About an hour and a half into our ride I heard it. It came from behind me. It was very close, and if it was not a familiar sound I may have been startled. It was loud and thunderous, baritone, and rumbled like a big block Chevy V8 from an era long since past. Starting deep in some cave, and bellowing out loud and clear:


“BUUUUURRRRRRPPPP!!!”


“nice one Katie!” I chirped between strained breaths, “ WHAT!?” she replied in a humorous indifferent way. Yup Katie was in town, and damn it was fun riding with her. Early Sunday morning a very nice sized group containing, Dennis S, Me, Ted, James A, Mike K, Andrew M, Katie, Mark (with a K), James C, Buddy, Matt, Rock Star Joey T and a brief appearance from Bill(doe). We rode white clay/ middle run trail system.

The trails were frozen solid and were fast. They where so hard that traction was seamless and you could carve corners with confidence, and abandon. As we left the parking lot at the ticking tomb, Andrew commented that with these conditions we should have no trouble with flats today. And thus, the voodoo curse was on. Less than a mile later we would have our first of three flats on the day. This was okay for me, being only my second ride in a month my fitness was suspect. Aside from the usual fast dudes I get to ride with, I had a Colorado contingent to smack me around. Joey T fresh from the fort lewis terror squad; Katie and Mark were some serious power in town to potentially make my life that much tougher. Katie's older brother James was here too. He was being seriously handicaped as he was riding a FS bike. Poor kid. More flats meant more time to catch up. More time to hear about ab balls , TVs, and beer pong.

Luckily, everyone was well behaved, and hell they let me lead for most of the day. Up the climbs I was breathing hard, but just trying to be steady, on every decent I would attack as hard as I could. I was enjoying the fine trail conditions, and trying to use my technique to not get dropped. Another benefit of the 3 flats was that it allowed us to talk a lot of smack. Katie can talk smack like an NBA player. I really miss that in my daily diet. We played on the skills trail. Mark, riding a cross bike, stacked on the steep down ramp. Going over the bars on drop bars is something that everyone should experience at least once but never again. James A and I followed him through this really nasty rooty section, and the guy flowed like butter. Very impressive. Really nice guy, and good looking too. Nice catch Katie…

After the skills trail Bill took a nasty tumble, his elbow was looking bad through his jersey. It’s always bad after someone crashes and they stand up, and then lay back down. Bill departed early.

Pace continued to be crisp but consistent; Joey took the lead on the longest climb of the day, and proceeded to beat the entire group into submission. Damn, I can remember when Joey was shorter than me, and slower. He hadn’t planned on riding during the break ,so he had a great mixture of his old devo stuff and his dad’s ww gear. He was slumming on the bike front riding his pop’s Santa Cruz Super Light.

Somewhere in this I realized I was no longer leading the group, and in fact was fighting my ass off to stay somewhere in the middle of the pack. I was quickly becoming pack fodder, as I felt a small bonk coming on. It has been a few years since I rode middle run with the honest to god fear that I was going to go out the back, and not be able to stay with the group.

After “shock and awe” where I left it all on the down hill, and limped my way up the bastard hill following, Katie rolled up along side me and said “you just hit the wall huh?”
“yup” I said. “but the juice today, was definitely worth the squeeze”

Our group which had lost 3, lost another 3 as Ted, Dennis and I bailed out and the remaining group members rode up to “magic mountain”. Rides like todays are special, and infrequent. Getting to ride with old friends, and new ones in the same day, was pretty awesome. My back was better, still not 100%, but there isn't any place I would have rather been this morning.

respect
marc