And she did it: Jolanda Neff won a third U-23 World Championship to go with her 2014 UCI XCO Series title. Well done Jolanda, well done. You done us me proud.
Posts Tagged → unsolicited opinion
Bad Ideas Turned Good
As I mentioned the other day, my buddy at the shop lent me his Trek Farley* to ride for a few days and see what I thought. I did a lap on singletrack last Saturday and thought it felt a bit harsh compared to my Pugsley and made the pre-mature decision to shelve any ideas of considering one in the future. Then I got to thinking: whether I buy one or not, I think my assessment was a bit rash and not all that fair, given that while I have ridden my Pugsley on singletrack, I have only done so for 10-12 miles at a time to mix things up after I’ve done a “real” lap or two on my Superfly, or when conditions were shit.
I’ve love the Pugs in the snow and on the deep sand ORV trails, so I figured I should give the Farely another go before I return it this week, and ride it on surface that would be more akin to what I would actually use a fat bike on. The trouble is (thank God!), there is no snow on the ground and this week won’t really allow for me to head north to those ORV trails. So I had an idea– I would use the Farley for my dirt road ride today. Afterall, some of those roads are pretty sandy and pretty shit… It was a bad idea; sort of.
Photo Dump
Because I’m lazy and a bit tired from riding in the rain and humidity for two days, AND from watching DVRed football for the past few hours (soccer, NOT fucking throw-ball) while drinking a few beers I am going to just photo dump the past two days. Let out your collective moans now…
Loyalty and Such
I do 99% of my riding on my own, so I often find myself pondering a variety of things as a roll along the trails and roads: personal issues, what I’m having for lunch, why I see so many panties along the road, and of course, bike stuff. My most recent “bike stuff” thought (not to be confused with my “butt stuff” thoughts) was about the strange beast that is brand loyalty in the cycling community and how it weighs versus supporting one’s local bike shop.
None of the following thoughts apply that much to riders who wrench on their own bikes; for them, building a frame up is as easy as ordering it off the Net or direct from the builder or manufacturer, riding the hell out of it and servicing it themselves. What I am thinking applies more to someone like myself: someone who can do some minor maintenance, but for bike builds, serious fixes, or the want of having a repair done right, by someone who actually knows what the hell they are doing, knows the local bike shop is the place to go (OR to a friend’s garage who has all the tools, digs working on bikes and is happy(ish) do it for a few dollars or a six-pack or two).
And so my thoughts…
Neffness IX
How could I not post a photo giving props to our my [current] favorite big haired, flat billed hat wearing, super fast XCO racing, lady-type Jolanda Neff for winning her third UCI XCO race of the year on Sunday in Méribel, France, AND celebrating her overall Women’s UCI Mountain Bike World Cup series title???
Trying Out New Habits
Old habits are hard to break; like limiting myself to riding during daytime hours since I left my (cash paying) job in March of 2009. I mentioned this a couple of weeks ago, but it’s funny how true it really is and what other habits–good and bad–have come to replace a post-work ride on a weekday evening.
Let me say, this blog post was NOT supposed to be this long, it was just supposed to be a few photos from last night’s ride, but then I got thinking, wandered more than a bit off track and found myself “on the couch.” The short story is that I had a great ride on Wednesday evening (as illustrated above), the long story below is to be filed under Too Much Information or Never Has So Much Thought Gone Into Deciding To Go For a Fucking Ride. I don’t encourage you to read on, but do so if you wish.
Firmness, Blogging & Monkeys
I am a firm believer in what an old bike blogging sensei once told me in a hazy drunken dream atop a rain-soaked and muddy Pennsylvania mountaintop : “If you can’t think of anything worthwhile to blog about, just post some crap photo you took while your were out riding, no one reads the shit anyway, and if they do–especially in your case–they probably think you’re a complete and utter fucking wanker.”
And so I have. ‘Cause no matter how many miles of the same freaking trails I ride, I find something that I dig and want to make mad, passionate, retinal love to. I have never said that about a road ride. Nothing against road riding, I dig it, and I’ve had some pretty freaking awesome road rides, but no matter how hard the road tries, it just ain’t as kind on the eyes.
My Cycling Metamorphosis
Lately I’ve been thinking about the magical metamorphosis that took place when cycling went from being a hobby for me to lose weight and stay in shape to something that–in many ways–defines me as a person today.
Some Background
As a kid, the extent of my bike riding was rolling around town on my black and yellow Mongoose BMX bike wishing I had the skills, speed and balls to race BMX with my friends Scott and John. The bike was cool, with sweet yellow mag wheels, checkered bar and stem pads and even though I never did race the bike, I rode around with a number plate on it. I was #4, paying tribute to then Pittsburgh Pirate shortstop turned coke-head Dale Berra. A tribute paid only after buying the #4 decal and being asked why the hell I was #4. If eleven year old kids called each other poseurs back in 1982, I would have surely been called one, and deservedly so.
After the BMX days, I sold my bike, stopped playing soccer, stopped playing baseball and turned all my attention to my new hobby; eating. Through my teens and very early twenties, I ate myself to a robust, ruddy cheeked, lonely and depressed 300 pounds. It wasn’t until I was on the brink of exceeding the maximum girth of my size 42 pants and lacked the funds to make the move up to 44s, that I finally did something about my weight (it seems it’s cheaper to lose weight than buy new clothes).
After years of saying I was going to “diet,” I finally just changed my lifestyle. I no longer attempted to starve myself, try diet pills or Slim-Fast shakes. For the first time in my life I started eating healthier foods, cut out between meal snacking (which were actually between meal meals) and started exercising, and IT WORKED!
Keep in mind, that at 300 pounds, my “exercising” consisted of long walks seeking out the biggest hills in town while listening to my Walkman, and that when you go from doing nothing to doing something, things will start to change; regardless, I was stoked to see the pounds start to come off. Then one day while sitting in my room listening to sad bastard music and flipping though a magazine I saw an ad for a mountain bike. It looked cool as hell and on top of that I remembered that this really hot girl I had gone to art school with had one. Cool looking bike… hot girl rides one…. OH, I’M GETTING ONE!
Neffness VIII
In light of her complete and utter domination of this past Sunday’s UCI XCO race in Mont Sainte-Anne, Quebec, Canada, I would be remiss if I didn’t give another shout out to Jolanda Neff (Liv Pro XC Team) and her continued “Neffness.” It was pretty amazing to watch as she took the lead in the opening lap and never looked back. In the end she took the victory by over a minute on Canada’s own Catharine Pendrel (Luna Pro Team). With two races remaining, Neff leads the series with 900 points, 310 points over the second place Emily Batty (Trek Factory Racing).
Metaphors Aside
I recently found this photo amongst the hundreds of unused, crappier than most, photos I take while riding my bike. It’s obviously not all that good, yet I find myself liking it. I like it–if for no other reason than–because in the past, every time I have ever crossed over this particularly heavily trafficked intersection (heavy for being out in the middle of Bumfuck, Michiganderburgh) where the North Higgins Snowmobile Trail crosses a Roscommon County seasonal road, I have been forced off my bike to walk. The sand is too soft and the numerous tire ruts from trucks, ATVs and dirt bikes too deep.