Title Goes Here

Not too much to say today. Other than: It's SNOWING! I feel like a kid on Christmas. I love the first snow. I love the second snow. I love snow in general.

Had a chance to get some good riding in on the new Farley this weekend.

Friday I took my son and one of his friends to the MatSu River Park where we rode some of the trails that we helped build along with the flow trail and some good single track before heading to the river bottom to ride that a bit. A fun time was had by all.

Saturday I didn't ride, but Sunday I did, with the goal of trying some rooty, techy track to really start getting a feel for the new bike and it's capabilities.

After starting out with a sweep of a few XC ski trails, a portion of which have been abandoned as they are on the municipal dump's property, I headed out to the track. First, though, the climbs on the XC ski trails.

I don't know what grade some of those climbs are, but there is one that is nearly a 1/4 mile of what has to be 20%+ grade - it's a killer. XC skiers like their steep uphills for some reason. (Crazy buggers). Anyway, I was able to clear all those climbs with no issue. Though I have to say I was able to clear them on the Pugs as well - it just took me a few more minutes to get my breath back after climbing on the Pugs than with the Farley.

Anyway, after riding the single track, I still have to say that I feel that the Pugs climbs the rooty, techy stuff better.

On the Farley I'm constantly needing to adjust my body position to keep the front end down and the power to the back wheel, where with the Pugs, I might have to push the front down a touch, but it's really Ron Popeil - set it and forget it.

The mass of the bike also seems to be a bonus on some climbs - the Farley seems to want to stop dead when meeting some obstacles that need climbing over where the mass and momentum of the Pugs seems to push it through some of these challenging areas.

That said, the lighter weight of the Farley does allow me to feel fresher after riding. Yesterday I put in about 20 miles of mixed riding - pavement, XC ski trail, and single track and was still able to take the dogs out for a 2.5 mile run in the afternoon. I'm not a runner, per se, so this is a fairly big deal. Don't know that I would have felt fresh enough to do that after riding the Pugs.