Suprisingly Dry

Last night at Wakefield I recieved what was almost the best present in a long time.

Suitably dry singletrack ready for riding. Especially since we had such a small turnout (Larry, Liz, Ernie, Lynn, Steve(late), and a new guy Bryan). I took the new guy on a casual tour of Accotink and then we hit a bit of Wakefield before it got too dark for Bryan who didn't have his lights. The final climb up the racecourse finish was in almost near darkness. Back at the lot Steve was waiting around for the intermediate group but with no sign of them he headed out. After letting bryan out I head back in and found Steve in Phase 1 working to put his tire back on. He'd knocked it off the rim on some root. We toured around Phase 1, the creek trail and phase 4 looking for the intermediate group. We ultimately determined they weren't in Wakefield at all. Back at the lot around 8:40 we found out they rode the Counter Clockwise Trail south and had a good time doing something different.

Post ride food and bev at Kilroys made for a darn good night of cycling. Also enjoyed a bit of Ernesto's remaining Porter I think it was as a PLB.

Though I couldn't get up at 6 this morning and slept till 6:30. Bad bad bad. :)

Beat up and Tired.

Thats how I've felt for the past week or so. Between prepping for the party 2 weeks ago, work kicking my ass repeatedly. Between that and the weather my riding this month TANKED. UGh. Maybe 60-70 miles, on the real bike. I did do some running in the gym and riding the cycles at the gym.

Last Thursday at the Wakefield Night ride, after doing my own 10 mile pre-ride, 10 miles later I was nearly tanked out and at 11 miles I was boinking. I was annoyed as hell to be wiped out after 22 miles of Wake-o-tink.

Tuesday I finally made it out to Laurel Hill and it's a hoot. You can really let go if you have the bawls. With a lower pressure in my front tire I feel I could have pushed my avg speed at least another .5 mph from 8.5 to 9. Or more.

The trails are fun and twisty. The skills section at Slaughter house is neat though the heavy rock section beat me twice, I just could get the momentum and line right. I made it halfway over the log skinny and had to bail. Need more pedaling. :) The actual trail was fun to. I think the best way to do that trail is go up the switch backs heading out of the middle of the figure 8.

The blue loop was fun, I took the 2nd enterance but I just didn't have the gas in me to really hammer it and fly on the rollers or hit the jumps there.

The Red (Apple Orchard?) was a neat downhill, and a bit of a grind back up doing it CW. I think finished out on Green to Red to back to the CCT then back the field trail to the parking lot. A nice bit of fun. Next week I want to hit there and get 2 laps.

Had an awesome dinner of Grilled Flank Steak, Broiled Polenta, a home made relish and a nice glass of wine. yes there it is. I do drink wine. Murphy Goode's Liar's Dice. A blend of Zins. Deep and smooth with mellow hints of spice.

No Bedlam for Moi.

Alas work has conspired against me. And so has the Federal Govt. And Fates, etc.

So I won't be making the bedlam in Bedford for this year. As I not only don't have the $$$ but I also have no new beer to sample, as I've been behind on stuff for over a month now. Ooops.

I did start Park Tools Bike Maint School last night and it's been very cool so far with even the intro and explanation on stuff such as hubs, freehubs, wheels and tires. The cool stuff gets going next week with Wheel Theory being a big one for me.

Hopefully this rain wraps up todya and thursday we can Ride at Wakefield.

But I'm not holding my breath.

Wednesday Blues

March 19th Entry From Kung Fu Monkey (kfmonkey.blogspot.com):

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's
life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish
fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its
unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially
crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of
course, involves orcs.

Now that explains why I'm so screwed up. Damn you Ayn Rand!

I still need to finish Return of the King.

Stupid rain, GO AWAY!

Thursday Wakefield. Semi Epic

It was a damn fine Thursday out for all cyclists I think! One of the best in a while for sure. I got out of work a bit later than I wanted but still made it to Wakefield right around 5. A slow gear up and I headed out 15 minutes later. Took a nice spin out by the rusted truck section as a short warm up. Then headed out for an equivalency lap of race course. Barely pushing I turned in a solid 20-21 minute lap. I think with a little more riding I may be able to turn in some solid sub 20 minute laps by race time in June. A quick visit over to Accotink followed that for some additional exploring. The Accotink workday had cleared up a lot of leaf covered trail and had 1 good reroute! Very nice work.

Back to the lot a bit before 6:30 to organize the group Night Ride. Had a pretty good turn out of 15 other riders. We headed out in 2 big groups of 8. Both groups stayed together till the first trail in Accotink where I had a rally point and offered quick thoughts on the trails. And we rode on, taking several legs I havent' before. Eventually I let Mike and Joel lead a bit including the section out of the park and back to the CCT as I don't know that way at all.

We rolled back into Wakefield at around 8 and after a time check and reorg we decided to ride till 8:30. We blasted off, doing the creek trail to phase 1, the creek trail race section and up and out on the high section of phase 1. We then did the climb up to the berms and rode down. And headed back to the lots. 12 miles in about 2 hours for our group and 22 total for me. I was stoked. A great night of riding, I was bummed out that I couldn't hang out afterwards. The wyf was having an existential crisis and I was late getting out due to session the berms. Oops. But an excellent night ride!

Cherry Blossoms and other blossoms

El Wyf and I took a gentle coast down into downtown Sunday for a visit to the craziness that is the cherry blossom festivus. The first part on the Canal wasn't too bad, but once we got onto the path along the river after G-town it was packed to crazy packed. I did make a sweet drop in off the benched sections there after avoiding a bunch of the crowds! Once we hit the tidal basin we walked about 1/2 way around it. Then after appreciating the nature we hoped back on the bikes and rode back down to the river and back, much quicker over all due to less crowds. It was a wonderful day to be out spinning.

I only felt bad that I was missing the shed trailwork day, but I'll hit the next one for sure!

Came back and hit Nest in downtown bethesda. Very good mussels and nice pizza. Enjoyed with a Rogue Dead Guy. Saturday I had a Milk Stout and wasn't really impressed. The DFH 60 that I followed it with was much better :)

Hoping to hit CJ tomorrow after owrk and see if the new section is seeing more action now with the entry bridge and the big bridge in.

100 Miles and Riding

Wow, its been a LONG while I think since I actually had a 100+ mile month. This month I hit 115 I think based on my cyclecomps starting mileage and ending today. Adjusting for a minor snafu that kept 3 miles off the record.

My GPS today decided it was too nice out to stay on and cut off all the time, after the 4th time I gave up. Gonna flash the mem/bios again and see if that helps.

For many guys out there 115 is nothing, a weekend maybe or a regular week. For me it's pretty spiffy. I average out probably between 40-60 miles a month. With the occasionally slightly higher month. My new goal is to push that number a bit more over the course of april....Maybe 150. We'll see I guess.

Today was a great day out at Wakefield. Didn't have time to hit Accotink, but wake was pretty good. Some wet spots but over all very ridable. Though I did see 1 or 2 spots that made me go Huh?

I'm off to finish digesting some good Thai food.

Cabin John Trail Work Day

Come one, Come All! To the great CJ Trail Work Day, Sunday March 29.

We'll be meeting at the Group Picnic Area on the north side of Tuckerman LN across from the maintenance yard at 7400 Tuckerman Ln.

We'll be rallying at 9am for what will hopefully be a busy and productive day of building bridges, maybe building a tool shed, some trimming of the trail corridor, blazing, maybe bench cutting a few spots. Depends on turn out.

Rain or Shine is the current plan. Currently we have 41 Low and 62 High with Few Showers (30%) in the forecast.

I'll bring out Coffee and Donuts and some a limited supply of bottled water in the AM. I'll also hopefully have at least 2 cordless drills. I'm also hoping to bring a EZ up shelter thing to work partially under in case of rain while bridge building.

You need to bring, gloves, water, snacks/food, and appropriate clothes, like work boots, or solid shoes. No sandals/etc.

Double Dip?

Inspired by riderx's triple dipple post of Monday I wanted to write up a decent post about my big Monday of riding. So on with the tale!

Monday we had weather indications that it would be a beautiful sunny day, and I had a newly re-tuned bike to put through the grinder. And the itch to ride somewhere different. Sure Schaeffer Farm is open again, but I wanted something tougher, to push myself. So I went back to Gambrills SP for a second tour of the yellow loop.

So after a late start I made it to Gambrills around noon, unpacked and got on the trail with a quick warm up spin up the parking lot side of yellow to near the top and back down, to cross the road and start the clockwise loop of yellow with extension. The first climb wasn't bad and I almost made it up the first climb with only a minor bump off. Alas the stairs kicked my ass, with pushing several sections, though I did make the last climb and damn that was a grind. Some nice flowing descents back down to the extension trail. The extension trail is really interesting. At the major rock outcrop I played around finding a nice line away from the trail on what looks to be a pretty fun play area, alas I minorly ditched on one try, the 2nd time I made it a simpler quick drop rather than trying to ride a line. Back on the trail it was a slow grind around the loop, with some climbing after crossing the road, coming down after the t section on a soft/loamy section I cut it to tight and dumped over real good. Banged my knee real good on a damn rock that was in the perfect place. Murphy's law. I quickly hopped on the bike swearing at myself and whatever diety placed that rock. I rode on with good climbs/etc until I hit the CRAZY climb at about 1:30'ish in my ride. It is rocky as hell. I dunno how to hit any of it honestly, except maybe on a dirt bike :) After that I made good on the climbs back to the road crossing and had fun on the bike rock formation descent. Then it was a grind back along the road till the blast down to the lot, I was too tired to really let go alas. Maybe next time. I did session several good climbs, and rocky area's finding better lines and trying to make some climbs.

Gambrills Ride

On the way back down out of the mountains, I had a crazy notion. Why not stop for a quick loop at Schaeffer Farm??? It's too nice a day and the riding should be good. So a drive down to the farm and a quick load out and I was ready to go.

It was an excellent day out at SF. The trail had a good bit of rogue branches down, but thanks to DKEG and Wrench's efforts the trail was clear of all major trees. So I went out the stunt section of white to yellow. The trail faeries have been hard at work building a few dirt jumps it appears. I skipped em due to being a bit tired. Out the yellow to the blue bypasses and back out on the far yellow loop. Trail definetely has some growth issues, the thorny stuff is already growing into the trail. In a feat of silly-assed-ness I rode the orange offshoot trail and it was fun, once I made the initial climb in, that was rough. Nice and flowing once I got going, and out back to the yellow loop. The field trails were fine by then. Probably 3 PM. It was a bit of a slog for sure coming back up the final climb to the big intersection. I met up with a rider I'd been chasing for a while, we both recovered and I took off first, he held pretty close the entire way back with me pulling away a bit on the descents. The armored stream crossing KICKS ASS! I was stoked, we both commented on how nice it was now. The final slog back up that yellow section to the white/orange meet up was hellish at that point. I just kept pushing the pedals. The final ride in was a bit slow. At first I was pulling a nice 9.1 MPH pace, but by the end I had dropped back to a 8.1. Oh well, not bad.

It was a excellent day out. It was not perhaps my best 16/17 miles. But it was better than any day at work, and a lot of fun. Now I just need to find a riding cohort who is off Mondays and wants to explore. Or else someone to lead me around the shed a bit, who doesn't mind slow riding, on one of my rare free Sundays or on a Monday.

Trail Building School

Had a good trail building/maintenance class at Wakefield for MORE trail liaisons on Saturday. Lots of good info for sure. Got to do some fun field work, play with Cannycom mechinized wheelbarrow/dump system. I'm now certified to borrow it for use on my trail work days. We also got to play clinometer's to measure the grade of slopes and to try our hand at planning good trail. I learned the 3 big rules, the 15% rule (trail grade). the half rule (of which your trail grade should be half what your actual grade is). And the 10% rule for the averaging of your trail grade over all.

After wards we did a ride of Wakefield, but i had to bail after 40 mins due to a late start on the ride. But got in about 6.5 miles anyways. We were flying, I was wondering why I was dieing. We avg'd out like 9.7 mph. On main trails at wake I usually run fro 7-8 depending on if I'm leading the casual rider group.

Hoping to hit gambrills tomorrow. I redid both derailer's cables this weekend and it needs a bit of tweaking in the morning on the rear d. Gotta pack the stand and cable adjustment tools I guess.

Finally moved Snow Day IPA to secondary. Tastes pretty good so far. Hopefully bottle at the end of next week or so. Rock Bottom beer isn't bad, the stout is got a good bit of coffee'ness and the brown is pretty good. Didn't try anything else.

Restaurant Review

Ceiba in downtown DC. - Give it 4.5 out of 5. Excellent Latin/Caribbean food. Though I feel it tends a bit more towards cuban almost. We started off with mojito's. I had the standard and wife had the Hemingway. I liked mine a bit better as it was a tad sweeter. Very well balanced without too much mint, and the piece of sugarcane as garnish/swizzle stick rocked, and was fun to chew/suck on while drinking. We then order a bottle of Chardonnay-Viogner (vee-ohn-yay), Chardonnay/Viognier, Nieto Senetiner, Don Nicanor, Mendoza, Argentina, 2007 $39. Super nice went extremely well with everything. We started with the wild Sea Stripped Bass Ceviche. Nice and tangy with a nice spice. For dinner I had the whole roasted snapper that was excellent. Moist and flaky, the sauce and garnish was terrific. J had the pork tenderloin medallions cuban style and they were superb. We finished off with a keylime apple tart type dessert with a super smooth coconut ice cream. Excellent service, a wonderful place to eat. A bit more management on my part and it could have been only a $100 meal. But it was well worth the chunk more. Almost 3 hours of dining.

Friday's stop by Whole foods provided a taste of the wonderful North Coast Brewery's Pranqster Belgian Ale. 7.6%. Was super drinkable with BBQ.

Beer Entertainment

I was listening to 98 rock on the way home from a meeting with the Volunteer Coordinator from MCParks. And I heard what I thought was a comedy bit they sometimes play, but alas it was just a commercial from America's Favorite Brew-lords.

Anheuser Busch....New Budweiser about the new butt-weiser specific glass so as maximize flavor, head, etc. They especially mention the "Natural" carbonation in budweiser. HAHAHAHAHAH. I was laughing my head off in the car.

I picked up a 4 pack of Sam Adams Imperial Style Doublebock. I tried a taste there along with the Imperial stout and a few other of theirs. I liked this one the best. Just had one now with dinner and it was really nice and malty. Good hop balance to clear the palate afterwards. I liked it better colder than on the warm end, went well with my dessert, cheapo brownie pieces.

I'll make my own, Thank You!

Hmmm, I've found out that an opportunity that I thought had been closed to me is now open if I can make the stars align (find a car pool).

Snow Day IPA - Based on Brewers Best HopNog kit from the fall of 2008. With a bit of pristine snow melted into the boil. It was supposed to be an ABV of 6-7% but I think between spillage and other I'm going to only hit an Abv of 6 max...It's had almost 2 weeks in primary, so this weekend I'll move it to secondary and plan to bottle by the first of April.

Moving ahead with becoming the main Trail Liaison for Cabin John Trail in Bethesda. Should have crewe leader training next Monday is the plan.

Rode wake and accotink last night for the first time in a month for actually real trail riding. It was awesome, did 12 miles with the casual group.

Lots of new beers tried lately including

471 IPA - A nice hop load but a hair to bitter for enjoyment.

Steve R at WFTNR hooked a brother up with an AWESome beer
Erdinger Octoberfest HefeWeisen - A super awesome Hefe that is smooth as hell and stronger than usual. Very minor yeast character.

Chunk also had his IPA out and it was super smooth. Very drinkable with nice fruity hop nose.

New Holland brewing The Poet - Nice and smooth and rich but it had an odd odor. Maybe it was a bit skunked...Nice otherwise

I just had another Punk DFH and I actually REALLY liked it this time.

Tommorow I shall brew Snow Day Pale Ale. :) I'm REALLY tempted to melt down some snow for a bit of the water base. :P

I need to ride more.

The title says it all. I have been hitting the gym much more regularly than since last spring and I know my core/shoulders are definitely getting stronger, I need to start doing more leg work. My power I think is increasing but the endurance boost just ain't happening.

Case in point, I rode about 30 on Thursday night around the CCT with a tiny bit of Wakefield (less than a mile i'd say). And I went out this morning for a snow ride. Damn my legs were still acting stupid. Now I admit i haven't been eating great and that was on a pretty light breakfast, so I will head out again later once it starts snowing hopefully later this afternoon, or tomorrow I will definitely try and do 10-15.

Ultimately I think to build my endurance it's going to require my getting a road bike. Well I've been looking at some budget SS/Cross rides and i hope maybe after taxes next month I might be able to pony down. Probably something like a Motobecane Fantom Cross Uno or Mercier.

Back to cleaning for me....Brunch break in an 45 mins.

Hope everyone out there is getting in some rides.

Also this afternoon or tomorrow I believe I will finally start what will be called Snow Day Ale, a hoppy little number. Almost an IPA but not quite.

Chocolate......Beer

Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout - Nice, super smooth, rich with a nice level of bitterness and not super sweet at all. Tasty and moderately strong. At least after having sushi a half hour before.


Birra Moretti La Rossa - Nice beer ultimately from Heineken. Nice rich matliness with a nice bit of hop finish that keeps it from being too sweet. Definitely a session able beer, my FatherInLaw picked this up and we enjoyed a bit. Strong too 7.5% ABV. A nice Italian double boch.

The wyf is out of town this weekend till Sunday afternoon and after payday friday I'm looking forward to picking up some tasters and riding my bike a TON.

Rob

Wakefield Thursday Night Ride

Last night was another WF TNR. Alas, it was too soft at the normal start time for any trail riding so we spun out for 50 on the CCT. It was a good ride, though small only 4 of us for most of it. We kept a pretty stead but slow pace due to moderate headwind on the way out. The way back we stopped to do a hill that was a pretty good spin up and busted my lungs WAY Tooo Much. I gotta build more base miles!

On the way back we hit the Creek Trail, the lower half of phase 4 to the lower half of phase 1 and out Salamander. Good times.

It was sooo windy. PLB's and PLBE's were enjoyed before we departed for kilroy's.

One of the guys on the ride who is home brewer is going to hopefully hook me up with the plans for a simple cheap chiller for lagering/summertime brewing.

Lotso Beer and a bit of Biking

Beer first I must say. Lots of recent trials and a few acquisitions.

At Whole Foods Lake Fairfax I finally tried Dale's. Nice! Smooth and crisp with nice hop balance. Not overly hopped and a nice bit of malt. Good head also. Excellent with the BBQ. Though I refuse to pay the $10 or whatever a 6 pack in cans. F-That.

Saturday - Brasserie Beck - Vday dinner sponsored by El Wyf! She hooked me up with an excellent dinner and we each drank 2 big belgians. Super nice!
I drank -
Rochefort 10 - Wow nice and dark and smooth. Super malty with nice hints of raisins plums and such. Bottled.
GuldenDraak - Damn nice. Draft from Keg. - Dark and malty also but less fruit than the Rochefort, a bit sweeter though it went very well with dessert. Hints of hops also cut the sweet at the finish, a bit. Pleasant long finish.
Wife had
Kwak - Bottled to interesting wooden handled glass thing. This earns points alone. Smooth and dark, with light fruit hints. Not as heavy as my 2 beers.
Damn can't remember her 2nd. But it was good. Edit later....:)
Check out there website at Brasserie Beck

Sunday - The Gordon for some crazy high end super nice cocktails. Then we hit Ulah for dinner and I had a Leffe Brune and it was super good with everything. Smooth and tasty.

I picked up a big bottle of Troegs Nugget Necktar and am looking forward to trying that and a big bottle of Weyerback Slam Dunkel, a double dunkelweizen to share with the wyf.

LAst week was a total fitness BUST. However I'm back on the bike, Sunday I hit black hills and suffered horribly. It's really embarrassing. A week of the bike and my legs went into total rebellion. So I punished them at the gym on monday doing a mix of box jumps, upper body and then road the upright cycle doing intervals for 40 mins. Today I got back out and rode Cabin John between Democracy and Tuckerman Ln. It was better than Sunday fro sure and my legs felt better, but I need to keep pushing more, and get out and just do some stupid mileage on the canal on Mondays. Alas I'm working next monday it appears.

Part of me is suicidally tempted to prep for riding up in Fredrock tommorow. We'll see, depends on weather and if I can entice any pokey riders out. Time to shower and make some dinner.

Cabin John Trailwork Day March 29

Cabin John Trailwork Day - March 29, 2009 - Sunday.

Come out and help us finish the bridges, to complete the re-route started this fall/winter series, between Tuckerman Rd and Goya Drive.

More info to come!

The Metal Lives

Just won a free download of the Metallica show from 1.15.2009 that I was a bit bummed out to miss due to some good friends getting married. But now I have a free copy of the show! That ROCKS!

HAD A SUPER COLD ride last night at wakefield. Ended up with 14 miles with the pre-ride included. Super frozen grown, but the powerlines/phase 2 is a disaster. RUTS RUTS RUTS! Argh.

Beers Whitelist

New Beers I've tried and enjoyed in the last weekend or so.

Bell's Kalamazoo Stout - Draft - WF Fairfax - Nice smooth and with a nice mid level body. Very tasty.

Victory Moonglow Weizenbock - Dark Wheat at 6.8abv makes this baby potent but nice and smooth. A bit too sweet for non-wheat beer aficionados. I liked it enough that I picked up a 6, and already drank 1.

Peak Epresso Amber Ale - Nice and esspresso flavor, without the stout or porter level of strength/body. I'm curious to hear my wife's opinion soon.

Tried to ride yesterday at CJ but it was more of an ICE path than a trail. And if I waited to the afternoon I'm sure other parts became a mud bog. Not for me. So I hit the gym in the afternoon for a half hour of intervals on the bike and some weight work.

Danny and the Demoncycle - VA Bike safety ala 1972

Snow Mobile

Yesterday my bike got its first real good taste of snow. Sure their was a bit on Monday at Gambrill SP, but not like Tuesday. I went out and toured the neighborhood snow area's riding the streets, the parks, and the green spaces! It was a blast, did like 4.5 miles in 35 mins of gently riding. It was real fun honestly especially watching the suckers out shoveling the snow while I rode on past.

Though I admit, I dumped while going up a driveway/curb combo in front of 2 women shoveling and I laughed the whole time. They thought I must be a nut case I suppose.

Regardless it was fun and cold. I also made tracks in my front and back lawn. Though I only have pics of the front. Next time I'll have my big 2.55 Weirwolf LT up front to stabilize the ride a bit more. And maybe I'll mount the fat 2.3 Crossmark up also on the spare rear....hmmmm.



Tonight I'm working on cleaning up and re-lubing the rear D and chain.

Gambrill First Ride Today

Man, what a day to ride frickin Gambrill for the first time! It was a great drive up with on and off flurries of snow. By the time I hit Fredrock it had slowed a bit, vs the MoCo-270 corridor.

Parked in the lot at around 10:15, 1 other car there but obviously a pedestrian as no bike tracks were visible. Finished changing gear and headed out a bit before 11.

Since I read a recent thread on the MORE forums about best routes, I knew I was going yellow and decided to do the clockwise from the lot loop, going across the street first and up to the Upper loop, then back down the other side.

Wow! It was fun, but damn sketchy in a LOT of places, some nasty black ice for sure under a fine layer of snow. Had the bike slip out from under me 3-4 times but caught myself each time. Had to push a few more hills than I would have liked but with the ice on some sides seeming worse I preferred that to a bad/dumb fall. I did make a few climbs with single dabs that I was proud of as well as 2 descents.

Lots of fun stuff to play with, I session a couple small sections trying to find best lines/etc. Some of the BIG formations were definitely a bit sketch but fun. It was a beautiful and empty day out on the trails with the snow and myself. Didn't see a single soul until I returned to the lot just in time to donate money infront of the very nice ranger. :) The envelope box was smashed and so I hadn't earlier. Oh well she was very nice about it.

Looking forward to trying again when less ice is present. A bit more snow would have made it funner also. I'll be back for sure now. I just have to get faster. Though a bit of that was due to creeping around turns/down straight sets where the ice tended to like to hide at a slow pace. :)

Post ride stop at Hard Times REALLY hit the spot.

Electronic Shifting

I've been reading and hearing a lot of discussion in the last 2-3 weeks about Shimano's new E-Dura Ace shifting system. A real mix of negative and positive. After reading a bit more and applying my brain to it here is my take on it.

Bling'ish gear for now, but give the tech another development cycle and it may really come to something truly interesting to the broad spread of cyclists.

My one application I might see if I had a truly "tricked out" rig was maybe running my front D on that if i had a 2x? system. I already run a shimano up front (hnmmmm maybe thats why it shifts so bad), but after reading reviews/tests/etc I could see using one if I went to a 2x? gearing. A smooth front ring shift could provide some nice benefits especially on those new trails when you hit an un expected grade change and find yourself wishing to hit the easier ring and not worrying about dropping chain or fighting the shift as I currently find myself sometimes.

However I would like to see some more improvements in the harness and battery systems first, also not ignoring the fact that it doesn't currently come in a mtb/thumb shift format.

For now I continue to ride 3x9, and look fondly off at the idea of a perhaps 1x3/4 Jones/etc but it just ain't happening till a new job is in hand. For now the Midget will continue to be my trusty steed.

On a funny note I was just reading in one of the MB monthly's that Steve Peat rides the same rims I do, and that leaves me feeling pretty geeked out.

Bikes, Beer, and Boots.

Ahhh what a fabulous trip. My first to Europe, and I can say definitely not my last. Got to drink some fabulous beers including a PILE of cask conditioned english ale's including John Smith, Old Peculiur, Winter Jewel, and Acorn Porter that was my favorite. Also drank a fair number of Belgian including Kwaq? Leffe, Leffe Triple, Le Chouffe, and another that has escaped my mind. Argh.

Where we were in england had a fair share of bikers, a few more than I see around here for sure, but nothing like Amsterdam. Bike parking is as bad as car parking in places here. Tons of cargo bikes, a few mountain bikes (BSO's really) and I saw 2 "road" bikes actually being ridden both on the same night. Quitting time was amazing as the HORDES of bikers would swarm out and nearly rule all the traffic in places even fully taking over car lines like the critical masses of old, but on a daily basis. Bike lane traffic lights were amusing and not always followed either.

Amsterdam is a stunning city and the age of stuff in England makes me feel just how young america really is. Though the interest in Obama overthere is remarkable and generally very positive, only some drunk guys in A-dam were really bad, but I attribute it more to the fact they had just seen Oasis (french of A-holes really).

More later as I have time to process down. For now I"m finishing up the laundry and pondering where to ride tommorow.

Oh yah and a ton of lovely ladies in boots :) What can I say, I'm a leg man. :)

Europe - The final countdown

Headed to the UK and NL today for the next week and change, should be a good time. Going to some very good friends wedding, hanging out, touring, beer drinking, etc. Maybe I can sneak in some urban biking in Amsterdam.

On the downside I'm missing out on some great riding time this week/weekend. You all ride safe, stay warm, and drink good beer!

Congrats also to Mic and Brie on their nuptials also this weekend!

Hopefully some fun photo's too. And I'm going to try and have a nice beer blog when I return.

Lots of Beer, Not so much biking.

Lots of Good Beer had lately, while at the Big Hunt on Saturday Night I got to try the following brews:

allagash Black - Nice belgian/stout'ish mutant with large notes of coffee. I thought it was pretty good, it was on draft in a nice chalice type glass. Not much head. Sweet.

Victory Hop Wallop - Yah this was a nice hoppy Victory brew that was hoppy on the nose and on the tongue with a nice balance. A bit of maltiness and for how high the alcohol content was not very noticable. Drinkable as hell.

New Holland Cabin Fever Brown - Not bad mild brown, not much nuttiness but a nice level of malt and other stuff, only had a sip of the wife's.

note - STAY THE HELL AWAY from the home brands at the hunt, wife had a Hefe style and it was SKUNK'd. Either the lines were gross on that puppy or the keg was dead Jim.

Also noted that Kramer books has some real nice beers in the cafe, headed back there soon for sure!

Today would have been a nice nice day for a bike ride but I am at home TCB and such. I am hoping to hit the gym again starting this week. It's been A LONG time.

Anyone got good plans for New Year?

New Beers Tried this Week

St.Bernardus Triple - Wow. Nice
St.Bernardus ABT - Wow but not as nice.
Rouge Nitro Stout - Smooth and Tasty. Not as strong as Old Rasputin, but very tasty on draft.
Anchor Brewing Anniversary/Winter - Nice the alcohol was abit much at first but was a super nice balance of malt and hops.
Hop Devil - Mid Hop Beer - Tasty.
Stone - Smoked Porter - Tasty with Fish and chips. Very mild smoke, nice malt/sweetness.

Damn and for some reason I'm supposed to ride Wakefield in the bloody cold tonight!

Beer Glorious Beer

Ahhh. My friend beer.

Today I picked up a 4 pack of Fordham's Doublebock. Very nice and malty. Nice flavor, good body. My keyboard even drank a bit...

Also finally got my 6 pack of Full Moon. But thats gotta wait for a trial till at least tomorrow.

Tomorrow I'm going to hit the Whole Foods in Fairfax circle and enjoy some beer, and fried foods. Nice

Tonight I've also managed to kill 2/3'rds of a bottle of NICE Malbec wine.

Bodega Tamari 2006 Malbec Reserva from Agentina. NIce body, good hints of tannin and a bit of spice. Smooth. It was actually a gift from a friend of the wife and we enjoyed a bit with dinner and now I'm almost done with the bottle. hehehhe.

Hard to believe but back before I moved to CA we used to often kill 2-3 bottles of wine a week. I still enjoy nice wine but not very regularly.

Rosy Evening.

Beautiful sky last night on the drive over to Rosaryville, wish I could have taken a nice photo, but alas that requires a camera I suppose. D'oh!

Rode at Rosary with a bunch of folks last night, Paul led the 2nd group out. Definetely wasn't a casual pace as even at the back of the pack I averaged out at 8.7 mph. As a 2nd day I felt sluggish and tired after we did the inner loop. We did the ride in counter clockwise. And we did the inner loop in a reverse figure 8, and it worked real good, though the cut back up that hill was a real MF!

We hung out in the parking lot till about 9 shooting the shit. Right as I was leaving the park a very light misting rain started to fall. Sweet timing.

Space Beer

Sapporo brews beer made from Malt grown in Space.

Oops my bad, dunno why I put Hops originally. Thanks Steve.

Sapporo Space Beer

Article from Sept 2001 on brewing in space

I've asked my NASA employed wife about this, but so far she's mum on the topic.

Maybe they are trying to distill liquor.

The Pancake

The title says it all. Thats been today.

Got to stay inbed later than the wife who had to leave at 7:15 this morning, stayed in till 8:30. Nice.

Played on the computer till 10.
Caught up on Chuck, Naruto, Kitchen Nightmares, and Dirty Jobs on DVR - FYI - Dirty Jobs has a GREAT bit on HOP Harvesting. Go watch it! Now!!!!
Made Pancakes with chocolate chips while watching above TV.
Decided to go for ride at Cabin John even though it was a brisk 36'ish though sunny with wind.
Got ready, fixed front tire (Flat?), Fixed Pump (loose fittings).
Rode at 2:00 till 4'ish. Stick on 2nd section mauled my damn rear derailleur. GRrrr. Took dumb fall near park on Tuckerman due to gully hidden by leaves. Cramped up super bad on one of the last climbs and bailed out before normal democracy road exit.
Got home and had pancake leftover, PB Sandwhich with Whey Protein Powder.

Feel like a frickin pancake yet I'm pondering riding tommorow yet again out at Rosaryville.

God I love biking.

Also celebrated the end of prohibition with Bells Winter White Ale last night, might try one of my own chimay's tonight...maybe.

Rain Rain Go Away!

Thursday's Wakefield Night Ride went off with only a little rain at the beginning, but by 7:30'ish light sprinkles wasn't quite full out rain. So by 8pm we were all off and done, and looking for ways to stay dry and warm up.

Success!

Recent Beer's Tried:
Bells Winter White Ale - Nice, white ale. Mix of Belgian and Hefe yeast made this an interesting brew. Out of the bottle not as much yeast taste but I didn't swirl really either, their was a very impressive yeast layer below. Nice hints of citrus. Was a bit on the warm side at tasting, a bit cooler might have made it better or in a pint. 5 More to go for future experimentation.

Flying Bison IPA - Nice IPA.

Joel's Porter - Nice and smooth.

Falling of the Face of the World

It's been a slow month for the bike really. Between weather, trailwork, and light maintenance issues with the Midget. God, its really been 2 weeks since I've ridden. UGH. Oh yah don't forget Turkey Day.

I may finally take myself on a pilgrimage to Fredrick perhaps Monday if it isn't super rainy this weekend. I want to ride more. But between work and life. Maybe next week I can hit the Rosaryville Night Ride.

I guess I should go prep for tommorow even though the rain chance for tomorrow is near 50%, but who knows we might dodge the rain bullet. Gotta be positive.

I do feel like I'm getting better at doing my own adjustments. I did reset the entire rear-d. And I think it's better adjusted now than it was. On a funny note while adjusting the thing last night in the man cave, I turned off the heat at the master switch and forgot to turn it back on. It was 55 in my house this morning. I could only laugh at my very cold self this morning.


Had some good beers lately though, including Delerium Tremens, a DFH Black and Tan (Chicory and 90), and a winter seasonal I don't remember out at Whole Foods fairfax. I also picked up a Delerium Noel to try sometime soon.

Also I must pimp Old Dominion's Baltic Porter as a great winter dark beer. Lagered and with a nice malty sweatness and just on the edge of am imperial/stout perhaps. Gonna pick up a 12 tommorow if I do go down to Wakefield.

Also gotta give props to Hormel's new Turkey Chili. Tastes just as good as the original if not better and A BUNCH lighter, 190x3 per serving vx like 270x9. Not bad for a whole can even with 2 servings.

Damn this laptops dieing again, the charging port is severally F'd Up.

Trailwork Time

Got to go out to Patapsco for some TW yesterday. It was a good time really, a bunch of folks from the bliss were there and I got to shoot the shit with them during and afterwards. We went to some place in Columbia MD afterwards that had a really impressive set of beers and some good chow. Regular's seen included Steve, Donna, Miley, Mike K, Paul H, Jay, Eric, Jason, David (Dave?) and some of the others I've only met a few times like the Fred Rock Crew. 34 People there for Tw. Nice.

In other news I've almost gotten my wheel to near perfect true I think. At least laterally. I think I have a bit of vertical issue but I can't quite tell, so I think I'm gonna go over and have the guys at CB look at it. Also need to pick up a set of new tubeless valves.

Riding Forecast
Might try and get a shorty in this afternoon if the wheel is done.
Thursday - Looks like we finally may be back at wakefield. Nice!
Next Week - Rain on Tuesday at Rosey maybe they'll move it to Wednesday.

Beer Abroad

Well I've got a trip to England/Amsterdam coming up in January. And it should be a blast. We're going to be out in the York area for 4 or 5 days in England first for a wedding, with a bit of sight seeing if the weather cooperates. I was hoping to visit some english pubs and sample some of the brews there, fortunetly the chap getting married is a fellow home brewer and he'll direct me I'm sure to where appropriate ale's etc may be obtained once we dry out his cellar.

My real question here is about Amsterdam and where to hit for beer. Have any of you all spent any time there not in one of THOSE bars. Due to work drug testing requirements, my imbibe-ments must stay in the realm of booze. Also any cool things not to miss are also in my interest.

I'm looking forward to doing some rainy pedaling around Europe. :)

Un FRICKIN BELIEVABLE!

I'd just gone downstairs to toss a salmon fillet in the broiler and I hear my wife yelling, I was like HU? I thought she was on a conference call, so I hustle up stairs. And first thing I notice is the scent of burning electronics. I ask is she alright and she says yes but the cat puked on the cable box and it started burning and sparking and she unplugged everything and she wants me to check and make sure its all off. So I throw the master switch on the power strip just in case, but she unplugged everything already.

Turns out the cat hurled then hung around checking the sparks and smell out.
She threw the cat off.
Unplugged everything while yelling on her con call
She disconnected right as I came up.

Right now she's explaining to the group on the phone what happened and she's laughing away.

Monday Again and Again

Well Monday has rolled around as it usually does. And so far the score for the weekend is

Bike Maintenance Tasks .5'ish of 4.
Beer Bottled 1 of 4
Bottles are cleaned and ready to go into the sanitizer, I just worry I'm a few bottles short, I may try bottling to a growler.....Any comments????
Burlesque Shows Finished 1 of 1 - It was awesome, the wyf rocked with Adam Ant and the old school Madonna. Photo's up sooner or later.
House Picked Up 2 of 4
Leaves Raked - 2 of 4.
I think I will get the bottling done tonight regardless.

For now it's not been a bad weekend. I'm gonna drink a tall boy and research bottling to growlers now.

Hope everyone had an awesome weekend.

Cross Promotion

Come out to the Palace of Wonders this Saturday, November 8, 2008.
DUTCH OVEN BURLESQUE
"I Love the 80s" Edition
Palace of Wonders
1210 H St., NE Washington DC 20002
10 p.m. / $10
www.myspace.com/lildutchburlesque
www.palaceofwonders.com > New pretty site design! Check it out!


Celebrate or commiserate election results whatever side o'the isle yer on!!
* Groove to 80s beats by DJ P-VO
* Costume Walk Off in 80s Gear - Win Fabulous Prizes!! Duh!?
* ALL 80s BURLY ACTS!!!!!
* STARRING Dulce de Leche - gorgeous & glamorous straight from NYC!!!
* JUST ADDED! The sideshow feats of Coney Island Chris - The Geek ... The Freak ... The Human Oddity!
* Hooping, Fire Dance and Burly-Q from our favorite danger diva Miss Joule!
* Local chanteuse and emerging burly gurly, Poppy La Rouge!
* From Charm City & Gilded Lily Burlesque, the sexy spitfire Little Luna!
* DC's own leggy lovely, Sugar Ann Spice
* Dutch Oven founder and goof-ball extraordinaire, L'il Dutch
* MC & resident perv Gary Gutter with his arsenal of sick and wrong jokes
* Too-Cute-to-be-Legal Stage Kitten Lauren Marleaux

Cross posted since my wyf is such a great sport about doing my stuff, I should pimp her events.

Homebrew vs Coors

In a close match homebrew has defeated the kinda evil and mostly just tasteless Coors conglomerate as America's Favorite Brew.

Photo by B. Ramsey

Tonight we shall drink Stout to Celebrate. And maybe a few Celebrator's also.

Brewers Bliss - Blissfully Brewed Heavenly Day
Excellent People
Excellent Riding
Excellent Food
And
Super Awesome Brew.

Bliss Achieved. Cheers to Everyone!

The Big Trip

My fall big bike trip happened this previous weekend to the Rothrock State Forest in PA.

WOW. That is some CRAZY riding to a guy who mostly flatland/stream valley rides in N.Va and Southern/Central MD. I CLREALY need to go ride a lot more up in Gambril/The Shed area. My rock riding probably did improve a LOT during the ride Saturday but damn I was slow. By mile 15 or so I was already feeling light twinges of pre cramps. By early 20's I knew i was in trouble and opted to road ride back to the final fire road climb. Though there was 1 big pipeline climb I had to do that almost broke me. I barely stand my legs were cramping so badly, I had to get back on and spin for a while to loosen up enough to walk it the rest of the way to the top. The climb back up the final fireroad to camp was hell and it was dark by the time we got back. Fully Dark.

Not to say that the ride sucked, in fact, it was frickin awesome and I'm already excited for a spring version of that trip and hopefully doing both days next time. The guys were awesome to ride with, definetly inspiring to ride with guys who are better, it makes me want to be better and stronger. I think my line choice did improve also even during the ride.

The camp itself was great and all the guys were cool to hangout with, drink beer, and cook insane huge meals. I'm gonna try and link up some photo's later today or this week.

Back to work now.

But here's the summary -
7H 18M Total Time with an in Motion Time of 5H 8M with a moving pace of 6.5 mph. Not bad when I consider how uber hard the terrain is. 33.7 Miles.

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/7011644

Flying like Super Something

Tuesday I took the rig up to CJ after work again and got 14 miles total between there and back. Nice ride and the shake down went very well.

Yesterday I arrived at Wake nice and early after picking up an order at REI and RickyD hauled me out to the top of the berms for an impromptu jumping/filming session. Unfortunetely his camera mount wouldn't hold the camera up so he probably didn't get a lot of good video.

The annoying thing there that i noticed was I was burping my rear tire on the landings. I guess I was maybe dropping 3 feet or something max. Didn't seem very far, but I know I wish I had a smoother touch on landings. Just haven't done enough of them yet. Had to re inflate after the 2 sets of 2 jumps I did, both times the tire was down to like 20 PSI.

The tire rub issue continues to worry me enough that I'm probably gonna by 2 new tires to replace my current one with on Payday. Probably try a Specialized Captain Control in 2.1 or 2.2 if I can find it or a Crossmark UST again in the 2.1.....grrrr. Unless I can find a Mutano Raptor UST in 2.1/2.2

Got another 14 miles in. Gotta see if the wife is gonna let me try the MoCo epic on Sunday. I really want to as a test for some big riding the weekend after. I figure if I can hang pretty well on 40-50 miles of moco I can do 30-35 miles of Penn or WV.

Bloody Knuckles

Thats about how I felt yesterday after fighting with trying to change the pads on the rear J7's. I was about to pulp the damn thing then bash my hands against the wall. I ended up shoving the old pads back in for a quick ride down into Bethesda for a late brunch with the WYF.

Today I re-attempted the task and after about 30 minutes of fumbling, spreading, playing the the contact adjuster knob I got the bloody things to pop right on it!!! I think part of it was the angle I was trying to use. So after, that I felt brave and boled and decided to replace my Rear D, hanger and the cable. Yep at the same time. Even as a computer guy I should remember the first maxim.

Only replace 1 major componet-eth at one time moron!

Well the rear d I did some minor adjustments on the high and low with the cable and chain off to match the originals settings. The other adjustment wasn't far off. The cable was the biggest pain as I did a shitty job cutting it. So it frayed a bit as I tried to thread it. After some lubing, pulling the housings apart to feed it through very carefully. A quick set of the cable in the rear d and a test. Hmmmm adjustmet is a bit off can't hit 2 gears, re-pull the cable. A few more adjustments of the Hi/Lo and viola. I recleaned the disc and set out for some quick runs to work in the brakes. The new pads, from Jagwire seem to be good, and maybe even offer a slightly softer touch. We'll see. I replaced my front skeewer with one we got free at the MORE winter party this year.

Cleaned the rear wheel/cogset fully and fully degrimed, degreased, and cleaned the the chain. Then I gave it a good spray of tri-flow to get out the water and solvents. Then I applied my usual coat of my regular lube, and then shook it down and wiped off all the excess. Butter!

The damn thing shifts great so far, expect to need a tune up in a week or two.

In crappy news I realized that yes my fat 2.25 in back is rubbing a bit so for now I taped it up with a few layers of electrical tape to judge the wear over the next few rides. Probably gotta find a narrow 2.25 or a wide 2.10 to replace the crossmark with. Not sure if I want to try the 2.1 CM.

Ahhh beer and chili for dinner. Now thats the way to wrap up a day off.

Also did a bit of window shopping for a new bib set.

Cold and Crisp

WOW! By the end of last nights ride it was cold and crisp, I think it was down into the mid 50's. Oops motionbased says it was actually 50'ish! Wow! Though not crisp either with a 90% humidity! Weird. All i know is i was wishing for slightly warmer socks and a bit warmer jersey.

Knocked out a bit over 22 miles with my preride and the main ride split at about 12 and 10 respectively. Found a bunch of new to me trails over in Accotink, I need to go ride that a LOT more. Next week I hope to spend a full hour and half or so over there not just 45-50 minutes. Lots of good steep/rooty climbs to murder myself on.

Would love to ride again today but I doubt I can do more than hit cabin john, gotta talk to the wyf and find out her plans for the night.

Bounce to the Moon!

Well the exciting bit of news from yesterday is the Wyf has upgraded jobs and accepted a new Civil Servant position at



She had been a Post Doc at NASA Ames and Goddard, on grant from NSF/NASA. This week she had just started the switch to being a contractor when, then yesterday afternoon she got the call offering her the job she had applied for last month. Big upgrade for her in that it provides nice bennies, her pay finally exceeds mine, and no more TAX hell next year. This year will still suck but oh well.

Hopefully leading tonights casual wakefield night ride assuming the trails are dry enough.

Bounce Bounce

Wow, I'm excited with a small tidbit of news. Hopefully I will be able to elaborate more tonight or tomorrow.

Weird dream

I had the most convincing dream in a while last night. Somehow I had a very in depth dream about buy a road bike of some sort, very odd I think it was a cannondale in yellow for some reason, I had better recall earlier this morning. I almost expected to walk into my basement and see it. Weird. Too bad it wasn't a cross bike I was checking out the other day. Or real. Boo hoo.

Now if only I could actually get out and ride. Last week was mostly a bust. The weekend was a rainy bust. Tonight's Rosh Hashanah. Maybe wednesday I'll try and hit FH again. Or maybe I'll be smart and just ride rosy. hmmm Isolated Thunderstorms. Last time I went to rosy under those conditions I got caught in a tstorm while riding. Though it did lead to my fastest lap ever. ahahahha.

Had a new for me Unibroue beer the other night, SEIGNEURIALE it was pretty tasty. Nice maltiness and spicy. Had it with some punkin and carrot soups (seperate). We then finished off a big bottle also of Fin Du Monde. Sometime soon I need to grab a bottle of the Don De Dieu.

DNK Brewery - Chimay Part Duex

Today I took the first of my gravity readings from the Chimay as it had stopped fermenting visible a few days ago, after about 6 days of good fermentation.

OG I read as 1.079 adjusting to 1.080 for the temp of around 77 degrees at time.
FG I read as 1.012 at a temp of 70'ish so no adjustment necessary.

Giving Final Calculation of: 8.9%'ish Alcohol, 1.024 Real Final Grav, 6.03 Grav Plato, and 263 Cals Per 12 Oz's. A sampling of the pre-secondary beer gave it pretty close to a slightly strong hefe. I'm thinking it should smooth out in the secondary as long as I'm very careful about siphoning the beer and avoid the sediment. As I did this by myself I ended up getting a bit more of the yeast/trub sediment than I wanted.

Tommorow I think I'll start messing with some label designs.

Vote for Theobroma!

I had the new release of TheoBroma at DFH in FC today on the way home from work. nice, not overly powering at all on any of the flavors, well blended. I actually do like it better than Midas I think.

Also Picked up this kit from Derek's.



75 IBU's is pretty rockin. I'm trying to decide if I also want to up the punch on it with some extra malt or not.

Kewl Cycle Kloths

Someone on the www.more-mtb.org site dropped a post about this following site today. They have some great cloths for the casual stylish cycle commuter who wants some slightly specialized gear. The reflective stuff is great as are the mudflaps.

And I've always wanted a smoking jacket.....Well not really on that.

www.cordarounds.com

And in the good news column my Rear D should be shipping from performance either today or monday. It will be nice to finally fix that. Now I just need to order a spare hanger as I'm gonna replace the current one again when I switch it.

FH vs PC

Actually the title should be clash of the idiots myself (@ FH) vs Performance Cycles.

In this corner we have me. A normally sensible and capable mountain cyclist. Who today managed to fall over after rolling into a small root. Classic fall really, slow roll into a root smaller than my forearm. Bounce off. Uh oh. Balance to far to one side and the world was tilting. Next thing I know I'm hoping back up and bitching not just at my bike but at myself. A quick check shows I'm okay. So I ride back out the exit section. Get to the lot and start messing around and notice that my Rear D which has been odd since my wyf battled rammed it at the beach is now WAY odd. And shifting even crappier. A quick adjustment on the bike rack and its obvious the thing is now REALLY on it's last legs. Where is the new Rear D I ordered from @#$@$ performance???. I can also only conclude that as I fell the opposite way, that during my flailing I managed to perform a series of repeated and powerful axe kicks with my right foot on the read d. I also notice that my left pedal is different. The damn shaft on one side of the pedal clipping system was out about a half inch?!?? I pull it a bit back into line and then apply my car jack's pipe thing to it knocking it mostly back into place. Maybe an 1/8th inch is now out. GRrrr.

In the far errrm corner is Performance cycles. An industry leader in crappy service and sometimes low prices. The other competitor recently order a new Sram x9 RD to replace one damaged during a rumble at the beach. Along with a new bottle of chain lube and 4 new power links. Today 2 boxes arrived from performance. One large, One small. Open the small box expecting Lube and Power Links only to find the chain lube. Now onto the large box. This box contained a ton of paper and 4 power links.

WTF!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!!! WTF is wrong with them, why weren't they shipped together in the same small box. What frickin retards. Now someday there shall be a third box I suppose. However the RD still says on Backorder. When you look on the site it says the RD's are due in the 19th....Uh that was 5 days ago morons!

Clear Winner
Performance Cycles!!!!!

Is the Rodeo here?

Thats how my ride at schaeffer started today. I looked at the poor woman and politely informed her that the rodeo is at the horse farm off to the right as you turned in. I pointed to the drive and sent her on her merry way. I just couldn't be the grinch. Oh well.

I blasted out 2 nice loops for 16.5'ish miles. Doing the big yellow loop 2x. My first run was around 43 mins moving time. I was pumped and went out and did the harder version I like with the first yellow stream valley to blue. Then I did the orange section out on the loop then back thru the 2nd valley and back. Did some playing on various logs and cleared some new stuff! Yah!

And I rode the first skinny on white and almost got the 2nd one a couple times. I'm stoked as my technical riding I think is FINALLY improving. Now to work on off foot jumps/etc and try a few larger/unramped trees/logs.

The rodeo was really noise when on the close side to the farm. Avoided a couple close calls with huge piles of horse dookie.

That puts me at about 65 miles this week! Yah!

To Label?

Now that my stock of brews is increasing from simple management (1 type or 2 with different caps) to 4 or more I'm thinking I need a more definitive tracking system. Or at least better than generally know whats in each brown box. Or better than a simple D or P on the bottle cap, as sometimes D and P can look a bit ambiguous, and while the simplicity of just using a number is okay, I'd rather go more elegant.

So I'm now considering making up labels. Any advice out there? Any tidbits of good knowledge? Better brands of labels for easy removal? Good design tricks? How do you, my fellow brewers manage your bottled collections????

Rosaryville Rushhour

After work yesterday I slogged my way over to Rosary for a quick ride with RickyD. Traffic wasn't too horrible over taking an 1:15 to get over there from Chantilly. On the way I had a moment of panic thinking the horse competition started that night, but upon arriving the signs said it started today (Sat, Sept 20). I was a bit late arriving at 5:05ish but ricky hung in the lot like the kind chap he is.

I geared up as quick as possible and we headed out. Great evening for riding, cool and crisp. We flew around the first section it felt like to me. R suggested we hit the interior loop, and I hestitated a minute before saying Yah. Normally the interior/tech section beats me up bad, but I guess recently i've gotten better at clearing logs. Only 2 really screwed me. The 3 set with the stoopid off angle/camber in the early part and the near the end off camber that someone has started to ramp. The rest of it was great, I had a blast. Soon i'm gonna start trying some of the skinny's. A few more trips to schaeffer for practice on the easy ones their first. The rest of the ride went well right till near the end when I started to boink a bit.

I checked the time/distance in the lot and we'd donw 11.6 in an 1:10 of rolling time for me. I was pumped usually that interior loops adds a LEAST 20 mins to my time and the quickest I think I'd done the combo in was like 1:30'ish.

The new front tire was giving me some scares at first on the first few descents, but by the end I wasn't even noticing it and was rolling fine and steady I felt like it was solid.

I was SOOOOO hungry on the way home, my stomach was rumbling the whole way. And stupid DC folk can't drive for crap, 2 wrecks one at the start of the s-curve and another half way through. 4 and 3 cars respectively. QUIT TAILGATING REJECTS! Your not getting there any quicker!!!!!

DNK - Chimay Update

Well after a bit of worry on Wednesday at the lack of fermentation, I switched the airlocks and VIOLA last night I had a nice vigorous fermentation. I think the airlock had issues as it seemed to be losing water.

For the week I've got 2 rides in, Monday was CJ for 18.8 miles and last night I got in 17.8 ate wakefield even with having to stop run out to TBL for a tire replacement and getting back at 7. Big props to everyone who helped out as I was supposed to be ride organizer last night, Anne M from TBL ended up leading the casual ride I was supposed to lead.

Tonight I'm either going to go suffer at Fountainhead after work or hit the Black Hills Night ride tonight.

Oh yah my new front tire is a Bontrager XDX Tubeless Ready. I wish it had a bit better defined side knobs but otherwise I really am digging it so far.

DNK Brewery - Chimay Chimay

Well I fired up the brew kettle once again last night, to brew a Brewers Best Ivan's Belgian Tripel, that I replaced the regular yeast on with a Chimay. It was actually one of the smoothest brewing run's I've ever had. And considering the multitasking during, thats pretty amazing!

3 Gallons Distilled Water
4 Oz Crush Aromatic
4 Oz Carapils Malt
Steeped at 160->150 for 25 Mins
7 Lbs Pilsen Light - Spray Dried Malt
8 Oz Malto Dextrin
24 Oz Light Candi Sugar
1 Oz Kent Hops at 4.8% Alpha Acid - Bittering
45 Mins at Rolling Boil
.5 Oz Kent Hops at % Alpha Acid -
15 Mins at Rolling Boil
Cooled to 85 Degrees and let sit for an hour
1 Gal Distilled Water
1 Gal Spring Water
Add Wort
.5 Gal Distilled Water - To Bring to 5
Added Yeast (OOops)
Wyeast 1214 Bel Abbey - Man June 23 2008 - Activated but not full active.

OG with Yeast slurry measured at 1.079 at a temp of 75 Degrees in Fermenter.

As of just now I have about 0 activity observed. Grrrr I may need some yeast nutrients or perhaps to pick up another yeast kit.

October Mini Epic Trip

This weekend is the annual fall trip for MORE to Douthat VA. I opted to skip this year in order to take a mid-october trip.

What I'm trying to do now is figure out where to go.

Currently I'm thinking I want to hit 2 rides optimally on the trip. Right now I'm mainly looking at the IMBA epic's.

Roth Rock Ride near State College Pa appx 201 Miles
Gauley Headwaters near Slatyfork, W.Va appx 247 Miles
Dupont State Park near Brevard, NC appx 510 Miles
Tsali Trail Epic near Bryson City, NC appx 540 Miles
Southern Traverse near Harrisonburg, VA appx 140 Miles -

The ST Epic in Harrisonburg is actually on my to do list next spring as part of the spring MORE Trip to Stokesville. R^3 may have closures in some area's due to hunting season closures. Not sure of what hunting closures the others may have yet.

I'm mostly an XC guy at this time, I ride a geared 26 Giant. I'm getting better at handlign more technical stuff like rock gardens of moderate dificulty. Massive downhills arent' my thing but I do enjoy long swooping rides and have no problems with suffering to gain my altitude.

Any opinions or suggestions appreciated.

Punk Rising

An odd week of riding. Due to the rains last weekend I didn't get out to ride till Monday mid-afternoon for a 2 hour slog fest at Schaeffer. I started with a quick lap of the yellow, and I did it in a pretty solid 46 minutes. Then I went out for the white loop again. And after a wrong turn leading to repeating the annoying southern section I finished up before a quick wrap up section giving me just over 16 miles in a bit under 2 hours.

Wednesday I picked up some Punk. That is DFH Punkin Ale. A bit strong in flavor is my first thought. I happened to look at the empty last night and realized that it had only been in the bottle 2 weeks as of Wednesday, bottled 8/26/08. So I'm gonna let it sit another 2 weeks before I try another. And make sure it's really cold.

Thursday was the Wakefield Night Ride. I actually swept instead of leading and it was mostly a nice change. We managed to squeek in a short ride at accotink. But I think that any more accotink visits are going to have to be on a pre-ride now. It was fun and ken knew the trails there very well. We then did a good bit of twisty fun with logovers, etc. From there we rode the first part of powerlines then dropped down to hit the remains of the creek trail, we popped out on the CCT and took the access rode and hit phase 1, skipping salamander. We then went a rolled phase 4, though I was feeling a bit slow on it. We then hit the high side of phase 1, climbed back up to the berms, and rode down. Fun! Then back to the lot. The group stopped so I optioned for 1 full lap out to the far powerlines and back, getting real close to 15 miles. I was happy with the ride.

Leading Casually, from the front.

Tonight I took up my regular fall duty of leading the Thursdays at Wakefield Night Ride for Sept and October. It was a blast, ended up with near 20 miles. Did a pre-ride with Tuba from MORE pushing out a respectable 7.5 miles in 50 mins. I then led out a group of 4 other riders on a merry chase for the next hour and 20 mins for another almost 9.5 miles. We were taking some sections slow so our sweeper could catch up. We did loser her once for about 10 mins and I felt bad! We did a quick lap of the section and found her near where we had stopped and waited before. Oh well it was a nice quick loop. I then did another quick almost 3 mile chunk after hanging in the parking lot a while talking with people. It was nice to be out alone, but it's always a weeee bit creepy. I startled something at the creek crossing and it almost scared me off the trail!

Next week I think I'll try and start off with a ride out to Accotink before dark with the group. Then come back and pound out some time in between phase 4 and such. Maybe a longer section, loop of the bowl also.

I'm wiped out. Its time to hit the shower.

Hu.

Never thought I'd say this but damn here it is:

Metallica may yet kick ass as a metal band. The new single is SOLID! It is awesome in a way I'd never thought I'd hear. If the whole album can hold up I'll be SUPER impressed.

Down with the Sickness

My cough cold continues to hound me, but I refuse to slow down much since it put me down early in the week.

So this week I got out for a schaeffer loop with the guys, and J came out and trooped with us on tbe beginner loop. She fell a few times but more to stopping issues rather than terrain. She cleared some tough logs!

Friday I hit the Little Bennett Friday Night Lights ride, we had a couple of regulars and of all surprises Brizn was out! It was a damn fun ride with everyone even though I did take an unplanned bath in the larger creek due to an unseen rock. The rest of the ride was good, and the slower pace was fine with me trying to hack out my lung every frickin 100 feet.

Sunday I went out and hit the Fairland Regional Park trail and had a good fun ride. Ran into rob, gary and co again who I hung out with Thursday after the Schaeffer ride at DFH. I kept missing the turn to head over to the easier area near the main rec center but it was okay. Ground out some hard riding before I went over there.

For the week I hit darn near 32 miles total. I'm pretty happy. Probably won't ride tommorow, think I'm gonna go hit the gym actually and do a bit of weight work.

Does this tire make me look fat?

Does this tire make me look fat?

Last night I finally picked up some more Stans so I could finally swap on the new tire for the rear of my bike. I've replaced my old MAxxis LUST Ignitor with a Maxxis LUST Crossmark. Following some people's suggestions I went from a 2.1 to the 2.25.

HOLY COW the damn this BARELY fits. As in I have to deflate it a bit to install the wheel! The CM is a massive tire. The old Ignitor went 1.5 lbs, the new Crossmark goes 1.9!!! Test riding in my basement it seemed not to rub but I'll have to get it actually out on trails. I think with this tire I'll be able to comfortable run at say 35 psi and get a nice cushy ride out of it. Damn it was a biatch to get on, feels like a much stronger wire bead in this one.

Now I just have to figure out my new front in the next month or so.

And I'm sick as heck since Sunday, I got a cough that started mid last week and by sunday I was misserable (Saturday wasn't bad). Monday I was off fortunetly and layed around all day. Had a backache from hell thats just now really getting fully better.
MY cough is a bit better today but now the damn thing moved up into my head. hu?? Thats frickin backwards! aARGHHHHHHH!!!!!

Also had to do a full lube/pm on the bike yesterday. I'd washed it on friday and didn't dry it or spray the moving components with the teflon/lube/dryer and it was BAD!

Round 2 - Titanium Seat Rails vs MY a$$

Winner - My a$$.

This is the 2nd seat I've destroyed since I got this bike, this was a replacement from last November'ish. I'd crushed the cro-moly rails on my original WTB Speed V. This time it was a clean snap near the seat clamp, I can only assume that this was perhaps in part due to over tightening the seat clamp bolts.

I replaced with a shiny new Bontrager Inform R, in medium width. Whats up with that!?!?!? Just kidding. But really it's strange in ways, I'm down nearly 15 lbs plus I didn't have my pack or anything on either. The jury is out on the seat for now, but I'm gonna send my Fly off for repair next week anyways. Got a 90 day money back on the Bonty.

Rode wakefield 2x times (before and after), when I cracked the rail I was making a good run on a W@W timed ride and I think I would have been inline for a sub 20 minute lap. On my return I did my first full lap at just a hair of 21 minutes. My 2nd lap blew as I was pooped, and the light conditions caused me to run a bit more carefully then before.

Tonight I'm kinda waiting on the weather to set what I'm going to do. If it rains a lot regardless I'll be headed home and to the gym. If not I'm going to try and ride schaeffer but incase i get stuck at work I'll fall back and do Wake again tonight. Haven't hit a group ride there since the spring I think. Ended up near 15 miles total putting me already at 40'ish for the week which is pretty good. I'd love to hit 50-60 miles a week regularly. Gotta make better use of Mondays.

Riding, Ride Like the, uh nevermind

Sorry, attack of those that shall not be named, this nice weather makes me want to drive a car with a convertible top, any car really.

Such nice weather here the past few days, so I've been outside a bunch and intend to the remainder of the week.

Sunday the wyf and I went out to wakefield to break my wife into riding clipless. It was quite an afternoon. She did great for the issues she was having. We need to adjust the tension on the pedals some more. She trouped through even after 3 different falls. Her 2nd lap was much better than the first. I'll try and get her back out there in the next week or two to solidify the course/area in her head.

Yesterday since I was off I snuck off for an hour and half of play on Cabin John in the beautiful weather. Nice day to be out rolling. Went from the Democracy Tennis center all the way up to goya drive and back. Took a non-direct way home and it totalled out nearly 15 miles, giving me 25 miles ish for the week already.

And suprise suprise, I weighted in later this evening and saw a new number I long thought gone, 205. EESH!

August, where are you going?

Where are you going this August?

Myself, I've already gone to Dewey Beach and had a semi-relaxing 4 days of Beach Time(tm). One of my favorite parts now is that my wife and i did a round of Out Run 2 and almost finished the whole first stage, which i've never gotten that close. It was a hard fought race with both of us making some good passes and driving. We also took one long ride out to Lewes and a bunch of short rides. Unfortunetly on the way back from Lewes, the wyf, in a fit of not paying attention attacked my rear d, and bent it pretty good, my 2 big cogs in the back are currently unreachable. Gotta do some creative bending tonight to see if I can get it better or if it's time to order a new rear d next week on payday.

Monday I'm going for a ride anyways but I guess I'll have to limit myself, and maybe go for a pile of mileage out at somewhere like Wakefield or maybe I can survive schaeffer.

Also on the repair/replace docket is my rear tire. It's got a TON of tiny gashes that aren't sealing well and a few rips. It's amazing how well it's held up. But I'm kinda pissed as those tires only have about 600 miles of my own on them and maybe 50 or so from the original owner. Oh well.

Also I need to get the damn garmin in for repairs, I want it fully fixed for the fall, I'm going to push hard to break 1k off road miles this year.

DNK Brewery Update - July's End

In a case of being busy and or simply extremely slack I have only now finally bottled the Dunkel and boy was I LAZY! hheehhe. The OG came in a bit high at around 1.009 giving this batch a revoltingly lower Alcohol content of like 4.2% Eeesh! Anyways it smells pretty good but it also came out a bit lighter than I wanted.

In the end its beer, has alcohol, and will taste better than cheap schwill. So I shall share and drink it as opportunity's present themselves.

In other notes, I noticed that this will be my 100'th post on here. Kinda funny with how long I've had this. I barely use my other blog account/service much anymore. Not that I use this a lot either.

Biking wise not much new, did a quick hit yesterday on an unplanned day off taking an hour and change to ride Cabin John. Gotta remember I can get into the trail without going all the way up to the main park off Tuckerman Lane.

Previously about a week and half ago I got to the LB Friday Night Lights Ride, unfortunately I flatted out with about 15-20 mins left and had to push it the mile back. Dave the ride leader led me on the short path back. Otherwise I would have gone what amounted to a VERY long way.

Headed to the coast for a few days early sunday hoping to get in a good bit of touring around the area on the bikes.

Self at WatW #4

Thanks to Antony for taking and posting a photo.

Oy

Pain and Misery were my companions today doing my 2nd lap at Rosary. My back was hurting after only 3 or 4 miles in, I musta already been tired, which lead to bad posture, and that led to sore lower back requiring stretching stops every 15 mins after that. Alas I didn't set any real speed goals out there either. On the first lap the TTF's section/loop tired me out and I was dragging after that plus keeping an eye on the tired Single Speeder with us.

Good group of people out there including Tom, Tony, and a bunch of other guys.

Here's the link to the motionbased track for the ride.
Tour de Rosary 7-13-08

Beer time tonight!

WoW Results Revisited.

So today they posted the raw unadjusted times for the first 3 WatW's. With no week 1 for me, this is how I broke down.

Week 2 Start Time Total Lap 1 Lap 2
24 - Beg Male rlowe 853 18:08:00 0:43:19 0:20:19 0:23:00
Week 3
27 - Beg Male rlowe 853 18:08:00 0:43:41 0:21:37 0:22:04

Positives -
2nd Lap Time was much better all around and I only lost 30 seconds off pace, not 3 minutes.
Negatives -
1st Lap Time was a full minute slower.
Goals -
Be More Agressive about passing, no hanging out for longer than a single tight section, ask and pass!!!!
Don't get stuck in the back at the start without picking better line up the gravel hill so as to avoid stopping.
Get a time of Say 41 Minutes.

WoW Results - Week 3

Raced Week 3 of Wednesdays at Wakefield today, and I simply didn't feel like I gave it my all once again, I spent too long on my first lap hanging off a guy's rear wheel when I should have asked to pass early on and driven myself forward. My stomach was a bit out of it, I think do to a mix of the race jitters and a bit iffy lunch of leftovers.

I'll post more later when I can get the data out of my GPS and see how it really went, my time on my cyclecomp and GPS showed a total time of around 44:30'ish. So we'll see later on how I actually did. A LOT fewer riders by my estimation in beginner.

Paul of the Rosaryvillians must have crushed me this week, I never saw him after the pile up at the start near the top of the hill! Ugh. But big props to him. Hope Eric did well also. While racing I think both JoeP and Ricky on single speeds passed me this week.

WatW Week 2 Results

Final Results - 24th Place at 42:45. Not bad and boy their were 18 more racers and the times/competition really improved over the first week, that time would have been 12th place. Vs this week, 12th place was at 38:50. Eeesh.

This week if we can race, I'm going to try for a 40'ish finish. We'll see if that happens, my rain danger sense is going off very firmly right now.

Went hiking up at Sugarloaf Mtn sunday and it was neat, though the wyf twisted her ankle and is angry due to having to take it easy for this week.

We hit the vineyard just below the mountain and they have some great wines to taste for $3. Also some very posh goat's cheeses from a local shop in Boyd's MD.

Also apparently you can ride the yellow trail at Sugarloaf during the summer, during the weekdays, so I may go hit that next monday.

WoW - Week 2, Race 1 for Moi

Well today I did my first race, Wednesday at Wakefield Race 2. It was a lot of fun, and its a damn hammer fest. I felt like I had a good first showing, adn by my cyclocomp I finished in around 44 minutes for 2 laps of 3.8 miles for a total of 7.4 miles. But boy was I plastered, a third lap would have been the end of it. A 22 minute average for me is damn nice.

Based on last week I'd have been in 14th or so place and just 1 place out of receiving a point for the series, not enough to win, but still respectable. I suspect this week it will be harder. I certainly wasn't last, and thats good enough really in my book, though I now have a CRAZY urge to race again next week. We'll see. My placement doesn't have a lot to due with it, more just time and finances, I'll definitely try for the final.

I felt like I could have been stronger and with a bit more agressive attack I might have been able to cut maybe a minute or two off and finish a few spots better. I think only 3 single speeders passed me. Gotta carb load a bit better the night before, I don't think I had enough in my for optimal fuel in the tank.

Well off to the showers.
Cheers to all the other racers out there.

To Race or Not To Race

Competition scares me. Or rather I'm hesitant to compete, and that sucks even in my opinion. Damn stupid childhood. I can only question myself in this and try and understand why I dislike it.

I guess I can see parts of it back in High School, especially during team stuff in Phys. Ed. I can clearly remember how frustrating I was in thinks like volleyball and soccer, with how I performed inconsistently, or when my teams would slack off. Funnily I remember not being upset for things like running competitions, or physical work.
In recent years, excluding perhaps Kendo/Iajutsu I've found myself avoiding competitive activities.

So where am I going with this you ask, today after work I headed out intending to ride. As I was driving away I had a random thought that it could possibly be the first Wednesday at Wakefield, but I dismissed it and headed on. Low and behold. I pull in and it's bike city, I head out to the far softball lot and gear up, a quick trip to the race area and I determine that I don't have any cash, so no racing today, which might have been better if I had! Less of a chance to wimp out!

So instead I rode about 16.7 miles of accotink. Nice hills and a few descents that are a bit fun. All the while pondering what would it be like to race, if I could fully set aside expectations and just go out with a desire to win, to ride my butt off and try and do as well as possible without getting frustrated at my placement. I still don't know if I can, I do know I WANT to and thats half the battle.

Afterwards I did go back to the race area to hang out. I got to see the kids awards ceremony and I saw a few folks I know but they were mostly talking with other people, the experts were riding when I was there but they were running fast and I only saw a few groups pass through.

I'm not even going to look at the results for this week regardless. And as of right now I am PLANNING on racing next Wednesday, but we'll see.

In beer news, the beer appears to be fermenting nicely, with a nice foamy head and the airlock was bubbling, pretty well.

DoesNotKnow Brewery Open - Dunkelweizen 1.0

Well, tonight I've finally reopened the brewery. And on tonight's menu, is my home grown Dunkelweizen. It's a bit of a mix in that I've taken some pieces from various recipes and a bit of advice from the local Homebrew Store.

I started out with this recipe

3 Gal - Distilled Water
6 oz - Muntons Crushed Crystal Malt - Lovibond 64.0
4 oz - Weyermann Chocolate Wheat - Lovibond 500/EBC 1000
6.6 lbs- Muntons Wheat Malt Extract (2 Cans)
1 oz - Mt. Hood Hop Pellets - Alpha's at 5.0 - Full Boil, 60 Mins
.7 oz - Mt. Hood Hop Pellets - Alpha's at 3.7 - Final 5 Mins
19 IBU Total

1 Gal Distilled
1 Gal Spring
+ Additional Distilled for 5 Gal after boil loss, spills, etc. - 3 Quarts plus a half cup.
Waste - 3.25 Cups of Wort/Hop Residue/Tube Flush
OG Sample - 1 Cup
Plus I may have overfilled originally by a cup or two.

Wyeast 3056 Bavarian Wheat BL (15Apr08) - I am a bit worried about this as this packet sat in the fridge during a 36 hour power loss, it stayed cool, but not 40's. Unfortunetly I didn't apparently slap hard enough to break the nutrient pack. Lesson learned, final temp of the wort was 74 degree's F.

OG unadjusted is 1.049. Gotta adjust for temp

Rosary in the Rain

Went out to Rosary for a nice evening ride, got out and got about 4.5 Miles out when it started sprinkling, by 5.5 it was raining. By 6 I heard rumbling and soon after occasional lightning! Ugh! But I flew like the damn wind and shaved probably 10 minutes of my previous best Rosaryville time with a finish in around 56 mins, though I did cool down for 3 or 4 mins. Another group was out also, the fast guy caught me around mile 6.5/7 and then the other 2 caught me near the end at almost 9. Oh well I still am happy as hell, the only downer was the rain, it was SOOO nice out, even after the rain, I was up for doing at least ANOTHER LAP. But instead I was good, spared the trail and went home to prep for our trip. Oh well.

Soon I will break 50 minutes out there!

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/6023914

Eeesh, where does a Month Go????

The end of May and the beginning of June were OVERLOADED with stuff to do, between J's performances, a trip, and both of us being sick last week its been crazy.

In biking area's I've gotten in a few good rides lately, 2 weeks ago I did a mini-epic at Schaeffer and Hoyles Mill. I didn't quite make it to Black Hills but was pretty close, but a fall on Hoyles Mill tired me out and it also had some poison ivy. Ugh so I aborted soon after with about 25 miles traveled. This Friday I did the FNL ride out at Black Hills and did 12.5 miles, it was a great ride. Today I went out this morning and hit Schaeffer and did a quick 15.5 miles. Beat the rains by just a bit, I'll hit the gym tomorrow then finish the week with a big evening hopefully out at Rosaryville on Wednesday, before we leave for FL on Thursday.

In the beer realm, I've been so damn busy I haven't had a chance to brew beer. Ugh. It's been either hot or rainy and today continues the trend or I might have brewed this afternoon. Hopefully after FL I'll get a nice shot at brewing.

I did pick up 2 AWESOME FRICKIN BEERS!

Bells Oberon - A summer brew, wheat based, but more like a White/Whit, nice orange hints, and mellow flavor, but at 5.8% Alcohol it gets the job done with a better punch.

Troegs - Troegenator - Doublebock - A malt monster doublebock, that rocks up and down. Nice smooth toasty malt goodness, a bit sweet mix on the nose along with the hops. Tasty.

Off to make the dinner.

Muahahahaha!

New components retrieved from the homebrew shop. Soon the next beer will be underway, and I'm stoked. It'll be a partial mash, but the recipe is fast and loose and i'm curious to see how it turns out.

10.49

10.49

That is the defining number of this month. No, not my mileage (Thankfully, more like 37'ish). No, that is the amount of rain for the month so far, with a regular AVG of 4.42 inches. Oh. Once again we've doubled our monthly average, and this time in under half a month. FUXOR!!!!

More brewing on the horizon, looking at maybe starting planning for the Dunkelweizen officially tonight and maybe try brewing sunday or monday.

The Cure

Saw the Cure last night at the Patriot Center out at GMU. First show of their new tour, for their new album out Tuesday. This was a rescheduled show from last september, when they wrapped their tour early.

We missed most of the opening act, only getting a quick peek in at them before their set ended. We got J at T-shirt, but damn that was expensive. Picked up some snacks and the show started around 9:10. The main show went for almost 2 hours, a lot of their more radio popular stuff during the main show with some new stuff, but we didn't know much of it as j and I both hadn't really listened to any new cure since wish in 93'ish. They then took a long break before the first encore, we almost thought they weren't gonna come back out. After 5 mins they did. They ended up doing 3, 4 song, encores. The final one was awesome and ended on Killing an Arab. Great show, they played for 3 hours almost and at the end. RSmith at the end thanked the crowd that stayed and said they enjoyed their first tour night and blah blah blah. Can't remember really. I'm pooped, on about 4 hours of sleep now at work.

Maybe more later. If not, oh well. We've got a friends birthday tonight and Radiohead in the rain probably tomorrow.

Wow!

Wow, I was out for a ride at Wakefield today after work and was SHOCKED at how many more people are out and out on bikes now that the weather has cleared, there musta been 30 or so riders all out in different size groups. The weather was awesome, out under the powerlines there was an nice breeze. Down near the creek the bugs were out pretty bad, no glasses is going to have to change soon I think, I kept getting the buggers in my eyes. I did a nice solid 14.1 miles and averages out a solid 9 mph and I did the hell climb 3 times and rode the back side of the bowl 3 times to in addition.

But it was great to see so many riders out enjoying the trails and all of em were pretty cool, no real churlish behavior though one guy did insist on riding up the berms while a bunch of us were waiting at the top. Oh well, we all kinda laughed about it as he made his way up.

The bike is in need of some tuning on the shifters the rear is starting to get a bit balky. I guess I should go pull the rear wheel, clean the chainset, and full clean the chain but it looks like its gonna rain for a few days, so no real hurry.

DNK Brewery - Impreza Black Porter - Update

The porter is now in the bottles, a bit later than I wanted, but yet I think its fine. I tasted a bit of the run-off/drip off from the filler rod. Nice, a bit coffee'ish, with a nice maltiness. Maybe a bit sweet even, I might want something hoppier if I do a similar brew again.

Next up I will probably start a dunkelweizen, the weekend after next. I doubt I'll have the gear or time to lay it down this weekend, though honestly, I really only might need some additional malt, and a partial mash kit. Who knows, I don't even have a recipe yet, so it's hard to say. I do have 2 cans of Muntons Wheat LME waiting on the shelves very patiently.

Bottling went REALLY well till about 2/3rds of the way in when I knocked over 1 or 2 bottles and made a mess, otherwise my new washing prep and bottling setup plan worked like a charm to me!

At least my basement smells good right now, even after I gave the spills (1 little one in primary area, the big one was in capping area).

Gotta figure out if I'm gonna ride tommorow afterwork or not, might just do a light day at the gym and then hope for Thursday holding out for good weather. Time to grill some fish and asparagus.

Chinco de Mayonaise

We celebrated el chinco de mustard yesterday by having friends over for dinner and having some awesome mexican style chicken fajita's from Bobby Flay's grillin cook book. Awesome, I drank a couple of pacifico's and a big one of my hefe's. Needless to say I was quite sleep by 11 PM.

Ahh the dulcet tones of the ice cream truck are audible in my neighborhood. Summer time is really almost here and spring has sprung. No rain this weekend led to what probably 23 miles for me in the last 2 days.

Today I ground out about 18.5 miles with a out and back to Cabin John, this time I went south from the Tuckerman Ln park all the way to river rd. A few sections were a bit rough or the blazes were nearly gone leading to some long stretches of looking for the trail. On the way back going up tuckerman lane I witnessed a wreck. The first car was waiting to turn left and may have been waiting on me to pass an intersection but I was still 50 or more ft away and grinding up a hill. A school bus had to stop short and didn't hit the first car, unfortunetly a jerk in a mercedes SUV plowed into the back of the bus at probably 20 mph or so. The kids weren't hurt just a bit shook up. Within 50 minutes the cops had taken statements and the kids were gone on another bus and the rear ended bus was driven back to the shop with barely any damage. The guy's suv was pulled off the side of the road and traffic got flowing again. Oddly enough they didn't want or care about my statement since I guess it was such a clear case of tailgating/failure to stop. It's a good thing the bus wasn't about to unload kids either!

Man, pacifico is such better beer than corona.

Great Morning

Took a short ride down into downtown Bethesda for bagels and a bit of misc hardware at the local hw shop. It was a beautiful morning only detracted from by my dieing from allergies, nice breeze, sunny. And no sign of frickin RAIN! YES!

Hoping to get out to Schaeffer tommorow afternoon, but we'll see.

Back to cleaning up for me, we have friends coming over tonight and I'm grilling. Yah!

Also finally cleaned up my disaster area of basement and the organization is quite pleasing to me!

IRON MAN!

Iron Man FRICKIN RULES!!!

Make sure you stay till the end of the credits, you get a neat scene for your patience.

Rainy Weekends.

It's been a cycle the last few weeks of rainy weekends and clear'ish midweeks. It sucks a lot, but I've gotten in SOME rides at least.

Yesterday I went and did the Rosaryville Night Ride, nice group of 10 folks. Held up a solid pace for me of a moving time of 1hr 4min. Honestly I could have done a 2nd lap but it was time to get outa the park. Maybe some other time I'll get out there early enough to do a pre-lap. Night riding in the spring is so different than winter with all the leaves back on the trees! Neat! And not wearing 10 million layers is sweet!! I got to the park at 7:10 ish and was changed and ready to go in 15 mins or less vs usually 30 mins in the winter.

Wednesday I hit Fountain head again. Had a moving time of 1hr 15m though I did retry 1 hill so drop a min off that. I also made it up a couple of hills I hadn't on first try and only pushed up 1 hill. And I estimate a total time of like 1:25 which is much better than the 2 frickin hours or hour:45 it had been taking. Ugh. FH kicks my butt.

May try and sneak another ride in Saturday if the rains hold off till the evening like they are saying.