Same Old, Same Old

Ugh. Back to the daily ins and outs, the same old, same old, the work-a-day world.

I'm  really not feeling it. I want to live on vacation for the rest of my life, man. Get up late. Ride my bike. Take a nap if I were so inclined. Ride my bike. Stay up late. Eat diner at 10 at night. Have a drink or two.

You know, live life, man.

But, instead I am stuck here. In the office. The daily grind.

Eh. It could be worse. I could have not had the two weeks off. I could have not been able to get my bike out there and enjoyed the weather and the snow and the trails.

And there was some good riding to be had. And then there was a meltdown with rain to make the low elevation areas kinda crappy for riding, but the upper areas? Bomber.

I don't know how many miles I rode during my vacation. Probably not as many as it felt like, because at least two days of riding were spent packing in trail so each mile felt like two and I'll count them that way if I want.

I know. I've talked about this trail system before. I just keep finding myself impressed with the work that has been done on the trails and the general beauty of the area. I love Hatcher Pass, but GPRA is quickly becoming my go-to backyard outdoor experience. I just love that I can ride, the kids can ski, and the wife can walk all at the same place and the great thing about it? There seems to hardly ever be anyone else there. Rare is the time when my trail experience coincides with someone else's. Not to say that I don't want to see you out on the trails. I do. I just also really enjoy the solitude that comes from having trails to myself.

It's a great time to be a non-motorized trail user in the valley right now. So come and get it.

I have to say that in the valley, the premier riding venue is certainly GPRA - Government Peak Recreation Area. There are two connected single track trails here and the lower track is machine groomed, flowy, and fast while the upper track is narrowly packed in, which makes for some challenging climbing - and the upper track does climb.

Cherry Cordials and Caramels

It's the time of year of too much crap food and short days. It's time for the holidays to be celebrated and for everyone to act like everything is great and good and all that crap.

It is also a favorite time of year of mine. I hate the holidays, but I love that I take two weeks off over Christmas and New Years - maximizing time off while using the least amount of PTO possible.

Usually I get a lot of riding in over this break time. And that's what I hope for again this year. I've been getting out quite a bit and riding some great trails. I haven't bothered with taking any pictures because:

1. I'm riding here, damnit!
2. Most of my rides are in the dark. Not much to see
3. I'm riding.

And it has been a while since I've posted anything here. While I've been riding a lot, they haven't been exciting or new rides. Just rides. You know, out there earning it, but not seeing new things or anything.

I mean, there's been a few rides in new places, but mostly rides in the familiar terrains.

I am trying some new approaches to footwear this year. Granted, this winter has been a bit weak so far. Hardly any snow and our coldest day so far has barely made it to the mid-teens. So, not really the best test for winter gear.

In fact I've not once used my BD Guide glove liners this year. Only a handful of times have I even used the outer glove over thin liners. In fact, on the coldest days so far I've worn a thin wind and waterproof shell glove over rag wool gloves and been too hot. So my footwear experiments are probably not real accurate.

So far this year I've been wearing Scott Team BOA shoes with a pair of Endura merino wool socks as the base (super thin and breathable) with a pair of Darn Tough hiking socks over top. Then over the top of the shoes I'm wearing Endura MT 500 overshoes. The few days that it's been in the teens I've thrown a vapor barrier (bagel bags) between the sock layers.

Works pretty well. I do find that my toes will still get cold in this set up, but I think that's just as much to do with the shoes being a bit tight as it does with the insulative properties of the setup.

I've also flipped over to flats with Vasque Snoburban boots a few times as well. The boots work well as they have grippy, stiff soles, but more and more I hate peddling flats. More and more I'm convinced that I just need to get a pair of winter cycling boots like those from Lake or 45 North. I'm just loath to spend that much money on a unitasker…

Rides I want to do over the break:

1. Knik to Iditarod. Well, not the whole thing, but part of it. This is part of the ITI race route. Need to get out there and check out some of the terrain.
2. Frosty bottom route. I'm not one to join organized races, but would love to do the race route - the 50 mile version - to see how fast I can do it. A good part of the route is multiuse trail.
3. Jim Creek towards Knik glacier. ATV trail that I've heard some good reports about this year. The ride to the glacier isn't quite doable yet as there is a lot of open water yet and not enough daylight to make the ride, but this might be a good warm up
4. Snowmachine trails out of Willow. I hear there's some good snow up there and we can make a nice circuit on these trails.
5. Gold Mint - want to see just how far back in the valley I can go this time of year this year.
6. Reed Lakes trail - Not sure how ridable this trail is - there was some ski traffic on it last week when I was up there, but it was still quite soft.
7. Whatever else catches my fancy.

So there it is - my list of rides to look at doing over the next two weeks. Throw in sundry quick scoots on trails in the valley as well as in Anchorage when the kids are skiing and it's going to be a pretty busy vacation. Couple with that a desire to start running regularly and, well, I'll be a bit wiped by the time I go back to work.

Yeah.

And because you want a picture, here are two or maybe more: 

Far out and gone...

I've gone quiet for a while now. I know. It's just the shoulder season is dragging on and on around here. The riding is excellent. Just not snowy. That makes it difficult to write about the rides on the same trails over and over again in some meaningful way.

It's not that I'm not riding. I am. And I am getting more comfortable with the Farley more each day. I still have some gripes about it. Tires and climbing. Climbing and tires. One is changeable, the other not so much.

I had a great couple of rides this weekend. One solo ride on Friday where I chewed up close to 15 miles of mixed trail in the 20F temps and sun and one ride on Saturday with my son where we rolled fewer miles, but some more challenging trails, some big climbs that he did really well on given that he was on the Pugs.

I still want snow. I crave the way that it changes everything about riding. Heck, if nothing else  I want snow so that night riding is a bit easier to contend with - the lights need something to reflect off of.

A new product - Endura MT550 shoe covers. I had purchased a cheap ass pair of covers from REI two weeks ago or so just to see if they would help extend the use of clipless longer into the season. And the overall consensus was that they make riding in temps down to the low 20s generally quite comfy. I'm not sure about going lower, but I think I might be able to push it down to single digits easily. I'm still going to experiment with vapor barriers and just see how low I can go. Anyway, the ones from REI were crap from a quality perspective. The Enduras are much thicker neoprene, have a rubber toe cover and have a nice zipper instead of hook and loop closures. They seem like they might be warmer, though I can't say for sure as I've only used them twice and both times were in similar temps as those I'd worn the REI ones in, temps that are difficult - mid 20s where there is a razor thin line between too cool and too warm. I think that my feet sweat more in the Endura, which would make them colder - thus the need to experiment with vapor barriers.

Anyway. That's really all there is. Just riding and riding. Good times, indeed.

Who Knows?

7:30 AM

I love riding in snow. It's just so amazing being out in the woods or in the mountains when no one is around. The silence. The joy.

I got a great chance to get some early winter riding this past weekend down in Girdwood, AK. Amazing!

I didn't ride far. In fact, I barely topped seven miles in total. Approximately. Maybe a bit further, maybe a bit shorter. Who knows for sure? Who really cares?

The riding was challenging and for a portion of it I broke the rules, but it was worth it. Winner Creek trail. The first 7/10ths of a mile of the trail is closed to bikes. Well, not closed to bikes, but closed to riding bikes. And I understand why. This trail is a popular trail, starting on a resort's property. The trail, in the early stages, is a lot of narrow boardwalk and generally gets a lot of traffic. In the summer. When I took off, there were exactly one set of tracks in the snow. I figured if it came down to it, I'd hop off the bike if I ran into anyone. No worries.

The route is a mixed bag. Primarily climbing. Lots of boardwalk. Some narrow boardwalk with lots of step ups on the way out. Climbing. Lots of climbing. The first mile and a half, to the junction between the upper and lower Winner Creek trails is nice riding through some amazing temperate rain forest. The trees here seem absolutely massive. Particularly when compared to trees elsewhere in this state.

I decided, at the junction, to take the upper trail, as I've hiked the lower before and knew where it would take me. So I took the upper. I made it maybe another mile and a half to two miles up the trail before time and trail conditions conspired against me and I decided to turn around.

All in all, I spent a good hour and 45 minutes riding up and then back down the trail. I had no revelations. No deep thoughts about anything. Just enjoyed the feeling of working my legs and lungs and heart. Enjoyed the feeling of sweating in the cold air. Enjoyed watching the snow coming down the mountain.

I did have a chance to really get a better sense of the bike as a winter machine. And I'm still not sold on the Hodag tires. No matter what they seemed to want to break loose on stuff that the Nates never would. The initial part of the ride involved a fair number of short, sharp climbs of frozen dirt, ice, and hoarfrost covered by a thin layer of snow. Perfect conditions for a studded tire, but also conditions that I've ridden successfully on the Surly Nate tires before. With the Hodag and the geo of the Trek, I felt that each climb was a struggle to balance keeping weight on the rear while keeping the front firmly planted and keeping the tires from breaking loose.

On off-camber stuff - forget about it. The sidewalls of the Hodags have no grip whatsoever. I had to daub a number of times when the rear would start sliding downhill.

Coming back down the mountain, I found that the back end wanted to break loose on corners if going too fast or that the wheel would lock and slide with just the littlest pressure on the brakes. This might be more an issue of the difference between the hydro and mechanical brakes, but it feels like the tire has something to do with it. 

This leads me to think that I really need to do a side by side compare between the Hodag and the Nate because, admittedly, it's been a year since I've ridden the Nate in snow. I know my observations about the Nate on dirt and mud versus the Hodag are correct, because there was not much in the way of elapsed time between riding these conditions on both tires.

This said, I had a wonderfully enjoyable ride overall. The bike is agile and fairly well-mannered on the trail. I still have some adjusting to do in terms of my interface with the bike and trusting the bike to go where and do what I tell it to, like I had with the Pugs. Of course, that kind of trust comes from having a crash or two. And at this time of year, I prefer to wait for a bit more snow to soften the blow… I don't heal as fast as I used to!

It was a good ride. A good day. 

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.

Soot

I'm not feeling terribly motivated lately to write or to really do anything. A downswing with the weather, I guess.

And the funny thing is that I should be excited to write. I should be rushing to get the words in my head down on the page, but I'm not.

However, as the best writers always advise, you must write even when you don't feel like it. So here it goes.

I bought a new bike. A Trek Farley 6 fat bike. I've talked about this already. And I still struggle with balancing the want and the need sides of things and enjoy the bike for all it's worth.

I've put on some good miles already. A 30 mile out and back paved ride. A 20 mile or so single track ride on mixed terrain. Daily commutes for nearly a week now. Rain. Wind. No snow yet, but that's coming soon.

I've put in some good miles and I think I've started to get a good impression of the bike.

Let me first remind you of my riding style and background. For the past two and a half years I have exclusively ridden a Surly Pugsley. Nearly 10,000 miles on that beast this year alone. Trail, beach, river bottoms, pavement, terrain parks, skate parks, pump tracks, snow, snowmachine trail - I've ridden the Pugs on just about ever terrain there is. So, my impressions of the Farley are going to be colored by my experience with the Pugs.

First, let me just say that the Farley is a nice ride. After completing the 30 miles of paved riding last Friday, I was tired, but not exhausted. I wasn't completely spent. I'd ridden a similar path the week before on the Pugs - going out 27 miles and calling it good and at the end I was feeling it. Exhaustion and aching legs. The Trek is lighter and it feels lighter and faster even with the wider tires. I know that I could have tossed off another 10 or 15 miles on the road with no problems at all and still felt fresh the next day. So there's that.

Unfortunately, most of my riding is on paved trail as part of the daily commute. While I enjoy all types of riding, this type of riding isn't what I do for fun. Some might say that my selection of one bike to rule them all is a bit backwards given the proportion of types of riding I do. It seems a bit backwards to buy a bike geared for trail riding when most of my riding is not on trail. But that's the way I roll. I want a bike I can bomb on single track and still ride for daily commuting. That's a big part of what drew me to fat bikes to begin with. Particularly with the Pugsley. The Pugs was trail capable, but had the accoutrement needed to make for convenient commuting - easy rack mounting, fender mounts, a more upright feel, etc.

The Pugs was a bear on the climbs. It would climb over just about everything, but you felt the weight the whole time. The Farley isn't quite the same. The geo is definitely more trail bike than expedition bike. Not as upright, fewer mounting points, and light.

And these differences translate into a bit of a learning curve on the trail. The first thing I noticed is that the Farley requires a bit more finesse. The Pugs would do whatever you wanted it to on the trail, but often it required a bit of brute force to get it to do what you wanted it to. Example - there is this slightly tricky off-camber, rooty climb coming out of the college trails and into the Kepler trails. It's not steep, but the roots and such make it a bit challenging. With the Pugs it didn't matter the line, you just pointed, geared up, and climbed it knowing that the momentum would help see you through.

Not so much with the Farley. No, with the Farley it is important to pick the right line and be in the right gear going into the climb. The front end does feel really light on climbs and wants to come off the ground. This leads to challenges when climbing over roots in that you can loose too much momentum and have to daub. I had two such instances on sections of trail I've never had issues clearing before.

Some of this might also be an issue of tires. I ran the Hodags at about 12 PSI and found that on wet roots, particularly on off-camber sections, they broke loose time and again. The tires also don't seem to shed mud all that well. With Nates and even with the Knards, I'd have challenges breaking them loose in similar conditions. I find this a bit interesting as my Nates and my Knard were both 27tpi versus the 60tpi of the Hodag. I am sure that I just need to experiment with pressure a bit more, but with the Surly tires I would often ride them on trail at the same 17 to 18 PSI as on pavement and would still grip everything no problem.

And completely apropos of nothing - the MuleFut rim, decent as it seems to be, has a graphic of a pig on it. Not sure how pigs and mules go together. Odd.

Another thing I noticed with the Farley is that it doesn't seem to want to jump. The Pugs loved to get air born. With the Farley I had a hard time feeling the back end coming off the ground, or even getting the front end up for manuals. With the Pugs, a manual was like nothing and getting air was even easier. Though with the Pugs it always was apparent that you were in the air because the front end would dive as soon as the back was up. With the Farley, the front seems to, once in the air, want to stay up. Yet the Pugs, for as heavy as it is, just felt more willing to jump than the Farley.

All in all, I'm impressed with the Farley. There's definitely going to be some learning to finesse versus just point and go here. I'm a bit curious how it'll do on snow, though.

Buyer's Remorse

Well, I finally did it.

I dropped the hammer and bought a new bike. I don't have it in my possession yet. Not until tomorrow. But right now, I'm not sure how I feel about it. About the whole idea of buying a new bike, that is.

Buyer's remorse, I suppose.

Or maybe I just wonder if I was hasty.

First, maybe I should look at the reasons I want a new bike. Notice I said want, not need. First and foremost it is completely about want. The bike I have currently would more than suffice for many more years. Hell, it's got a new frame, so I guess it's nearly a new bike.

Now that we've got that out of the way, let's talk about about why I want a new bike.

I ride a lot. We've established this already. And as someone who rides a lot, I want to have the most comfort I can while making the commute. In a self-powered vehicle that can mean a number of things. A lighter bike makes for easier rolling which makes for a more enjoyable and comfortable ride. In the winter, wider rims provide a bit better tire profile for flotation meaning a bit easier riding through the snow making for a more comfortable and pleasant ride. I'm hopeful that a wider bar will also lead to a more comfortable ride.

Another reason I've been looking for a new bike has to do with the recent snafu with the Pugs frame and being without transportation for a couple of days. Generally I don't go in for the idea that one needs to have an extra car or bike just in case one quits working. But, I've found myself in that situation too often. And it sucks. I want to know that on any given morning even if my primary bike is down, I can still get to work. Without driving.

I also am getting tired of riding by myself. Particularly in the winter. I don't have many (any) friends and a really challenging schedule which makes it difficult to set up rides with people outside my family. With the new Pugs frame being size large, all of my kids and possibly my wife can ride the bike, giving me four different possible riding partners. So, the bike will no longer be set up optimally for me as the rider, but it will be available if I need it and will give my kids something to ride along side me as I explore new areas this winter.

The large frame on the Pugs feels just a touch too cramped for me to ride everyday without putting on a new, even longer, stem that could affect the handling and with the slight differences in geo, the large already feels a bit twitchy to me.

And I just want a new bike. I've ridden the hell out of the Pugs and have gotten the per-ride cost to somewhere way south of a penny per ride. I've gotten my money's worth out of it. I still like the bike, but am just ready for something new.

So what makes the new bike better than what I currently have? Well, not much. Or maybe a lot.

I've already mentioned the wider wheels. The frame is non-offset, so easier to build a 29er wheelset for for summer riding. The hubs are out of the factory with sealed cartridge bearings rather than the open bearings that caused me so many problems on the Pugs until I rebuilt the wheel (which is now entering the break a spoke phase...). The brakes are hydro vs. mechanical. I don't know if this is better or not, yet. I've had a few times where the mechanical brakes felt a bit sketchy. The frame is aluminium and has a lifetime warranty - so no seat post bonding going on here. I've have aluminium frames break in the past. They have a life span and all. But that frame, too, had a lifetime warranty and the company replaced it. Unfortunately at the time I didn't have the funds to build up the frame as few, if any, of the parts from the original bike would work on the new frame. That said, I'm in a different place now and by the time this frame bites it, well, I should be getting to the point where a cruiser might be more my style.

Other than those few items, it's not like the new bike is light years ahead of the old bike. It is just new. Which is part of the hesitation I feel now that I've made the payment. Is this really what I want to spend that much money on? What else could I use that money for? The kids could use some skis. We could probably use a second car since we have one child who is licensed and one that is going to be soon. We could use a new X, Y, or Z.

I tend to get this way after making a large purchase. Not with cars, because when you finance something it feels a lot less real in terms of the cost.

I'm sure that I'll love the bike. And I'll ride it all the time. I just don't know that I'll ever be able to say that its purchase was ever anything more than me wanting something new and having the funds to afford it.

On the flip side, I do find that a new bike, or even new bike parts, tends to cause me to up my riding, which should result in a corresponding reduction in weight, thus better health? Yeah, I needed a new bike for my health. That's it.