Ramping It Up

     A little over two weeks ago I was at work when I received a message from my friend Cale informing me that some guys we know were planning on heading out to Fruita, CO to go mountain biking.  I was instantly intrigued and committed on the spot to join in the adventure.  The rest of the work week seemed to go by at a snail's pace as some of the best mountain biking in the world awaited me four hours west.  When Friday finally came, four of the group headed out to Fruita while Cale and I planned on heading out in the morning.  We were able to take advantage of our open Friday night by scoring cheap tickets to the Kendrick Lamar concert at the amphitheater right by our apartment.  The next morning I woke up at 2:45am and we were on the road by 3:30.  Four hours later we were at the trail head in Fruita and ready to embark on one of the most well known mountain bike trails in the world: Zippity Do Da.
     Zippity Do Da was a rude introduction to legitimate mountain biking: tough climbs, steep downhills, miles of terrain all beckoned.  Being from the flat midwest, I never really HAD to switch gears on a bike; it was always more of a way to change up the difficulty of my straightforward pedaling.  Here, it was a different story.  If you didn't switch gears correctly you would easily fall behind or get burned out so quickly you wouldn't know what hit you.  While this was tough to get used, the biggest obstacle for me was the fear of the intense downhill on some parts of the trail.  I can't remember being so scared before as I was atop one drop in particular...

It may not look like much, and it fact the picture leaves most of the downhill out, but when I was atop that hill it took me many seconds to overcome the jitters and go for it.  It was white-knuckle riding at its finest and my hands were firmly gripping the brakes for about the entire way down.  Somehow I didn't crash, as the intense braking I used probably made it a lot worse for me... I fishtailed quite a bit and nearly lost my footing on the pedals because of it.

     By the time we completed the ten mile or so trail, I was exhausted but two of the guys insisted on doing another run (thankfully on a different trail).  While one of us decided he was too tired to complete another circuit, the other three and I went onward to a trail called PBR.  If I was tired before, the climb on this trail nearly killed me (and not because it was a particularly steep or long climb).  While the other three charged ahead, I slowly but surely made my way up the trail... two hours of sleep the night before, four hours of driving that morning (while Cale slept in the passenger seat), not enough food (my fault), not enough water (also my fault), and the ninety degree desert heat really began to catch up with me.  I am pretty notorious for not bringing a whole lot of food or water on hikes and while I usually am able to get away with it while hiking, mountain biking was a different story.  I ran out of water by the start of the second trail and needed every ounce of effort and concentration to make it to the start of the trail's downhill section.

     But boy was it worth it! The downhill on PBR was by far the most amazing mountain biking experience I had ever had.  The trail went up and down and left and right, all at fast speeds that only slightly pushed the envelope of my comfort.  It was AMAZING.  Any thoughts of being tired were quickly flushed out of my mind as I gained speed through one turn to the next until we were awarded with one last quick climb near the end.  As I pushed myself up the last of the trail, the muscles in my thighs instantly cramped up and I literally had to wobble through what was thankfully the last of the riding that morning in order to lay down, refuel, and give my legs a well deserved stretch and massage. 

     From the trail head we drove ourselves to what was our campsite for the weekend at Colorado National Monument.  I had been here a couple times before and had even camped almost at the exact same spot a few years earlier while working at camp as where we set up shop that afternoon.  Probably one of my favorite camps sites ever, the spot overlooks the city of Fruita down in the valley below and at night you can take in the quiet expanse lit up calmly before you.  We were able to pass the heat of the day away in between rides by playing word games that one might encounter on a long car trip.  When the sun finally began to make its final downward journey of the day, we returned to the morning's trail head to get in a couple more runs.  The two experienced bikers charged ahead towards a more advanced route while the remaining three of us went after PBR once more.  Subsequently, Cale and I had a few more miles left in our legs and we took a stab at a route called Kessel Run.  The route started up the same climb as PBR but curled right to take on some furious left/right, often banked turns which tested our control skills.  While the run was a blast, nothing could touch PBR that day and we returned once more to our campsite to eat dinner and sit out on the cliff overlook to take in the night views described previously.
     The next day after cleaning up camp, four of us headed farther west to hit up a couple trails which skirted past the Colorado River (I believe they were in the Kokopelli trail system).  The trails provided some great views, though the weather was quite overcast and even handed us some intense spitting of rain.  My legs took in all they could handle on two solid trails and when we reached the parking lot again those legs of mine were happy to sit down in a car for four hours as we returned to Denver.

Here are some more pictures from the trip...

 

No Lack of Adventure

I know, once again I have failed in my efforts to update this more often, but it's not because I have had a lack of things to talk about...

     During the weekend before Memorial Day weekend I was finally able to tackle my first 14er of the year.  I was set to meet up with some friends from out of state at the trailhead of Quandary Peak at 4am in order to try to reach the summit by sunrise.  By the time we hit the trail however, it was 5am due to late arrivals and longer than expected preparation time.  The trail was covered in a thick layer of snow from start to finish and made for a much harder than expected climb.  Two members of my group were also lugging their skis up the entirety of the mountain, which did not help our progress in the slightest.  Though the hike took much longer than expected, the end result was still a fantastic view at the top and a huge sense of accomplishment at the bottom.

     Memorial Day weekend was one for the books.  Despite not originally planning on travelling back to the Midwest for quite some time, I finally talked myself into it.  The Indy 500 beckoned and I was not about to miss it and seeing my family and friends.  In order to save money on the flight out, I flew into Chicago and spent the whole day Friday exploring the city.  Though I lived within a few hours of Chicago for most of my life, I never really had the opportunity to go downtown and see a lot of what the city had to offer.  The cityscape actually blew me away and exceeded my expectations as I walked over twelve miles all over the downtown area.  I can now say that Chicago is probably one of the most impressive cities I've ever been to.  That night I hitched a ride with some friends down to Indianapolis and stayed the night at my old house before getting up the next morning and heading to the Speedway.  That Saturday was a fabulous time as I met up with friends I hadn't seen in quite some time and my brother was even able to join us.  We played a lot of volleyball and tailgated all day long as you can only do on 500 weekend.  On race day we all headed into the Speedway to watch one of the most exciting races I could remember.  I personally started off with the majority of my friends in the infield of Turn 3 for the first fifty laps or so then went with a few others to go see part of Hardwell's performance in the Snake Pit for a while.  The performance was fantastic and was really great to be a part of before deferring back to the race where I eventually met up with another group of friends in the actual stands of Turn 4.  There we watched the last thirty laps or so from above the track, where we witnessed Ryan Hunter-Reay become the first American to win since 2006.  The rest of the weekend was spent catching up with family, which was of course a great time as well.  It had been quite a few months since I had seen them so it was rewarding to be able to hang out with them, even if for a short time.
     This past weekend was quite the pleasant surprise.  Though we stayed in to kick off the weekend on Friday night, some friends of mine and I made plans to head up to Boulder for some good times.  I had originally planned on meeting a former co-worker for a hike around the Flatirons but traffic and rain got in the way.  Instead, when my co-worker arrived in Boulder he joined my other friends and me as we made our way from one brewery to the next around the area.  Over the course of the day we took tours and sampled beer at more than five different breweries.  It was a great time and we all vowed to do it again in the future in order to see many of the other breweries in the Boulder area.  The next day was a bit more lazy, as one might expect after our previous day's activities; however, I decided that it was too nice a day to waste and so I headed southwest to take on a hike I had my sights set on for quite some time.  The hike was in Pike National Forest and was a trail to the top of a fire lookout called "Devil's Head."  The hike was not too tough, especially for what I have become accustomed to, and I was up and down in quite fast.  Despite the ease, the view was fantastic at the top as I was able to get a 360 degree view of the surrounding area, including Pike's Peak to the south, the plains to the east, many snow-capped mountains to the west and even the city of Denver to the north.  Here are some of the pictures I took on my small expedition.