If there is dirt my tires are on it!

Since in the past 2 weeks I have gotten more flats then in the 4 years of riding I decided to take a chance and head out for a ride.  It was cold and kinda of wet on the trails this morning.   I was reading in one of my mountain bike mags that you should ride between 30 to 90 mins.  Also not to do much climbing because you might get over heated.  It said if you ride hard your body trys to cool you down by sweat which for the article is bad.  So I did a ride up a very steep hill since have never be able to ride up it yet.  I know bad, but it really was not bad it was great.   And to top it all off I did not get a flat.  YAH!!!

Its my day off today, lucky I get every other Friday off.  Decided to let it get warmer before riding in the cold.  I have to say the a cold morning ride is one of my best rides.  I love the cold air, the packed dirt and the omission of riders who think they can start at full speed and burn themselves out quickly.  My plan was to ride up Knapps/old tin mine the whole way out of the saddle to build up my climbing skills, but that did not happen.  I got up to my first stopping point and once again I had a tire leak again just like last weekend.  But I was ready this time I had CO2 that i got for the bicycle company however they were sitting in my work backpack back at home.  So the past 2 rides I ended up exercising by hiking instead of biking.  NO MORE I am going to get my tire checked out.

I had  great intention of riding today, and I kind-of did started out in 20 degree morning.  I rode great until I was knee deep in mountain and then it started to snow.  After hitting my rest area ( where I reach my goal) where I stop when I reach a point in my ride that I either went further without stopping (mostly a major climb) or I have gone past where I have rode before.   This time it was not stopping.  I noticed my rear tire was hissing and going down.  Being the prepared rider that I am, i went to my pack and pulled out one of 3 CO2 canisters and found out that since I store my pack in my car the CO2 were frozen or did not produced air to fill my tire.  So I went through the remaining canisters and all they all just could not fill my tire, and to top things off or make it more of a challenge it let the remaining air out of the tire.

That forced me into walking down the great Franklin Mountains while it was snowing and yes I did pack a jacket that protected me in just this type of weather.  I packed my bike on my back and away I went.  Two hours later I made it to my car and went home.   When I got home I looked at my tire by that time it had sealed itself.  So I just did not pay any mind to getting it fixed after putting air in and watching it for a few days.  The tire held it psi so did not follow through with getting it looked at.

Like I said in the title “When things are the same all the time day after day”, I mean I ride the same and do the same day in and day out.  However the month of October has been one month of Travel.  I went east to the Eastcoast then two weeks ago I went to the extreme west coast (hawaii) both I just did not have time to ride.  When I get back from all my travels I was sore (my back) that I need to loosen up and ride slowly.  One of the rides I was doing was practice for the 12 hour of old El Paso race which happened on Oct 22 2011. 

One of the things I have to do before a race is to check in with the doctor and when I talked to her she STRONGLY suggested I not race which I did.  So I am back off to training for the next races next year.  In the process of training I found an new trail out in the Northeast area.  In the next couple of post I will be trying to add video of the new trails.

RIDE SAFE

Which I am trying to live by.

Well the long rest period (3 months) is over and I have been riding the past 2 weeks basically 2 to 3 times a week.  It has been moving slow it seems that when crap happens it takes me a lot longer to get back to where I was before the wreck.  I meet up with John who informed me there are new trails created during the recovery period.  I can not wait to tell and show the new stuff.  I just registered for the 12 hour race hoping I will be back where I was BLK (before the lose of kidney)I will see.

It has been one month of a no ride promise I gave to my family, I am still sore but that is normal my Doc’s tell me.  I have been training on my trainer the past month and I am getting back to where I was before the crash.  Well look into getting back on my bike sooner but I will have to be at lease 98 % before that time.

Yesterday was the race, however I could not attend the race either racing nor watching.  I decided to take it easy and sleep till I woke up.  In other words I sleep through the race and missed it all.   Since I planned a while back to race I paid my money but when I damaged my kidney they wanted to refund my entry fee, which was very nice but I decided to keep supporting the mountain bike seen.  I believe we need to have more races sponsored by bike shops or other sponsores it keeps the bike scene active.  There is next year if nothing happens in the mean time.

This is like my crash nothing special not a major fall on some but it just did not work out well for me.

On Sunday 20 Feb 2011 (yes the windy day)  I crashed a minor crash than sent me to the hospital that night.  I was riding along LAZY COW to the Bowen Ranch when all of a sudden a gust of wind came up taking my bike from under me causing me to fall.  Like all crashes I have the tuck and roll has always worked.  So like most of my rules “if you can walk it off you are good to go”, that rule has been tested and that rule has been thrown out.  After the fall I rode another hour and a half.  That night I was in sever pain that by middle night I was having a procedure to stop the bleeding.  After the Procedure the Urologist told me my left kidney was gone.   So I was looking forward to getting rid of the pain and finally getting some sleep.  To make a story short I just got released and will keep you all up to date about my crash.

One thing I can say it was hell here in El Paso the past 4 days.  We have never experienced cold weather like this.  Mind you we have had cold weather like below zero in the morning but it would warm up by the afternoon.  But for 4 straight days of single digits it was very hard.  Our house just would not warm up maybe it was due to the electric company doing black outs.  They tell up they were just unprepared for the extreme cold.   We were told that out of 8 power plants none were working.  They also told us we were getting our power (electricity) from AZ.  So we were forced to blackout throughout the city.  We were also told THAT EVERYONE would be losing electricity through out the day.  Well on Wednesday we lost 4 hours of electricity and on Thursday we had most of the night without power.   Then the gas company did not want the electric company to one up them so they lowered the gas pressure so the heaters were not working to its full  capacity.   As for the water company they had no choose in the matter they JUST FROZE some people just did not have running water.   I tried to ride on Thursday with the temp being 4 at 8am.   Since the snow turned to ice and getting to the NE was an adventure in its own right, it took 1 hour on a drive that usually takes 15 mins.  Riding was a joke also it turned into a power slide here a power slide there.   I was fun but not totally fun.