Trail Maintenance with CCCMB

My family is thinking of joining in for some trail maintenance work this coming Saturday. We use the trails so much - time to give back. Even more - a way to serve our community and fellow riders and hikers.

Not sure if we'll all go or just Kyle and I. Thinking we might all try to get engaged and eject if the kids go sideways. Who wants to join us?


Here is a link: http://www.cccmb.org/

Morning Glory & Shooters Trails - Los Padres National Forest

Saturday, January 10, 9am to 12pm

Meet at SLO Vet's Hall Parking Lot

2009 MTB Race Calendars

Here are a few links to races that I have found:

http://www.cccx.org/mtb/2009/index.shtml
(I will be doing at least 1 one of these in Fort Ord pre- Sea Otter)

http://platinummtb.com/schedule.htm

Mid March ....Keyesville Classic ....date to be announced

http://www.ridesb.com
(practically in our backyard)

And I think we should plan on Friday morning MTB rides being race prep days of sorts....TT / mock racing...maybe not every Friday but every other at least.

Chad

Who has a new ride?

Some serious bike passing has been goin on and I think it is about time to see who ended up with what... post em up boys.  How about Steve Leonard bein on the dirt yesterday?

Sunday Fellowship

It was a beautiful afternoon for a fellowship ride out in the back bay on the Rock Quarry trails.
We enjoyed our time together, especially with Steve....aka - "Chewy".... making his presence in the mtb world known! (Great to have you out there Steve..........You were rocking!)Chewy at the top of the toughest climb out there, wondering why in the world is he trying to convert from the road? Answer = It will only make you a better roadie!!!! Who knows, you may not label yourself as a roadie anymore......
Look at that bunch! "Clyde" Collins, "Ricky Bobby" Ernstrom, Jason "Techy" Evangelista, Chewy, Dave "El Jefe" O'Brien, and "The Future"
Ricky Bobby giving his best Blue Steel impression.

BTW - Jefe/Chewy......Nice bikes!!!!!



Levi

Christmas Ride Report from the OC

My family went down south and spent Christmas in Orange County.
A life long buddy of mine, Ryan Damato, and I went out on a couple rides while down there.
The first was on "San Juan Trail" which is in the Ortega's between San Juan Capistrano and Lake Elsinore. The trail is awesome......I would say its a top 10 kind of ride. Its a 19 mile ride that is like shooters, MDO and Madonna all mixed together. Long steady climb that really gets the legs burning and a decent that keeps on going. I highly recommend riding this trail if ever down that way.......only caution is make sure you have someone with you riding the trail for the decent to warn of crazy corners. One who does not know the trail well could easily head off the trail in a bad way if not careful. Ryan is one of the only people I know who will go side sliding into these turns and peddling out of them....he is a crazy!!!!!

The other ride was behind his office in the hills of San Clemente, at the end of Pico. This is a relatively new trail system that gets better every time I'm down there. In part because of the people trying to stop the toll road that will go through there down through Trestles. They figure the more the area is being used , the less likely the toll road goes through.........I'll take it!

Ryan also used to lead the OC chapter of OCBOMB (Believers on mountain bikes), but has now started his own group with similar intentions of ministry on the bike. It is called "Linked" and he hopes to get us to represent on our next kit we get made up......What do you think?

Hope you all had a great Christmas and Happy New Year!
Looking forward to many rides in '09...........


Levi

New Year's Day Ride - Da Brothers

We had an epic epic ride this morning. Rabbit and Torque. Tim's inlaws and my inlaws happen to live a few houses away down in north county San Diego. This year we both brought our bikes down and we were fortunate to steal away this morning for a great ride. Who knew that Escondido could rival the Central Coast for best trail. For now, we'll call it the best ride in 2009. I think its greatness came from 1) the monster climbs (3 ups), 2) the brother element, 3) and all around great variety.








Highlights of the ride include:

1. Tim greeting me with coffee at 5:25am.
2. Almost cleaning the 22 switchbacks up Elfin Forest "WayUp Trail".....we both had 2 small dabs.
3. The monster climb up the new county reserve from Del Dios Highway (pic does not do justice. It was the steepest fireroad we have ever done.
4. Team Enduro. Team Black ....we were matching.
5. Riding with Rabbit who was strong strong strong from beginning to end.
6. Catching some good air on one of the jumps and almost not making my front wheelie landing
7. Riding with my brother. Best ride I think we have had together
8. Breaking the year in with a 22 mile, 3400ft of gain, 2.5 hr mountain bike ride. Round 2 - the sequel - is set for tomorrow morning.

Here, above, are a couple of pics. Look closely at the backgrounds and try to get the perspective.....insane climbs make insande vistas.

Shooters Improved x2

The new trail below Shooters is now open. . . . smooth, fast, and fun. Great climb and amazing descent. It was definitely the missing piece. I must say, shooters may now be my favorite local ride.

Its quick . . . up and down from the Poultry Unit in less than an hour and half.
Its varied . . . great climb, now fast, smooth descent.
Its a a great, quick workout . . . you can spin it or you can mash it. Its as hard as you need it to be.

Caught it Saturday afternoon with Scott Morton, aka Doc . . . his first time up . . .

Watch out, he's hitting the mountain. . . solid!

And again this morning with Mark Ernstrom, aka Hobbit . . .

No dome protection this AM. . . don't tell his wife.

the crystal clear view from the hill

cool waterfall back there, but you can't see it

part of the new trail . . . pic doesn't do it justice

So what's your favorite local ride? (Check out the new survey in the right panel!)

And let's hear about some of those out of town rides, boys!

frosty & sticky

I was amped that a ride started to firm up for this morning. . . a chance to burn off some of those Christmas calories. . . . Hobbit, Clyde, Coach, and Torque were expected. Lopez was the call, 6:30 the meet time.

Got an 11:00 text from Torque that his wife was puking, so he was "iffy."

Arrived at 6:20 and parked in the lot on High Mountain Road, because I'm cheap and didn't want to pay the $7 parking fee. Rolled into the parking lot at 6:30 on the nose and waited. . . . and waited. . . .



and waited . . .

No one showed! What's up with that? (I'm not bitter. I'm really not. Honest.)

So I headed out all by my lonesome. Did the campground loop and then headed out the long grind climb to the lookout. On the way back, climbed a crazy steep fire road off the dirt road. Finished with a reverse campground loop.

It was beautiful. IT WAS COLD. It was sticky, but not muddy, after yesterday's rain. It was fun.

ice in the puddles and frost on the lookout bench

foggy lake in the background , freezing my tail off

Saturday Ride Report - December 20th

We had a great ride this afternoon. Started off Turri Rd...."Rock Quarry" was the name Dave Obrien gave to the ride. Present included Sean (Levi / Blingstar....keep reading for explanation), Dave, Tyler (Future), Julie, Kyle, and Torque. Levi (a.k.a. Blingstar) was supporting his new Anthem. Sick sick bike. We had at least one long hammer session where he was showing why he is going to kill it in Cat 1 on the dirt this year. That bike is super fast. We will see if his new name sticks. Speaking of names, we need to name Dave and Kyle....

It was a real joy to be out there today. I have not ridden with Julie for quite some time. Thanks to Liesel and the Obrien girls for watching the rest of the Theule kidos.

Here are some pics from the day....

P.S. I think there were more rides today. Anyone, anyone....ride reports please!


Dave looking great on the Enduro. Next up...MDO from his ranch.




Blingstar showing some guns.



Future wondering "what took you so long Levi". Yes, he is fast. Tyler - remember to TT your hill before Christmas.


Little Brady in his new dome....Santa came early....he won't know the difference, right?

Kyle's first Kit

My firstborn son turned 10 this week. Kyle and I had a sweet time together on Tuesday, December 9th as we headed up MDO for a little rite of passage. His task was to make it up the Hazard Peak Trail where he was awarded with a Daily Devotional (thank you Dan Woods), some prayer time, a short conversation about becoming a man, and a really fun decent. He had no problem completing the mission. He and Julie have been riding 2x per week for the past 3 weeks. It really showed on the ride. You rock Kyle! Here are some pics of our day. Kyle - I love you my son!

Ride Report: Saturday, December 13

Spontaneous Saturday morning rides are rare with us. It could be the crazy schedules. Or maybe our family commitments. Kids. Fatigue from the week's activities. Probably all of the above. The point is we rarely head out on Saturday morning rides. I can't remember the last time that 4 of us rolled out on a Saturday after 9:00 for a 3 hour ride.

Got an email from Jeff a little after 8:00 am. The ride call was for LOVR and Foothill at 9:00 am. Met him, Korey, and Tim and rolled north towards Los Osos. Tim said "the pier" somewhere along the way so we ended up rolling to Cayucos. Had a coffee and scone at the turn and headed back. Headed through Morro Bay and did the Turri loop on the way back. Nice to stretch the legs a bit on Turri.

The foursome was great. Jeff kept us in line. Korey was steady eddy. Tim was up to his rabbit tactics as usual. I was giddy to be out with the fellas. Heading back on Foothill I ran into Doc (Scott Morton) on his new "bling my ride". And what do you know...he turned and pulled me back towards Patricia. I have fond memories of him doing that on my first central coast road ride back in 2006.

The week ahead may be a bit wet. Looking forward to hitting it hard during these winter months. Check the blog for ride posts. There will be plenty.

Ride Report: Friday, December 12

Clyde and I rolled out at 5:08am from Patricia Dr. The plan was to head up Poly Canyon to Stagecoach to Morning Glory down through Stenner and home. After 2200 ft of climbing in roughly an hour...nice medium pace..I was shifting from big ring to mid ring and snap.....the rear deraileur hanger snapped clean off. We were moments away from the decent of MG...argh! Had to call a co-worker and he graciously agreed to come get us at the top of the grade. What a bummer.

Despite several mishaps with the Enduro, I am loving the bike. Hope to get it back this next week and plan to ride it through February on any and all mountain bike rides.

Memories of the ride:
1. having a pre-ride coffee with Skippy
2. rolling pre-5:10
3. a nice steady pace...were you breathing Skippy?
4. a very quite Enduro (thank you Arts!) until SNAP!
5. seeing Scott Smith out running at 5:15am. He is cross training apparently.
6. the brightest moon i have seen in a long long time
7. getting chain and derailuer out of the spokes and off without any collatoral damage...I think...I hope.
8. the warm truck that picked us up.
9. friday morning rides rock...
10. sorry to hold you back Clyde. thanks for waiting for me.

Tour of Cali

The official route has been announced.

There is an unofficial plan floating around out there to ride the route from the central coast stages on down south. Dates are Feb 14-22 (Comes into Paso on the 18th I believe)

Who's interested?

www.amgentourofcalifornia.com

Wed Morning

Meet at 5:30
End of Maddona
Up and around Irish hills, over to laguna side of Madonna....up to top, around ring and out.

Hasta manana

levi

anyone wanna ride tuesday mornin?

lemme know. I might be rollin...