Archive for the 'bike' Category

The Monday night St. Louis ride pared down to Root and me, with Ckucke away in Lost Wages, and Chris and JT having prior commitments.  Just about 16:00, the skies over Honolulu went black and squalls of heavy rain fell.  Although momentary, the grey over the mountaintops promised more of the same, and if nothing else the trail was going to be panko.  

I called Root and told him I was going home, but if the weather was good on the windward side, we could still do some secret training.  The weather was indeed nice, so I geared up with the light, anticipating a longer-than-usual ride if Root showed up.  I did my regular run over to WCC and rode laps.  The sky went from blue to twilight orange, then descended into darkness.  Taro called and got my voicejail and said that he got stuck late at work, so couldn’t make it.  A white veil of rain crossed the valley, so after a couple of laps in t he rain, I decided to dig.

D = 16.17 km (10.05-miles), Vavr = 18.2 km/h (11.3 mph), Vmax = 37.3 km/h (23.2 mph), T = 53-minutes

Nobody really wrote anything about this, but Root, JT, and I went on a CroMo hardtails-only ride on Sunday, 02 March 2008 at Ditch.  Root showed up with his 10th Anniversary Fat Chance, JT had his Bridgestone XO-1, and I had my drop-handlebar Bridgestone MB-1.  The climbs were so nice on bent-over, lightweight bikes, but the horsey-print trail surface made for some punishing conditions with no suspension and skinny, high-pressure tires.  Aside from the inevitable monkey-butt, there was some good neckache from craning to look ahead, and vibro-itch on the jiggly parts of the arms.  We rode out to the end of Ditch then came back and did the inner loop.  We actually rode all the steeps, but didn’t do much of the stuff in the rock garden. Continue reading ‘Leap Year Ride’

Windward side was sunny on Wednesday, and being a holiday there was little traffic, so I got home fairly early. Surprisingly enough, people weren’t driving like total fools (which is the norm for a holiday). I rode the regular training loop including the Chicken Trail. Almost cleaned the entire rooty climb in one go – maybe next time. I saw the two chicken families. All the little hyoko are now ugly, scraggly fledglings. One family is down to less than half-a-dozen, but the other is still at full strength. I did a little exploring at the top to see if any of the old singletrack is still rideable, but the old top traverse has some homeless structure built on it, so I couldn’t connect it to the old lower trail to the orphaned part of Kapunahala. There are a lot of surveying ribbons and pins up there – something is going to happen with that land soon. I turned in a few more laps than normal since the sun was out, then backtracked up the Chicken Trail. I cleaned the reverse climb.

D = 16.72 km (10.11-miles), Vavr = 16.4 km/h (10.2 mph), Vmax = 40.7 km/h (25.3 mph), T = 59-minutes

Talking bike with Chris all afternoon inspired me to get out and take a spin yesterday.  Scat and Root were going to hit the jumps, but I didn’t get the email about that until after noon yesterday, so I didn’t have my ridy kit with me.  The sun was still high when I got home, but it was overcast and a little windy out. The Moment was as it was after the last ride. The shifting was fine and the suspension felt nice… the back brake felt a little pumped-up though – I’ll have to check that out later. I did my normal loop, but from the top of WCC, I saw that the State or C & C workers had cleared away a lot of brush, African Tulip trees, and invasive Albizia trees on the hill behind the District park pool. Root and I explored this hill many years ago and found several well-used trails. In recent years, the hill had become overgrown, thus attracting wild chickens and druggies, so I hadn’t ridden there in a while. The brush clearing has made it at least unattractive to the crack-heads and paint-sniffers, so I took a spin up the steep, chicken-infested hill to check things out. The trails were still there, but there was a lot of trash scattered about. I might have to add that back into my neighborhood rides – the rooty melaleuca climb, the scenic hilltop, the moonscape chicken drop-in.  I went back to WCC and did a couple more laps before heading home.

D = 11.88 km (7.38-miles), Vavr = 16.7 km/h (10.4 mph), Vmax = 36.6 km/h (22.7 mph), T = 42-minutes

Yes, periodically check your equipment and tools. They can become damaged through disuse. Is that anything like blue balls? Anyway, I went pretending I was a roadie (no tightie shorts though!) tonight in a vain attempt to get my conditioning somewhat better for the trip. Started too late, only been doing it for past few weeks. Anyway, I cruised out past Koko Marina. Beautiful crystal clear night, calm to almost no winds so it was fast in all directions! Turned back into Hawaii Kai at the cancer duck corner, cruised past the 7-11 and decided not to do the little hillclimb to the back of that valley. I’d done it before, and Kulioouou Valley the other time. Zipping around on the flats tonight, I got it in my head to climb Mariners Ridge. Continue reading ‘Check your tools’