Bedrock & Paradox

Used to be my favorite animal when I was little, and still an object of fascination. This shot must have been taken with a huge lens to be so close. Tomorrow’s class lesson, Pika distribution in the mountain ranges of the continental US and the research being done therein on genetic drift. Since the last…

Beta from Eric’s GPS from Sunday. 6.9k total of vert, not too bad.

Set out to augment the narrative below. The bike setup for yesterday was ideal. 30:20 was perfect, not too much for the climbing, able to hang with the gearies in the harder singletrack, and didn’t spin out too bad on the brief pavement (much of which was still uphill). Cockpit is ideal, Midges give great…

Cliche yes, but so is “ships passing in the night” until you’ve been on one. Yesterday was epic, not in the sense that anything went wrong, but in the mental sense. We all got pushed, some more than others, and to quote Seb Grieve “its all in the mind.” I went down to Phoenix early,…

Cuz I need to go to sleep! Below is a great photo of me assuming the position of the day. I forgot to set my altimeter log, but I think we logged around 6k of up in over 30 miles and 8ish hours. Gorgeous, gorgeous, fantastic riding. My hydration and nutrition was ideal, body felt…

Small version of tomorrows ride, courtesy of Dale (epicrider). Good stuff. 2.5 hours skiing today, trails icy from the last week’s freeze-thaw, but beautiful and a good workout. “Found” a new and much faster way to Flag courtesy of M and mapquest last night. Yeah, it’s been that obvious for the last 6 months. Dumb.…

I am in the midst of the good ole News Hour, and a story on the Voice of America and it using English, or not. A commentator lamenting English not basking in exclusivity, comparing it to Radio Moscow not using Russian, Radio France not French, etc, etc. We are America, and it might be a…

A review I’ve been meaning to do for a while, and the more straight and mindless sections of my 2 hour ride today let me consolidate the data; always tricky saying things like this in a way others will find accessible. The background: two plus years ago I bought a Cdale cross bike from a…

Part of this weekends plans: I’m finally crawling out of my shell and heading down south to ride some of the extensive trails in the Phoenix area. I’ve never even seen “the valley” in daylight, and am scared of it. Too big, too hot. The high for Sunday down there is 70! Won’t have to…

M is indulging in some snide, pomo cultural experience right this second: watching American Idol. It’s really, really bad. I find it enormously discouraging that such a deliberately public display of idiocy and embarrassment is so popular. We are all a part of this monster. On the other side, I rolled out 90 quality minutes…