Mixed disciplines

Butch and I busted out some rural road action today. I get a chuckle out of the bus stops that some of the farmers put at the end of their drives. There is bus stop down near Hastings that consists of a tractor cab. This was right next to Acton alps hence the old gondola.

Cross Worlds

Last weekend I went to CX Worlds with my Supervisor Adam. Adam will dispute the fact that he is my supervisor, but his name is on my performance evals, so as far as I am concerned he is my supervisor. It was Adam, his 5 YO son Gerit, Dave, a dentist from Zumbrota, and I in a rental car for 12 hours each way.

It was a glorious time. By the time I got to the hotel all the Kansans were there and well into some PBR. Then some random dude from the Oregon Cross Crusade just wandered into our room, and Slater proceeds to bash OBRA and give the guy crap. If the dude had not just walked into our room I would have felt bad.

Keeping the mighty Ohio river at bay

Jonathon Page put on a good show, but had a mechanical that knoked him out of the running

The course was awesome. I came away from the races thinking that our courses are simply not technical enough.

Voss just made everyone else look weak.

Dangling.

U-23 Next year!

Little Lars was really impressive. Just kept laying the power down late in the race and popped onto the podium.

Bart had a great race too. 

Poops and giggles abounded as we made fun of Brandon Bundys aversion to germs.

I was pretty bummed that I did not get to see Mod's Race, where he brought the rainbow colors back to Nebraska. It was good to see the midwest so well represented.
The snow keeps falling in Minnesota.  Somebody should have shot that groundhog.......

Fat Bike Musing and Riding St. Croix River Ice

Last week Eddie K lent me his fat bike for an entire week. I had the opportunity to ride it in several different scenarios.  The first was at the Hillside race up in Elk River.  I did not do as well as I thought I should have, but I had the distinct feeling that to milk the most out of a fatbike you really need to be realistic about your expectations.  

• If the snow is packed, its probably going to be faster on a narrow tire bike. 
• Don't expect to accelerate rapidly.  you are pushing a lot of rubber around, capitalize on your inertia.

After getting input from Grelk, I realized that it might be best to utilize the utility of the Pugsley for exploration.  Enter Barry Tungseth: who hatched a plan to ride the St. Croix River north from Stillwater to Marine on St. Croix.There was only one other person dumb enough to join us, David Meyer of the Hub, Bike Cooperative.

A little preventative medicine for my first river ice experience

I will admit that I was scared to death at first, but Barry led the way. and we only saw open water once.

Once we got north of the High Bridge we just skirted the sand bars on the WI side of the river.

It was just so amazing to be out on a perfect day, seeing what no one else will ever witness on that day.

It was incredibly unnerving to look down through the ice and see the river bottom. You also would gauge the ice thickness by looking at the ice cracks......

 We were all on fat bikes, and tried to stay on the fringe of the river where there was some snow, as the ice could be incredibly treacherous.  That being said, I only fell a few times

Certain sections looked liked there had been a lot of Snowmobile traffic. Photo: David Meyer

Post Coffee/Pre bubble gut. Photo: David Meyer

We only had one incidence of breaking through the ice, and thankfully the water was only 20 inches deep. The hole was just big enough to sink a wheel into. Photo: David Meyer

Dave and Barry were great company and I would love to ride with them any time.  I also had some time to reflect on the utility of fatbikes.  I guess that I see the most utility for fat bikes off the beaten path.  I actually did not care for it on the single track, as I was used to super steep angles and fast acceleration.

We made Jasper a sweet school bus cake for his 2nd birthday.