Winter Park Slopestyle Video

When we were mountain biking at Winter Park in Colorado with our friend Chad, they still had a lot of this course still up including the drop-in at the top. In the video they say it's a 35-foot drop. After seeing it in person, I believe it. The video doesn't do it much justice.

More bike videos on BikeMag.com

~Chris

Hey Rocky, watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat...

Yes, that's a bull moose keeping a close eye on what three mountain bikers were doing disturbing his dinner in a little creek valley along Headwaters Trail on Moscow Mountain. he eventually ignored us and we continued on, eventually climbing above him in a very short distance. Lorena and I along with our friend Dan Cordon went on a great, long ride on the mountain yesterday. All told, we rode somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 miles of trail in 4.5 hours and had about 2300 feet of climbing involved. Dan sent me the GPX file and I mapped it on MapMyRide.com where it came up with a little over 23 miles. I don't know if they're taking into account changes in elevation in their distance calculation because Dan's computer on his bike showed a different distance than Google's map. Our intention was to have at least a 3 hour ride with little repeat of trails. I came up with a route that only reuses a couple of short sections of trail and a couple of new trails that we needed Dan to show us how to navigate. The total ride time was a little longer than Lorena and I may have normally taken but Dan doesn't get to ride as much as we do and so we had to stop and wait occasionally and we needed him on the new sections. It was all good and everyone had a great time. Lots of calories were burned up there. As Marty can attest, you spend the first 50 minutes or so going uphill to Paradise Point. It's harvest time for the wheat so you can see the difference in the Palouse yesterday, versus one I took when Marty was visiting in May. I could have sworn I had another one that was better but perhaps it's on our desktop computer that's now in a box. We've got a lot of stuff packed and are nearly ready for the move in a few days. It's amazing how involved it can be to move less than a mile. We're meeting up with our friends Hap and Diane tomorrow up near Harrison, ID. They're on a pretty amazing trip across the country. You can read about it by clicking here. That's all or now. Time to pack a few more boxes. ~Chris

Map My Ride

I finally decided to try out the site www.mapmyride.com and take a look some rides we do around here. I particularly like the elevation chart and the ability to just click on roads and have it automatically generate the path following those roads.
The first ride I mapped was one that takes you from our house to the Four Corners area up on Moscow Mountain. From Four Corners you can hit a lot of singletrack trails and this is the option if you don't want to drive there. I know it's only 10 miles but as you'll see on the elevation chart, the last half of it is UP. It takes me a little under an hour from the house but is a pretty good warm-up for all of the trails up there. The road is mostly gravel once you get out of town and the climb is washboarded in some spots that can even come into play while climbing. The bonus is that none of the climbs on the trail are not as long as this so you get a little bit of a break.

Look for more maps like this as I get time to work them out. With that, we're heading out on a road ride.
~Chris

Random stuff

Our little world has been busy as of late and is about to get busier. The school thing is always there but, we are preparing to move to a new house here in town and so lots of boxes are being packed and tripped over. We're looking forward to moving but not the move itself , naturally. On the plus side, Lorena's parents will be arriving for a visit next Monday and have offered to help with the move.

Also, Paul Kinney is on his way out here for a visit and will probably be arriving on Sunday, albeit sans mountain bike (bummer though I understand why). Perhaps he will be a new neighbor this Fall?

On the riding front, we've been alternating between road and mountain when not at school or packing. Lorena ruined the front rim of her Spinergy wheels on her Epic. A new rim should be on the way soon and so she's riding her old Trek 8500 in the meantime. You've gotta love having "spare" bikes around for just such an occasion. I'm just leery of lacing those PBO spokes up.

I recently finished the book "Bloodsucking Fiends: A Love Story" by Christopher Moore. This is the book I should have read before I read "You Suck" earlier in the summer. I highly recommend both books.

I also recently acquired a French press coffee mug that I use here in the office. It's awesome but.... Rule of Life: "Thou Shalt Not Re-Use Coffee Grounds In Your French Press If You Desire Flavorful Coffee". This I discovered this afternoon as I failed to enjoy what was basically a cup of warm water.

With the rise of 10-speed drivetrains, 9-speed components are getting more and more scarce. The apparent going rate for a pair of used Ultegra STI shifters is $167.50 on eBay. My cross bike has been down for a while with a broken rear shifter and I recently watched two sets of shifters go on eBay for exactly $167.50. They're practically gold. If any of our readers out there have a shifter they're willing to part with for a negotiable fee, I'm game. I've been wanting to ride that bike so bad lately but haven't been able to and cross season is only a little over a month away.

That's all for now. Better get back to coding.

~Chris

Colorado leaves its mark

I like Colorado. Now I know why it seems as everyone moves there or wants to move there. Of course, my favorable opinion of Colorado may have been influenced by the previous few days driving through the sagebrush high desert of central Wyoming. At one point in my life, I thought that I would like to live in the “middle of nowhere,” but the middle-of-nowhere Wyoming is definitely not for me. It may have been one of the most desolate places I have experienced, and do you truly experience a place zipping by at 65 mph?

We stopped for gas at the little “town” of Jeffrey City, WY, population 50; population within 20 miles is 150. It is an old Uranium mining town and most of the services there were closed. It was practically a ghost town that was not old enough to be a ghost town worthy of tourist attention. And it was about 60 miles from any other town.

I have to admit that Laramie and Cheyenne, WY were probably much like Northern Colorado, but we were already a day behind in our collecting trip, so when we made it Fort Collins, CO on Thursday evening, I felt a bit of relief. A friend of mine recommended a restaurant, with microbrews of course, in the downtown area. We had our dinner on the veranda and enjoyed a pleasant evening, good beer and people watching in the central walkway of downtown Fort Collins. In less than one day there, I knew that Fort Collins is the kind of place that I could enjoy in the long run. In retrospect, it is a bit like Moscow, ID, but on a much grander scale.

The next morning, we met with my friend Amy for a coffee at the CSU Student Center. It was our first espresso drinks in probably 2000 miles. My girlie peppermint mocha, AKA grasshopper, sure was tasty! Our first field site in Colorado was along Poudre Canyon. We found a pull off with enough Dalmatian toadflax for us to sample and a ranging river right behind us. One of the best things about my research project is that it can take us to some truly beautiful locations that we probably would not see otherwise. Early that evening, we went up to White Ranch Park near Golden, CO to break out the mountain bikes again. The trail was given good reviews online and was better than our earlier rides in Idaho Falls and Pocatello, but still not ideal. I think one caveat that we both look for now in a trail is that it can be ridden in either direction, whether up or down. The trail had water bars that were a little washed out on the downhill side and a couple of poorly designed rock sections. Chris was a little frustrated, but it was a new trail for the both of and I had to remind him that if we rode there the next day, we would probably clean nearly all of it. We ended up cutting our ride a little short, because we were expected somewhere and the drive up had taken us a little longer than we had anticipated. The end of the day found us in Denver, with our friend Chad from our undergrad days. We had dinner at the Handle Bar, a bar and grill that is decorated with bikes and bike parts. The stickers on the doors could have put many bike shops to shame. On Saturday, we went to Winter Park, CO, about one hour west of Denver to go mountain biking. The intention was to ride the next week’s race course and then take the gravel roads back to the car, about a 2-hour, approximately 20 mile ride (14 miles of trail). Somehow when all was said and done, it was a 33-mile, 4-hour ride and it was fun!

I was riding well and did not want to hold the guys up, so when we got to an intersection and they were waiting for me, I often waved them on. At one point, we had just started into the trail when I realized that I should have stopped for a gel. The trail was a smooth, wide double track and I figured I could get my gel while on the trail. I was reaching back to the mesh pocket of my Camelback with my left hand and then saw some dried up water puddles up ahead in the trail. With one hand in my Camelback and only one hand on the bars, I grabbed my brake to slow down and grabbed it far too hard. I was thrown from my bike and lay in the dirt for a few minutes berating myself for such a stupid crash. I started to get up and found that my knee had a nice wide V-shaped gash with the skin folded up a little in the middle and blood oozing out. I sucked on my knee a little bit to try to staunch the bleeding and thought, “this looks like a few more stitches.” At this point, I figured that the guys were far enough up the trail that they would not hear me even if I yelled, “down!” So I remounted and rolled slowly, ringing my handlebar bell as I rode down the trail. Chris, Chad and Aukie had already figured that something must have happened and rolled back to meet my partway. No one had a bandage with them, so I removed my sock, which was already bloody, folded it in half over my wound and Ocky tied Chris’s flatted tube around my knee to hold the sock in place and we continued to ride. Perhaps it is time for me to add a small first aid kit to my Camelback since I no longer have the opportunity to ride with my former-Boy-Scout-brothers.

We probably rode for another two hours after I bonged my knee and it was probably the best thing I could have done because my knee never got stiff and tight, even on the ride “home” to Chad’s place.

After the ride was over, I had a little help cleaning out and bandaging my wound and, all of us being low on calories and a little bonked, we stopped for dinner on the way home. By the time we made it back to the Denver area, we figured that my knee wound was too old to be stitched and just added ointment and a new bandage. It is healing well. In fact, I had planned to take a photo of my gash, but somewhat sadly, it just isn’t that impressive anymore. If I do end up with a small scar, and I probably will, that would mean that I will have to stop making fun of the divots in Chris’s knees!

~Lorena

Sure feels good to be home

We arrived back in Moscow at midnight on Tuesday after about 18 hours of traveling. Monday was an extremely long day to say the least and it felt great to sleep in our own bed again. We've spent the last couple of days getting back to normal and is why it's taken so long for an update. This one is going to be long so you can't say you weren't warned... The last update was last Wednesday in Lander, WY where we were camping. Before I get to that, I'll go back a couple of days before in Pocatello, ID where we had done a little mountain biking on the Gibson Jack and Mink Creek trails. After we had done all of the collecting work that Lorena needed, we went to a bike shop in Pocatello to see about trail maps for the area. Unfortunately, the map was $7 and proved to be not terribly helpful after we took the wrong trail (thanks to confusing directions from the bike shop employee) and ended up going up a pretty unrideable ATV trail. The first part of the trail was cool but it got progressively more rocky (and steep) to the point where it seemed like we were pushing more than riding. Since the map wasn't too clear, we thought we were on a different trail and figured that if we could only get to the next intersection we'd be back on good trail again.... We never got to that intersection but, we did end up with a pretty cool view looking back on Pocatello.

On the way back down (we started pretty far down there), we talked to a hiker to showed us where we were on the map and confirmed that we taken the wrong trail. It was a bummer but at least we know what trail to take the next time we ride in the area. There was also a non-motorized trail we were hoping to finish the loop on that we did ride before the sun went down and we had to head back to the hotel. That trail was super fun even though we didn't get to ride a whole lot of it. We left Pocatello Tuesday morning and drove to near Soda Springs, ID for the next field site. It was pretty straightforward to find it because we met with the Caribou county weed superintendent who took us right to where we needed to go. The site was pretty much in the middle of nowhere, among the farms and ranches north of Bancroft, ID. Anybody from back east would be amazed at the amount of irrigation that's done out here. It makes you wonder if it would even be possible to farm that region without it. I'd say not. The next site on the docket was supposed to be near Irwin, ID. We had the GPS coordinates for the location and a vague description of how to find it. As we approached town, we found a landmark that resembled our directions and even found a stake that looked like the ones we used to locate the previous field sites. Unfortunately, the stake was about 1.5 miles from where the GPS told us it was supposed to be and there weren't any of the invasive weed to be seen. We knew this couldn't be right so we headed up the road trying to get closer to the GPS point. Conveniently, there was road construction that shut down one lane of the only road that could get us to where we needed to go and so we waited. Once beyond the construction, we drove around on back roads trying to get closer but couldn't figure out how to get there. We went back through the construction again to the original location to verify that we just hadn't missed the weeds. Nope, no weeds. So, we decided to try one more time to find a road leading to the site. We went back through the construction again and then turned on a road we hadn't been on before. This led to a series of roads that got us close, but not quite where we needed to be without trespassing on private land. That's a big no-no in Idaho that can lead to getting shot, or worse. Two hours of hunting and ending up empty handed. On top of that, we wanted to make it to Cody, WY that night and it was already mid-afternoon. We decided this site was a bust and headed up the road. We drove over Teton Pass above Jackson, WY on our way to the Grand Teton National Park and then Yellowstone. That was the highest pass we'd been over so far on the trip, somewhere around 8000 ft.

Finally getting through the tourist hellhole that is Jackson, we got to see the Tetons and they are pretty grand.

It was a bit sad that we had to push through the parks instead of getting to enjoy them. We did stop by Yellowstone Lake and saw this snake trying to eat a frog. I'd say the snake had his dinner covered for the rest of the summer.

We made it into Cody at around 10pm to find that most hotels were booked. Oh yeah, it's tourist season. We did get this little (and I mean little) "cabin" for the night. Funnily enough, while we were filling out the paperwork for the room, the attendant had on the evening news and they had TDF highlights. It was nice to at least see a little cycling coverage in the middle of cattle/rodeo country. There was a field site in Cody. Actually, it was about an hour drive from Cody on a dead-end highway that ended up near the confluence of a couple canyons. The scenery was pretty stellar and we were really in the middle of nowhere. Fortunately, we were able to find weeds right on top of the GPS location and it was easy. The terrain was still pretty rugged and desolate but impressive nonetheless.

This brings us to our next stop of Lander, WY. It's pretty much in the middle of ranch country and that's about it. If you aren't a rancher or work in the oilfield, I don't know what you do in Lander. The scenery from the campground was nice and there was a threatening thunderstorm that was moving in as the sun went down.

We had a nice night in Lander and were unknowingly within half a mile of the field site with our tent. That made it pretty easy to get to in the morning to take the samples. This is getting even longer than I though it would so I'm going to cut it off here for now and probably post the second half tomorrow. I need to get a ride in this evening and could spend the rest of the night writing here. Perhaps I'll have enough energy after the ride to write a little more before heading to bed. We shall see.

21st Century Camping

I can't believe I'm writing this at a campground where we're sleeping in a tent. Yes, it is an RV/tent campsite but, still. We're in Lander, WY for the night and will be headed to Fort Collins, CO tomorrow... we hope. I've got tons more to write about the last two days but, I'll just say that it will have to come a little later. There are tons of pictures too but it's getting hard to keep the eyes open. We're both pretty tired and it's time to hit the sack. Good Night.

Where's Willie Nelson when you need him?

If you'll pardon the reference... we are, in fact, "On the Road Again." I'm writing this from our hotel room at the Best Western in Pocatello, ID. It's our home base for a few days before heading out to Wyoming and Colorado. Lorena is setting up some monitoring sites and collecting some samples from others as part of her master's research into Dalmatian Toadflax, an invasive weed in these here parts. We are on the road for the entire week and I'm her free labor. I really only need my laptop to work on my master's research at the moment so that allows me to work pretty much anywhere as long as the battery is charged. We left yesterday (Saturday) with the hope of making it to Idaho Falls or Pocatello in one day but, that proved to be too much. Instead, we ended up camping at Bannack State Park, about 18 miles west of Dillon, MT. It was a very nice campground and cheap too at $12. The scenery is hard to beat. Since Lorena really doesn't have to start her site setup until Monday, we decided to do a little playing along the way by hitting some mountain bike trails we've never ridden. Friends have told us there is great singletrack near Idaho Falls and Pocatello and so we were looking forward to some good riding. We picked up a Falcon Guide for Mountain Biking in Idaho at the library, unfortunately dated in 1999. A lot can happen in 8 years and a lot has happened. Much of what they called singletrack in the book is 4-wheeler width now and there are a lot of 4-wheelers and motorcycles using the trails. The worst part was the fact that we stopped at a bike shop in Idaho Falls to ask about trail conditions and status and we were told there it was singletrack. The trails I'm referring to are near Kelly Canyon ski area, east of Idaho Falls. Needless to say, we were a bit disappointed to ride around for nearly an hour and half, eating dust, only to head back to the car in disgust for searching in vain for the phantom singletrack. On the plus side, we were riding our bikes and the views weren't too bad from here either. As we were packing up to drive to Pocatello, we did talk to a couple of other riders that told us about how the trails used to be singletrack until they allowed ATVs on them in the last few years. The dust in some places was two inches deep and it made your tires sound like they were flat when you rode through it. Funnily enough, the two riders we ran into looked just like a couple of riders in Ohio that we know. One was a dead ringer for Paul Kinney of the Orrville Cycling Club and the other guy looked like someone we raced with in the OMBC series in Ohio. Unfortunately, I can't remember that guy's name right now. He does ride a Specialized Epic if that helps... Tomorrow, we're hoping to ride some trails here in Pocatello that we've been assured are non-motorized and should bear some resemblance to the trails we've been spoiled on in Ohio and northern Idaho. I sure hope so. We don't know when we'll be camping and when we'll be in hotels but I should have pictures and stories posted sometime later in the week or as we have internet access. Some of those new-fangled campgrounds have wi-fi now. What is the world coming to? Mine is pointing in the direction of a nice soft bed. Good Night.

Trail of Coeur D'Alenes Ride

Today was a pretty fun road ride. Seven of us left Moscow at around 8:30 this morning to drive to Plummer, ID to ride the Trail of the Coeur D'Alenes. The trail itself is 72 miles long but we had no intentions of that out and back. We figured we'd ride anywhere between 50 and 80 miles depending on how everyone felt. The group spanned just about every level of riding ability but everyone was generally in good shape. We figured we'd likely split up into a couple of groups, one that would ride longer and one that wouldn't. The first 7 miles was roughly downhill. It's a very gradual descent but a descent nonetheless. Everyone was feeling pretty good and we had the highlight of crossing the lake on this bridge at the bottom of the hill.

I remembered this bridge from the Bikecar movie and thought it would be fun to ride on it at some point. We got our chance today and it's pretty fun. The little stairsteps seemed like a bizarre method of construction at first but it made for a more fun descent off of the bridge in that you could bunnyhop on them.

The group started to split up between mile 12 and 15 and we regrouped at Harrison to decide on the next leg. Jason and Liz decided to turn back and the rest of us decided to continue on to the east. Poor Liz was riding a Trek 420 from wayback and it probably put her at a severe disadvantage compared to what everyone else was riding. Both she and Jason are very good runners but riding a bike that probably weighs twice as much as everyone else doesn't help. We rode another 10 miles beyond Harrison and Smitty's girlfriend Lex was starting to not enjoy not having cycling shorts combined with a seat she was not used to (borrowed bike). We decided that continuing on to Cataldo would be a bad idea even though the thought of an 80-mile ride turning into a 50-mile ride wasn't exactly what we'd hoped for. So, we turned around and started to head back. We did stop in Harrison to eat a little lunch and then it was back to the car. Remember, there was a 7-mile climb waiting for us at the end. We hit the base of the climb and cranked up the pace. I tried to keep it above 17mph for the entire climb and managed to do so. That kinda gives you an idea of the grade. Not horribly steep but long. It was starting to hurt at the end but fun overall. I would like to ride more of the trail in the future. There's some great scenery and you get to see a lot of the countryside that you don't see from the interstate. Stuff like this: You can check out more pictures from the ride by clicking here, or clicking on the Flickr links. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go deal with my sunburn.