Thursday, May 29, 2008

Finishing Touches

Don't let the title give you the wrong idea though, the job is never done. I'm quite pleased with the way this turned out, not that I can take much credit, it was someone else's idea, my contribution was limited to execution.

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Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Pictures And Such

Evening ride tonight, not too far, just a few miles around the hood.

The nearest library.

Found a park not far from home that I had no idea existed, couple hundred yards of singletrack and just about the coolest off leash dog park I've ever seen.

Downtown view.

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Monday, May 26, 2008

Weekend Update

Well I'm just sitting on the couch watching the new BBQ season out on the deck and it seems like as good a time as any to go through the rundown of what's been happening.

Sometime in the middle of last week I finally decided to seek a professional opinion about my heel injury from last weekend. The PA, radiologist, and orthopedist all are in agreement, I broke my heel. It's a hairline fracture and there's nothing that can be done. I'm supposed to keep my weight off of it for ~3 weeks and use crutches, so far that's not really working out so well. Oh yeah, no bike riding.

Saturday, I spent the majority of my time working on or in the garage until it was time to head to the party at Paul and Sean's. It was kind of a coming out party for the house, which I was given way too much credit for. It was also a good chance to take some night pictures of the house, my lens is no where near fast enough for hand held night shots, but here they are none the less.





Yesterday was BBQ shopping day. Patrick, you would be so proud. You can come up and try it out when you come pick up your bike(it's ready, by the way). Later, Rach came by and we all went to dinner at the shittiest Mexican place I've ever known, Tacos Guaymas. And no, this was not my first visit to this consistently bad crap shack, I've been there at least four times previously. Rach really likes the patio seating, so that's where we went. I keep hoping that the food will have the tiniest bit of flavor and I keep getting totally let down. Seattle's not much for Mexican food and so far I've found a couple places that are decent and one that is exceptional. Not quite the same as what's available in the 'nix. Anyway, Michele and Rach walked and I rode down after(Yeah, I'm not supposed to ride, but zero pain on the bike so I'm fucking doing it).

U-lock in pocket.

The argument for big tires in the big city.

The stairs on the way home, good for riding down.

On the docket for today is some bike, maybe some canoe, and the breaking in of the BBQ. Good times.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Results Are In...

...and here they are.

Well, dad and I finished 24th in class of 29 finishers, however if you don't count the ten hour time penalty incurred we'd be 10th in class and 20th overall. Too bad we weren't smart enough to figure out obscure Seattle landmarks.

Dad found a picture of the two of us in a rather comprising position on the interweb. He stole it first and now I'm following suit:

Oh man that's rough.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Weekend Recap

So after laying low around the house for a bit on Saturday afternoon we loaded up bikes and did a little show and tell with dad at Colonnade. We rode around for about a half an hour, playing on the fairly simple stuff. Of course, that's the place where I'm bound to take a little damage. Coming around a switchback I came off my bike a little funny and went down on my heel. Must have done a little damage too, because I've been a bit hobbled since. Good thing I don't need my heel to ride a bike.

Played on the pump track again, a lot more work than it looks like, and yes a little better on a 26" bike, but that doesn't make me any better. I've got to get one of these, great total body workout.

Fast forward to this morning, a god damned le mans start, and me with a gimpy foot. At least we were in the first starting group, we made decent time up to REI too.

I was amazed by how well we were doing, there were lots of people out there on road bikes, in full lycra and dad and I on our knobbies were keeping pace ok. After REI was the first secret checkpoint further up on Capital Hill where we got a very cryptic clue for the next secret checkpoint, when we couldn't figure it out for the life of us someone gave us a location(the wrong location, of course we didn't find that out until it was way too late). Off to Recycled Cycles, thankfully it was downhill. Oh was it ever downhill, we were screaming down 23rd/24th at 40 mph(ten over the speed limit) and passing cars. Recycled Cycles was bicycle jousting, dad riding a BMX bike with me perched on the pegs attempting to snatch up a series of rings, we did ok.

Next stop, Greg's up at the hamster wheel for the keg walk. See dad keg walk.

Over to Ballard next, shaving distance in favor of elevation. Getting up to Phinney wasn't too bad thanks to the little bit of dirt that can be found in Woodland park. Of course, dropping 300 feet down the other side in 3/4s of a mile was very good. From there it was an easy roll into Ballard for a little paperboy fun at Bike Works. Dad got to hurl rolled up newspapers at me and I got to try and catch them. After that I figured we were home free, it's flat to Gasworks Park and then we just roll back into Fremont and done.

No so fast, somebody thought it would be a good idea to have human wheelbarrows be a part of this event. Easily the hardest part of the whole thing. My fat ass trying to support my upper body balanced or a little wheel and dad trying to haul the rest of me.

This guy had it easy with a kid as a partner.

Back to the center of the universe and home fucking free.

But wait, there's more. Two hot laps on big wheels. Pneumatic front and plastic rears made for nice drifty action. I've got to get one of these.

All done! I haven't seen official results yet but Michele estimates less than 20 teams ahead of us out of the ~100 entered. Not too shabby, I was certain that we were much further back.

Playtime. See that nice two wheel action.

Oh, it's beer-thirty! I'm sure glad Michele suggested bringing the chairs.

And there's Michele now!

Dad cleaned up in the raffle, scoring both a Rudy Project backpack/helmet bag and a women's size small Swobo jersey, I didn't get jackshit. However, I do still have this gimpy foot.

Saturday, May 17, 2008

It's On

Dad's here, we're all signed in, and we've earned a head start. Oh yeah it's going to be a good day.

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Friday, May 16, 2008

Happy Bicycle to Work Day

Here's some random people enjoying Bicycle To Work Day.

Here's Michele observing Bike To Work And Then Get A Ride Home Day.

And I feel so blessed to have celebrated Leave Your Bike In The Garage And Spend All Day Behind The Wheel Of The Company Gas Guzzling Beast Day.

At least I can look forward to some riding this weekend. Yeah!

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Big Time

I haven't seen it yet, but word on the street is that I got into the latest issue of Dirt Rag. I'm guessing it'll hit my mailbox tomorrow.

Thanks for the heads up dad.

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Playing Catch Up

So apparently someone is taking this whole race thing seriously. All this time I've been barely riding my bike at all. I tried to log some decent miles today in a last ditch effort not to get my ass handed to me by a man damn near twice my age. I rode the El Mariachi and headed South towards Colonnade bike park. The ride there gave me an opportunity to give some thought to the tires I'll be running next weekend. I've got a pair of 700x28s on the spare wheels ready to go, but today it occurred to me that the WWLT roll pretty well and they're in no danger of getting eaten by a storm drain. On the down side there's a bit of a difference in rotating mass and my fat ass can use any break I can get. Something to think about anyway, also I suspect that the secret checkpoint could have something to do with Colonnade, that'd be one more plus for the WWLTs.

Back to the ride, it's only about six miles to Colonnade from the house and downhill two thirds of the way, a neighborhood zigzag route minimizes climbing, yeah me.


The pump track is really fucking sweet, a lot of time went into this and it shows. Of course I need more pump track time to not suck so much. I wonder if 26" tires would help?

The wall rides are pretty impressive, not really my cup of tea, but I sure like to watch.


I really like the new carving, it complements the other one quite well.

So the question that I never get asked is,"What's the Seattle equivalent to In-N-Out?" Well, it's Dick's.

Yes, that's right, Dick's. Of Sir Mix-A-Lot's My Posse's On Broadway fame, although this is the 45th location. Not quite as good as In-N-Out, it'll certainly do in a pinch. The question is, was I there to hang out, play, or flaunt clout?

Hey look, hiring practices of a similar quality to those of In-N-Out.

Maybe I'll get out and ride even more this week, supposed to start getting really nice soon.

Monday, May 5, 2008

St. Eds

Dropping down to the lake right off the bat seemed like a good idea at the time.

Actually, in retrospect it still doesn't seem all that bad, but on the way up it sucked. Not a hard climb some much, just a super out of shape rider. And a dog. A mean dog, on a 50 foot leash. What the fuck, why even have a leash? And then to shrug and say that you dog doesn't like strangers or bikes as if that makes everything ok? Maybe I need to start adapting some sort of Gnome-esque trail etiquette. Is a short 6 foot leash too much to ask? Unless your dog is Gordo the Wonder Dog of course, than no leash is fine with me, that's the one and only exception.

After my trip to the water and back I made a B line for Finn Hill.

While there I took the El Mariachi for it's first flight. First I should explain, I rarely leave the ground on my bike, when I do it's because of one of two reasons. The first is when I hit a bump, jump, or lip at speed and roll it, I'll absorb as much of the jump as I can and take the rest of it as a couple of inches of air. The second is when my front tire decides that it will go no further and I leave the ground sans bike, amazingly enough about 75% of the time I land safely on my feet. Neither of these count as a real bicycle flight. Anyway, I came into a clearing at near 20 mph to see a group of four straddling their bikes just off the trail right next to a nice little jump. Nothing entices this fat boy toward flight quite like an audience. Tiny chicken shit brake check right before launch and I was off. I'm not exaggerating when I tell you that I fucking sailed. I was so shocked by the smoothness of the landing I just kept on going, sliding sideways off a berm and into the brush. I figured it would be better to let my airborne visage live in the minds of the crowd rather than explain my off trail misadventure so I just rolled on at high speed. The last thing I heard as I rolled out of sight was,"he had no suspension". That's right I'm a bad ass.

Couple of lousy self timer shots while I was still riding my airborne high. I figured that was enough for one day and headed back to the car.

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Oh My!



Sorry ladies, he's spoken for.
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Sunday, May 4, 2008

SST, Again.

Back to South SeaTac again today. The singletrack has been really nice the last two times I made the drive out and I was expecting something a little softer this time due to all the rain. Not so, nice and tacky, not at all slick.

It usually takes a few rides at a new location for Michele to start warming up to the trails, and SST is no different. Her main complaint right now is that we don't really go anywhere, all the trails just loop back on themselves. I totally understand where she's coming from. I really like it when a trail takes me somewhere, but there's also a place for a dense system like this one that brings trails into the city. She did like the airplanes coming in to land overhead at least so that's gotta count for something.

We made a couple of laps before packing it in and heading to The Center of the Universe for lunch. Turns out parking is easier than you might think on market day(if you're willing to pay for it).

We passed Stalin on the way to McMenamins.



Saw this on the walk back to the car, I love this thing, even though it is a VW. It says,"Unofficial Car, Artists Republic of Fremont".


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