Holy Toledo, so This is MTB'ng
So Sat Steph aka Snowtulip and her friend picked me up for another adventure in MTB'ng. This was my third time out and each time Steph has picked a route that was slightly harder than the last. We went into a section of mountains called the Manzanos and off we went. The track started out simply enough and I was feeling pretty good about myself! (silly me!) The trail got a tad rocky and the first nasty section of rock I lost the line. I stopped and both ladies very patiently talked me through some different options, then Steph actually came to me and showed me the line she picked. As I followed her through I kept thinking "no one can drop a bike like this and survive", but I did and Steph had me do it again. This time I picked a different line which had a different drop and thought "oh yeah, this is what they mean when they talk about MTB'ng". again silly me - life was Just beginning!!
The trail got rockier and rougher with more and more drops and more and more line options - THEN it descended!! :eek: I would just like to say here that Steph and her friend are both pretty awesome MTB'rs and are both very patient with a rank newbie like me. The trail was pretty steep and I hung in there as long as I felt comfortable. When I felt it was just too much I stopped and got off the bike. There were 2 guys Climbing this sucka and one of them fell right before where I was standing so I didn't feel so bad about whimping out. I ended up walking the rest of the way down thinking "I'm not sure I'd HIKE this stuff!" When I reached the bottom Steph or Edna told me we had just come down the 5 Hills of Death (ROFL...who comes UP with these names anyway??) I told both of them I was glad we came Down those hills and didn't try to climb them! :eek: ohhhh the sweetness of innocence, coz what goes down, must go up!!
As we continued on the trail really never got any better, lots of loose rock, Big loose rock and drops which I'm beginning to like a little. :o Then we started climbing!! Steph put me in the middle coz on a nice "clean" trail I'm the faster climber, but let me tell ya'll, these trails weren't nice, they weren't clean and they were Never meant for climbing without ropes and pitons. Edna Rocks as the climbing queen, she just went her merry little way right up those babys like they were nothing. I made it most of the way up most of them - oh yeah...did I tell ya there was more than 1 hill that we had to climb? - and I just kept thinking "no one can sit a bike tilted this far back without falling backwards" but ya know what? Ya can!! One time I lost my line again (I gotta get better at this line thing) and ended up in the loose rock in the middle of the trail which brought me to a deadstop, another time my tire hit the crack between 2 rocks instead of climbing up them and brought me to a dead stop, and a coupla times - I just couldn't go any farther. Good thing I wasn't wearing a HRM coz I'm guessing my heart was waaaaaaaaaaay beyond red!! LOLOL I didn't feel so bad on a few of the uphill walks to see Steph walking with me and bless her heart, Edna "said" she had to walk a few too! Kindness in a situation like that is a mercy! ;) I also remember thinking I wouldn't drive a Jeep up some of these trails and these guys are riding BIKES on them?? hmmmmmm wonder what the definition of nuts really is!!!
We stopped for a rest and I had a bite - I was pretty dogged by then. I shared a Larabar with Steph and Edna and 2 guys sitting on the side of the trail. They were heading off towards another section that Edna said was a pretty ride and I was game enough (stupid enough?) to say, hey wanna do that one too?......thank goodness my companions had the voice of reason on their side!!! By the end of the ride I was as tired as I had ever been from riding and I wanted to try it again another day.
We had only ridden for little over an hour ride time, at just about 6 miles and I was shocked and amazed that we had covered so little distance. The mental and physical demands of MTB'ng sure make it feel like you've gone a lot farther for a lot longer!
I got home Sat afternoon and it hit me what I had just done. The old lady voice said "OMG, what were you THinking?...how insane was that??" while the kid voice was saying "so....when are we gonna do that again??....coz this time I want to make it All the way down the Hills of Death and try to climb farther UP those doggone mountains!".
THAT is what it is all about
Letting the inner child in you come out and play another round! Doing all the stuff you were not permitted to do when you were young :p
I can't even put it in words the thrill I am experiencing on two rubber wheels!!! I am picking up my new (first) road bike this evening...Corsair, I saw in another thread about you picking the bugs from your teeth...I will be chowing on that protein soon :D
Rubber-Side Down...Enjoy the trails!!!
CM is a bike riding queen!
Ok, so she finishes centuries and in her spare time picks up mountain biking. Corsair did great on this mtb. trail; we hit great singletrack, great technical sections and she didn't flinch. I truly believe she was a mtbiker in a past life, she rides so much better than I did when I first started out. She wore the She Ra Tiarra for a great job on those uphill and downhill rock gardens!
