Eastside on the Dirt

Andrew Gendler sent out an e-mail Friday to drum up interest in a ride he and Bryan Warnock were going to do on Sunday.  The goal was to do some endurance effort for around 5 to 5 ½ hours with two trips to the ridge for some accumulated elevation.

Our ride's profile via a finish on BBR

Of course I was interested and questioned my ability this early in the season to do some sustained effort alongside some teammates that had already been putting in some training for the upcoming mountain bike season.

Saturday I started by putting in some effort around the house to clear Sunday morning’s schedule. 

Trail 5 climb.

Pleasantly, upon arrival I realized I was the fifth person to show up!  Good turnout for a 7am departure on Sunday in April for a long ride!  Andrew, Bryan, Cory Bolen and Ron Miller were waking up together in the Military Parking lot adjacent to the dog park. 

Keep it single!  There are consequences!

We rolled up Ridgecrest and shed our morning jackets and made for trail 5 – Curlew where we made fresh tracks in the ‘fluffed’ dirt from recent sheep grazing to Watchmen’s to play with the herd:

Sunrise Climbing.

Ron: “Do you see any black sheep?”

Andrew:  “Just you Ron, since you are surrounded by Eastsiders”

Ron: Our ride's Black Sheep

Quick decent on 5-mile to the junction before climbing to the start of Trail of Tears/Orchard intersection.  Steady climbing for over 20minutes put us on the ridge.  Trail 4 connector was as fun as ever with Hero like conditions (no dust, minimal puddles and we were to 8^th street ready to continue down Scotts. 

Sumit of Trail of Tears (TOT).

Ron split left as we went right on Corrals leaving the Eastsiders the final push up Hard Guy to the ridge and back.  On the decent I suffered a flat (running a tube in the rear (pinched) and no Stans in the Front to ensure I ‘take my chances” – I used my only spare tube to fix and catch up with Cory and Bryan only to find Andrew 2 minutes down the trail with a slashed sidewall/slow leak after Andrew had mentally made note: "Wow, I am really lucky that I haven't had a flat on my mountain bike in the last 12 months."   Time to fill the Karma bank, Andrew!

Hard Guy out-and-back.

After finishing Hard Guy, Cory, Andrew and Bryan headed down Corrals to BBR to finish out the day.  I returned Corrals/8^th/Freeway/Military to at least get closer to or more elevation than the roadies were getting on the Ronde Van Boise!  Not sure I got as much elevation as Team mates: Mike Shaw, Gabe Keck, Mark Schafer, Andy Filler and other non-teamies did with completing the road ride and ending with a bonus climb of Table rock or two!

Strong work everyone!  Again, it seems so early to having everyone riding so strong!  Can we maintain this to the end of the season or hit that mid/late season drop-off?!?  Time will tell.  What I do know, there will be plenty of single track and post-libations between now and then and that, my friends, will make all the difference.

Cheers,

Z