And it led to an awesome view...

I wasn't really sure where I was at this point, but I soon found a sign that gave me all the info I needed.

A little more climbing awaited.  I didn't care.  The roads were empty and I enjoyed the solitude.

After a while, my surroundings started to look familiar.  I was near a mountain bike trail that I hadn't ridden in a while.  Even though that place is always open, I brought the wrong kind of bike.

I rolled across the street and spotted a trail map I'd never seen before...

This was the kind of trail I could ride on a road bike.  I figured, "What the hell."

Short and sweet.  I'll be back with a mountain bike though.  Anyway, I rolled south and hit another town on my list...

Not much to see here when it's not Christmas, so I rolled through to spot the one thing worth viewing this time of year.

Lots of climbing remained.  I was hot, tired, and had no idea how far I'd gone or how much of my ride remained (my Garmin died.)  Before I knew it, I rolled into the next town over...

And I crossed the river to head home...

I rolled into my driveway three hours later, relieved but very happy.  It was time to get on with my day but there was one problem...

I was locked out of the garage.

Shit.

There was a power outage in the area, and my keys were locked inside the garage.  The power company's estimate was hours away.

I waited outside in the hot sun for three hours until I could get back in the house.

I was beat tired and hungry and the rest of my day was pretty much toast.

At least I got out for a ride though...

We Make Anything Fun

I took another week off from here for some reason.  Wait, I know the reason...

Who gives a shit.  I do this for fun (and mebbe entertaining you fine folks), so when I don't have a chance to post anything, I don't.  No stress for me.  Awesome.

I've actually been pretty busy.  Work has been crazy but I've also managed to have some fun.  And by fun I mean riding bikes.  Just like always, I'll start with the most recent and work backwards.  And yeah, it involves road bikes again.

I wanted an adventure that wouldn't kill me but more importantly, I wanted the little lady to join me.  I told her we would take a nice, leisurely stroll through the 'hood on skinny tires.  I wasn't completely honest though.  I had a plan, but I didn't want her to know that I'd planned on getting her to ride into the city. We started like most of my rides out of the house, with our new horse friends.

I really should take the time to learn their names.

We had a short visit since they were eating so we rolled out.  We took some nice, easy roads that had little to no traffic.  The little lady kept saying she didn't want to be out all day, so a six hour death march was out of the question.  I kept it fun though, and before we knew it we were in the city.  She was having fun still, so my plan was working.  We hopped on a local greenway to make this a much less serious ride.

Suddenly, we had to stop.  While rounding a corner we both noticed that her rear tire was flat.  We pulled over and I offered to help, but she was all, "I got this!"

A small sharp object was removed from her tire and the tube was replaced.  Moments later, we were on our way.  At this point we were just wandering around, kinda sorta thinking about heading back home.

She wasn't quite ready to go home yet though.  She wanted to hit a local brewery and knew there were a few close by.  She grabbed her phone to see which one was closest, while I looked on.

Across the street, I spotted something hilarious.  I rolled over there to investigate.

Hong Phat, you so funny.  

Just when I thought it couldn't get any funnier, I spotted a note on the door of this run-down restaurant...

"Wi'll see your soon!"

The little lady had enough of my picture taking.  She wanted beer.  We hauled ass outta there (all downhill too) and shortly we arrived at Blue Blaze Brewing. 

Beer was had...

We hung out for a while, but we had to get back home.  She didn't want to be out all day, but I "tricked" her into riding all the way into the city.  She retaliated by "tricking" me into going for beer.  

We both win.

The ride home was pleasant for the most part, until the skies opened up about three miles from the house.  It was raining hard and the temperature dropped about ten degrees...

But it was fun as hell.  

Another adventure in the books.  This riding for fun thing is definitely the way to go.

Watch Them Ride

Maybe I mentioned it.  Maybe not.  When I ended up on an impromptu mountain bike ride last weekend I may have made a mistake.  Riding a single speed and hitting all those roots, rocks, and jumps put a hurting on my ribs.  I feel like I did when I first broke them, so it looks like I've regressed in my recovery.  So instead of making things worse (again), I've decided to take a hiatus.  You know, after the Mayor's Ride which wasn't a big deal for my injury.

So anyway, since I'm not riding I decided to try to do the next best thing and watch other people ride.  The local big deal criterium just so happened to be in town over the weekend and I considered going.  There was rain in the forecast and I almost cancelled.  But then I decided to go.  And got there just in time to see the start...

In the rain.

The little lady and I walked around for a while, and quite honestly it was nice to be around bikes (even if it was roadies.)  We saw a few people we knew here and there, and eventually found the crowd that suited us.

Me and Dicky are down like flat tires.

The crit was fun to watch, especially since we were doing a fair amount of heckling.  And then, the skies opened up again and they called a rain delay.

The rain was heavy and we found some shelter in a local drinking establishment.  Oh yeah, that was right after Lunchbox joined us.

It's cool, he wasn't drinking.  He's a good kid and follows the rules.  I don't though.

That was fun, but it didn't look like the rain would ever stop.  We decided to call it a night, and started wandering towards where we parked.  Then suddenly we found some friends under one of the VIP tents and decided to act like we belonged there.

Free food and beer.  Just what I needed.  After hanging out for a while (and running into my favorite douchebag former Olympian who pretended like he didn't even see me several times) they called off the race.  We watched as they sad roadie folks packed it up for the night.

While I really wanted to knock the roadies, I think they would've kept going.  They actually didn't seem to mind racing in the pouring rain.  I have to give them props for that.

Anyway, with the race canned we wondered what was next.  Suddenly, one of our new friends said he had "a place" and to grab all the beer and food and follow him down the streets of Uptown Charlotte.  And of course, Lunchbox grabbed the biggest tray of food he could find.

Even though he's some kind of cycling industry insider now, he has a good heart.  He actually walked down the street and passed out those sandwiches to the homeless.  Srsly.

After his great act of kindness, we parted ways and I headed down through the alleys of our fair city.  I had no idea where I was going, so I looked up at the buildings to see if anything looked familiar.

We walked through alleys, down a bunch of different stairs, and ended up in some local speakeasy.  I'm not kidding.

It was neat.  The beer was flowing, which may explain why my pal the Gentle Ginger got kinda frisky with the locals.

What a wild night.  I'm not riding at the moment, but hanging around bike stuff is good enough at the moment. 

Damn I love my cycling friends.

Hold On

You thought I was gonna skip the rest of the week until Friday again?  Who gives a shit.

I actually got some new stuff I wanted to mention.  While I don’t care much for the road bike, I do care when stuff wears out.  I ride it quite a bit unfortunately, which means that I will eventually exceed the useful life of some items.  Stupid stuff that you really don’t think about…

Like bar tape.

Luckily, I haz solution.

 Touch it.  Feel it.  Love it.  I lol’d.

Lizard Skins 3.2mm Bar Tape.  It’s thicker than the last stuff I used (also from Lizard Skins of course), and extra white so I can get it extra dirty. 

The tape goes on easy, and it feels softer than a mess of hot buttered biscuits.  I can’t wait to ride on the road test it out.

Up next, I needed new grips for The Executor, my Niner ROS9.  They’ve redesigned my usual “big bike” grips and I was full of excite. 

And yes, even you can get custom text on your bar clamps.  You don’t have to be famous or some shit like that.

My first test ride on these were up in the hills of The “Other” Pisgah, and hot damn they are comfy.  Since I’ve been all racey lately I haven’t been riding the big bike that much.  That will change soon, in fact as soon as this weekend.

Anyway, just a few new things from the fine folks at Lizard Skins.  I’ve been riding with their stuff for quite a while now, and they never disappoint. 

You go buy now.

I go ride now.

One Last Time

I’ve missed a few days.  I had some things going on.  Some good stuff too.  Who gives a shit.

Anyway, I’ve mentioned several times before about riding on the local unfinished interstate near my house.  The latest news on it is that it’s currently “on schedule” to be finished by the end of this month.  I really enjoy riding on it because I don’t have to worry about getting run off the road by drivers and I can take up as much of whichever lane I choose.  I figured that I better get in one last ride.

Closed to cars, yes.  Who gives a shit.

The ride there is relatively short, but when I got on the wide open interstate I let it go.  It was nice as usual.  I went all the way from one end to the other as far as the barricades would let me (and traffic from the “finished” road.)  If you do it twice it’s almost fourteen miles. 

Fourteen miles of solitude.

While I don’t normally believe the reports of being “on time”  for projects like this, looking around I could tell that they might be right this time.  The road is complete, and the only thing left was to paint a few lines here and there. 

Most of them were done though.

Check out those clouds.  It started to turn shitty after I got back on regular roads, but riding in the rain didn’t bother me too much.  What did bother me is the fact that I’m losing my private training road to “real” traffic.  At least I did get to enjoy the shit out of it for the last few years though.

Training kinda sucks, but things like this can make it a little bit better.

Aren’t you glad I took a few days off from here?

Almost All Roadie

I must confess.  I haven’t been on a mountain bike in…way too long.  I guess I’ve either been too busy, or that pesky weather has foiled my plans.  I wonder if I even remember how to ride in the dirt.  I’ve been on my road bike quite a bit though, so I guess that means I might officially be a dirt roadie now.  Or worse.  A regular roadie.

Yuck.

I’ve spent so much time on the road bike lately that I’m actually wearing out parts.  I had to buy new stuff, which kills me because I hate putting money into bikes that don’t ride off road.  I mean, seven years on one drivetrain is good, right?

Shiny.  New.  Another seven years hopefully.

I had to get new tires too.  That’s not really a big deal since Maxxis takes care of me, but I did feel funny getting a box from them without any knobby tires in it.

I do like riding on the road.  I like the dirt moar better, but I just haven’t had the time.  I’m pretty sure that without TotalCyclist, I wouldn’t be riding much at all lately.  I’d like to get in a ride in the dirt here locally sometime this week, but it’s not looking good.  These next two nights are busy after work, and I pissed away my Saturday by hanging around The CyclePath.

Lunchbox did too…

We had to stop by to pick up something.  No big deal.  I was just in there a few days before though, with two bikes…

The little lady’s baby orange bike (B.O.B.) and The Executor.  I took them to the shop, they boxed them up, and they are on the way to Tucson, AZ.  In fact, with an expected delivery date of today, I’m sure they will be at D-Wayne’s house any minute now.  He will have plenty of time to put them together before we get there later in the week.

I’m pretty sure he’ll test out the little lady’s tiny little bike when he gets it assembled.  Mine will probably we perched high atop a cactus or something.

Man, I can’t wait to get out to the desert.

I think.