Sunday, November 27, 2011

Buying speed

Its been a humbling experience moving to Colorado. Even when you're dialed on your riding and fitness, you are just rabbits for the pros and "faster than you" guys who seem to have endless amounts of time to ride. At 6" and somewhere between 185 and 200, I'll never be a fast climber but you still gotta get yourself up before you can get down.

Since I've moved here my bikes have gotten more and more travel and fatter and fatter. My current "all mountain" bike is in the 31.5 pound range, coil rear shock and tires that look like they are off a motocross bike. Needless to say, I don't enter many cross country races on it, but when the trails turn down or I get a chance to do lift service at a resort it shines.

Enter my latest favorite bike....
From New Niner Jet9 RDO


I built this bike up to be light(ish) and fast. I wanted a bike that I could ride on the road or bike path to the trail, then rip the trails then ride back home. Hand selected parts that are reasonably light, decent price but durable were picked and assembled. I built it up a couple weeks ago and then headed out to Hall Ranch, a ride that I've done tons of times for a shake down ride. I didn't ride overly hard, although I will admit to a nice dose of new bike adrenaline. I have no fitness, maybe negative fitness, at the moment but was quite surprised to see the results when I got home and dumped my GPS data.


4 personal records and another 2nd best time. Hmmm....Gotta just be the new bike excitement and gorgeous weather. Encouraging, but I must have been going harder than I thought.

On to the next ride...a revisit to the ride above, but this time with the intention of riding at a reasonable, conversational type pace. And the results...


Even faster on the way up. I was actually faster on the loop as well, but I used both my iPhone and my Garmin Edge 500 so it says "2nd best time", but its really 3 more personal records on this trail that I've ridden a lot. Also of note is that I've had a terrible head cold that I've just barely started recovering from. I think with a determined effort with lungs that are cooperating, I could smash these marks. These marks are beating my previous really hard efforts without any real fitness and without really going hard.

And then today, I did a different ride just for further comparison. This is a trail that has a 4.5 - 5 mile climb that is a mix of smooth and fast and rocky chunk. I did this climb a lot the last couple of seasons getting ready for my bigger events, so I've had a lot of results tracked on this climb.


Again today's ride was at a reasonable pace. Sure I went into the pain cave a couple of times, but I was never going deep into the red. The trail today was busy, but on the way up just about everyone yielded pretty well. There were a few times that I did have to come to a complete stop as descenders skidded towards me but overall I just kept powering up. The bigger shock was that I posted my 2nd fastest descent on record despite yielding an estimated 30+ times on the way down. Still puzzled at how that happened. I shaved almost 4 full minutes off my previous best time.

So what is the big difference? Is it the 29" wheels versus the 26" wheels? Is it a Horst Link suspension versus a CVA suspension? Is it aggressive 2.3 tires versus lighter, faster rolling 2.2s? Is it strictly a 6 pound weight savings advantage?

I honestly don't know, but there is obviously a large quantifiable difference between my two bikes. As I get more and more rides in on the new bike the differences may become more clear, but I'm quite pleased with how big an impact this new bike has made.

Who says you can't buy fitness? Not me anymore. Now how do I buy more hours in the day....

Friday, November 25, 2011

Thankful to be in Colorado

Won't ever get enough of this great weather we are having, the last several days have been picture perfect. In an attempt to burn off a few calories before intaking several thousand, we got the whole family out for a hike at Hall Ranch just down the road from us in Lyons.  Nice morning to be out, few people on the trails.

Cooper wanted to see where we were and where we were going on the map before getting started

From Hall Ranch Hike


Now that we have that figured out, off we go

From Hall Ranch Hike


Lauren didn't seem to care about the map much, but was cozy and warm in her Teletubby outfit

From Hall Ranch Hike


Cooper had his trusty walking stick (we've had this one for at least a year) and his trusty binoculars

From Hall Ranch Hike


Up we go

From Hall Ranch Hike



From Hall Ranch Hike



From Hall Ranch Hike



From Hall Ranch Hike



Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Cooper hitting his stride on the Stryder

Jill sent me this video the other day of Cooper showing off his skills at the skate park near our house. Just a few days ago he couldn't ride up or down these, now we flies around them.

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Halloween Treats

Halloween is such a fun time for us these days. Its an event (do you really call it a holiday? I don't) that I never cared for much until we had kids. Now its a big event for our whole family. In the last couple years, we've been blessed with some gorgeous weather, including temps in the 60s this year.

We decided this year to head south to Sarah's place to trick or treat with her and Reese as well as Tressa and her daughter Riley, who is just a bit older than Cooper. We had a wide range of costumes, but I think each kid's costume properly represented them. On to some pics...

Cooper was a Dragonosaurus, here demonstrating his "ROAR!"

From Halloween 2011



From Halloween 2011


Princess Riley joined in to help

From Halloween 2011


Pieces and Riley hug it out

From Halloween 2011


Then it was time to play before tricking and treating

From Halloween 2011


Lauren went as an elephant. Jill went as a supermodel.

From Halloween 2011



From Halloween 2011



From Halloween 2011


Trying to get all the kids to pose at one time is not the easiest thing to do

From Halloween 2011


My family.

From Halloween 2011


And off we went...

From Halloween 2011


Cooper and Riley just stormed into people's houses at first, one track mind to the candy.

From Halloween 2011


Riley is ready to smile at a moments notice

From Halloween 2011


Pieces hauled in a ton of candy

From Halloween 2011


Lauren smiling back at me

From Halloween 2011


Strangely well organized for our bunch

From Halloween 2011


Lauren is quite tall and started to blow out her costume by the end of the night

From Halloween 2011


Then back to the house to hand out candy

From Halloween 2011


Baths, books and night time

From Halloween 2011

Tuesday, November 01, 2011

Feed Me!

Lauren has yet to get any teeth, but that has not stopped her from being voracious about getting some real food. When shown any type of real food, she attacks it. When this kid gets some teeth, she is going to be dangerous around.

Here are some pics from a recent feeding and the carnage that ensued...


From Pumpkin Patch Visit



From Pumpkin Patch Visit



From Pumpkin Patch Visit



From Pumpkin Patch Visit


Cooper poses with his pumpkin he got at the pumpkin patch.

From Pumpkin Patch Visit



From Pumpkin Patch Visit