Can I excite Mitch about off-road riding?

Tuesday, 27 September 2016

Mitch met me at home for a ride together. We took the Tahquitz bike path to the Whitewater River, and we headed north toward Ramon. Lots of sand riding for Mitch. He begged off riding beyond Ramon along the planned first build of a CV Link segment; he was ready to head back. So we took streets, and I guided him in playing well in traffic.

Ride conditions
Temperature: 82°F at 10:15
Precipitation: none
Winds: calm
Clothing: Double off-road shorts, undershirt, ankle socks, full-finger gloves
Bike: Trek Fuel/EX mountain bike 
Time: 00:58:44 for 8.5 miles
Heart rate: 106 bpm HRave, 132 bpm HRmax
Bikeway users: 1 pedestrian
Playback of the ride

Up to the Stone Man, now destroyed

Thursday, 4 August 2016

In more temperate locations, I typically rode a "birthday ride" today. That meant a mile for each year of my age. But 65 miles isn't something I'm ready for today, even at 90°F this morning. So I'm expecting that ride to take place six months from now, in February. Today I took a morning ride into the Goat Trails, and I started at 8 a.m. to the trail head through the golf course up to Gene Autrey Trail, then south to Rimrock Plaza.

This ride had a sense of exploration, a chance to see how much additional trail had been attacked by heavy equipment. I hoped that the Lone Heart and Stone Man monuments were unaffected, but my hopes were undone. The grading has obliterated both monuments and smoothed out some of the climbs as well as leaving a dirt layer on most of the trail. I only looked up the doubletrack east and west of the Stone Man, and even those sections may have been graded, though more lightly. It seems to me that the doubletrack is now less fun uphll and more treacherous downhill.

I hope to organize a maintenance group from the regular riders of these trails, and I'll begin to gather their names from the Strava.com statistics of the trails.

My way back on the Goat Trails stayed on the doubletrack until I got to the Merry-Go-Round. From its southeast corner, I took off on a short singletrack that drops to a mid-point of the Second Climb. After reaching the roads, I followed the bikeway that parallels East Palm Canyon to El Cielo Road.


Ride conditions
Temperature: 90°F at 8:28
Precipitation: none
Winds: not recorded
Clothing: Teeshirt, ankle socks, double shorts, quilted full-finger gloves
Bike: Trek Fuel/EX mountain bike 
Time: 1:02:04 for 9.61 miles
Heart rate: 129 bpm HRave, 154 bpm HRmax
Bikeway users: not recorded
Playback of the ride

New tire setup for Fury

Saturday, 30 April 2016

I finally converted my Trek Fuel/EX mountain bike to tubeless tires. I chose two different tires for their response: a Continental Trail King on the front, a Maxxis Minion DHF on the rear. I bought both from Competitive Cyclist, and I called Mike Dartt at http://mikesbiketruck.com/ for his at-your-door service to do the conversion. (Supposedly the conversion can be pretty easy to do, but my arthritic wrists say otherwise, even for getting a well-stretched tire onto my rims.)

For the front tire, I expect confident cornering grip and enough stability to track the riding line correctly. A reinforced sidewall can improve support for riding on rocky terrain, although too stiff a sidewall can lessen feel and suppleness from the ride. The correct tire pressure and suspension set-up play their parts in the front-end performance as speed increases on rougher, drier tracks. Finally, well-balanced weight distribution and correctly-tuned bar height aid the grip. Reviews lead me to believe that the Continental Trail King meets these needs.

On the back tire, some riders advise a slightly narrower tire with a lower profile center tread or a closely spaced tread pattern. These attributes should result in a faster rolling wheel on dry and rocky ground. Since I'm still new at riding the hills, I chose a wider tire (2.4 inches) and a fairly open tread pattern, to help slow the roll. Cornering tread is still important, and I want plenty of traction in the turns. So I followed reviews to choose the Maxxis Minion DHF that is 0.1 inch wider than my front tire.

References

Dry trail riding advice.
Different needs for front and rear tires.
Continental Trail King.
Maxxis Minion DHF.
Competitive Cyclist.

This morning I took Fury out for some trial on the roads, going to the Farmers' Market and on a ride with Chuck over his favorite route. The front tire had lost some pressure overnight, and it had a lot of rolling resistance for the ride to the market. I pumped it up to 35 pounds before I rode with Chuck, and it rode really well at that pressure. I might reduce the pressure to 25 pounds when I hit the trails.

Ride conditions
Temperature: 75°F at 08:30,  79°F at 12:40
Precipitation: none
Winds: calm to 5 early, then about 15 mph with gusts from the north and west
Clothing: Casual MTB shorts, shortsleeve tee, open-finger gloves
Bike: Trek Fuel/EX mountain bike
Time: 23:12 for 4.0 miles, 1:08:12 for 8.7 miles
Heart rate: 111 and 89 bpm HRave, 140 and 128 bpm HRmax Playbacks of the rides: Farmers' Market, With Chuck