26 January, 2008

Temperature Change

Tuesday night had rolled around, warmer than the last few days, and blessed with a few re-whitening inches of powder. Find the lights. Charge the Lights. Hit the trail. Well, the O and E canal MTB trails anway. I really don't like them. Let that be known. Something smells really bad down there, they were built by someone slower than me, and eventually the whole upper half of the trail is going to slide down upon the lower half of the trail thus slamming shut the hopes of building better MTB trails in america's "number one urban park system." And when its frozen and ice covered, I like it even less. JD, and Jackson schooled me pretty well for 4 laps. My riding TO the trail had nothing to do with it, I just suck in icy conditions. What I will blame is the bike, not THE bike, because THE bike was at the shop awaiting travel to Georgia. I took out the full bounce gary fisher...which in its non use has forgotten how to shift properly, or conversely, has learned how to shift on its own. Either way, we weren't getting along and I deeply missed having only one gear to worry about. And some dry trails. Two more weeks to Snake Creek #2.Wednesday found me in sunny Phoenix, quite the temperature change. Inspired by Team Dicky's run club, and my lack of bike, I decided to go "running."
I consider myself a fairly fit individual. Let me be the first to tell you, running uses different muscles than riding. And when your heart can handle what your legs can't, you can really get yourself in trouble. It is now Saturday afternoon, and I still cannot walk down stairs without intimate assistance from the handrail. I walk around stiff legged because my quads won't support my weight in a bent position. Getting out of a chair requires a full tricep press to a standing position. Ridiculous. I haven't run in maybe 6 years, and this little outing lasted nearly an hour on rocky trail. I doubt strongly that I gained any much needed "hike a bike legs" from this outing. Instead I got "wooden puppet legs," which, no matter what the rumors, are shite for pedaling a bike.

What's next. A pre race week. Hope I can get some riding in this week in St. Louis. I'm starting to get into the part of the year where I'd like to out doing some long rides. What worries me is that the best I can do is some stupid indoor hotel fitness center rides. I'll be flying to ATL on friday night and driving up to Dalton for the February edition of the Snake Creek Gap Time Trial.

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