I've been joining a gal's ride on Monday, an informal deal that develops by
email. I've gone out a few times, and it's been really nice to join someone
else's ride.
Last night, there were **10** fun gals who showed up! What a group! Ladies
in lycra overrunning the trail head. Now, the plan is always for a high
fun factor with a low stress factor. The plan is also for a short easy
first loop, drop off anyone that feels done and then go back out for more.
Liz puts me out as lead, how's that for stress. She's on her new single
speed and wants to stay with her newbie friend, so she's on sweep. This all
works out very well except for one thing, she knows the route she wants to
take and I only sort of do. You can imagine the silliness and chaos as the
sweep rider yells out through the woods "no, go RIGHT there, the OTHER
way..." It's ok
tho - she knows the north end of the park much better than I do. I get lots
of razzing.
The spirit of the ride is awesome; No Rider Left Behind and Let's Have Fun.
We have a take no prisoners sense of humor, which everyone is agreeable to.
I'm the resident target, being a semi-lost lead rider. When it comes to the
log pile that
has an easy go-round, Jane takes a handful of gals back to it, shows them
how, and lets anyone who wants to give it a try. At least five new log pile
riders are created. Then off into the woods on fast flat buff singletrack.
It's fun being out front, really, I can set the pace and it's almost like
being solo, I hear the gab thing going on behind me. After 8 (oops, supposed
to be 5) miles we drop off one rider at the trail and head back out for the
second
portion of the ride.
Now, I'm in my element, the plan for the second loop is to hit many of the
singletrack elements in the south end of the park, which I know very well.
This is a lot more fun to lead when I actually know where I am going!! Now,
this is truly mindless cycling with flow, because the brain knows where to
do and the body just follows.... The park is a crazy maze of double and
single track. Either you know it, or you don't. For years, I followed my
riding pals around without a fricken clue as to where I was, and I got tired
of the mystery.. So I started coming out on my own and figuring it out. The
north side of the park is as bad as the south for maze factor, but at least
now I know where I am and where to go.
So, leave the trailhead (again) on a singletrack spur, take a right when you
hit the doubletrack, head west pedalpedalpedal, then when the double track
heads up the hill, duck on the singletrack that goes behind the old military
ruins, through the forest, back out onto the double track in the meadow,
stay right and then look for the new piece of singletrack that was built
this spring. They can no longer ridicule me as I am clearly in charge now.
This next section is a bit
challenging for some of the gals, narrow, twisty in a dark forest, and then
there's the crux..
up hill baby heads with a step ( flat rock) at the top. My goal is to
clean it by finishing with a wheel lift onto the step, but I think I need to
come out in a non-group format to work on it.
Onwards... we come out onto the clearing, work our way up [censored] Hill ( you
don't want to know) through the burn, and down to the river on the Little
Vietnam section..
flat fast and LOTS of vegetation. I feel like the crash test dummy out in
front -
you never know who is coming the other way. Tonight, thankfully it's no one.
I take the pulse of the gals right behind me...
"OK, girls, there's a little tiny rock you can jump off, if you want you can
follow me..."
"Yeah, right"
"C'mon, it's tiny, I'm 45, I just learned how to do this!".
No takers besides me on actually launching off it, ( hey, let's hear it for
the Bomber fork upon landing) but a couple of the gals are tickled just to
have ridden over it. Maybe next time, eh? It only took me years of riding
off the thing to learn how to catch air off it.
We wind our way back up the hill to trail's end. A gaggle of happy, sweaty,
lycra clad mountain biking women with big grins on their faces.
~penny