The Registered Nurtz received a temporary upgrade today. I
was feeling pretty frustrated because our local riding group
was shredding at Gasworks Park and I had too much work to do
to make the trip downtown. After several hours of sweating
over the keyboard, I decided to pop out for a muni ride in
my local trail system.
Things felt pretty good right away, and I decided today
would be a day for some climbing. After a light uphill on
the trail out of my neighborhood, I dropped down a short
hill and into the woods trail that circles the Queenslake
Bog, a low-lying swampy area of forest that’s been mostly
unchanged for the last 10,000 years. Not far into this loop,
a paved trail drops in from a nearby neighborhood to join
the dirt trail. The paved trail isn’t long—50 yards or
so—but it’s super steep. My first/last experience on this
hill was trying to ride my muni down it on a damp day…I hit
the steep part, tried to slow down, and the damp moss on the
pavement just slid my wheel out and I landed HARD on my
[censored]. Ouch! That was a year ago.
But today was dry, and I was at the bottom of the hill
instead of the top. Decided to give it a try, with zero
expectation of making it. The Moab climbing last month must
have helped, because I was able to dig in and roll it all
the way to the top. There were a couple places where I b-a-r-e-l-
y got the pedal over the top, and I was pulling on the
handle with all my strength. It was easily the steepest
sustained climb I’ve made, so I rode back down to the bottom
(with no [censored] crunch this time) and tried it again to see if
first time was fluke. Nope. Topped it again, then once more
just for the sake of the workout. I’m certain if it was dirt
or gravel, I’d never get up it.
Deciding to quit that one while I was ahead, I jumped back
onto the woods trail. The first mile or so of this trail has
always given me a hard time. Lots of short curvy uphills
with roots, a combination that always seems to take me down.
Today was different…I still had a couple good UPDs, but got
through the challenging section without having to stop for
air, and with only three root- or log-induced dismounts
compared to my usual 8-10. Yeah, feeling good now. Pedal on
Garth. After clearing the rooty section, the trail smooths
out for a mile or so, eventually crossing a set of ball
fields where I practiced a bit of curb-riding to test out
the “balance with your core instead of flailing your arms”
advice from a recent RSU post. Seemed to work, although I
was incapable of doing one without the other. Flailing is
still the default…
But on to the next hill. The trail now enters an area of
heavier jogger and b*ke traffic, and changes from dirt to
paved. There’s one hill here I rode a lot in preparing for
Moab…the sidewalk climbs the hill via a series of six
switchbacks, while a gravel/dirt trail goes straight up
beside it. You can see this gravel trail—and my son riding
down it—here:
gallery.unicyclist.communishots10007Open ↗. The
paved trail winds back and forth just out of sight off the
left side of the photo.
To prep for Moab, I'd ride up the long paved hill, then down
the shorter, steeper gravel trail. Then one day in mid-March
I decided to try to climb the gravel hill, with zero
expectation of making it. I surprised the heck out of myself
when I rolled it all the way up, and in the month since,
I’ve been using that as my training loop: Power up the
gravel hill, then ride down the paved switchbacks to catch
my breath, then up the gravel hill again. Repeat until
nauseous. Today I decided to run it a couple times, and
started right in. It’s not real long, but climbs about 40-50
vertical feet over a couple hundred yards (I think). The
first part of the hill is steepest (photo), and at the crest
of this section there were four youth, age 17 or so,
standing in the trail. They had clearly just finished some
illegal smoking (yeah I can tell) and had moved on to more
legal Marlboros. I was fully expecting a “dude where’s your
other wheel” as I rode through their cloud of smoke. Instead
one of them said “Hey, is that hard?” “Brouftht!” I replied
as I passed them, sucking wind so bad from the climb that I
couldn’t even say the word Yes. As I continued pedaling
away, desperately trying to stay on the pedals, another one
yelled “That’s savage! You’re savage, man!”. “Thamfts!” I
huffed, this time able to get slightly closer to the word I
was looking for.
That left me feeling pretty good, so I headed for the final
climbing session of the day: the Impossible Hill. It’s this
one dirt hill that has always given me a terrible time. It’s
easily accessible from my neighborhood trail system, so I’ve
had many opportunities to try to climb it, and just as many
opportunities to fail. So many failures, in fact, that my
son and I gave it the Impossible moniker. The nickname made
me feel better about my continuing string of failures, until
the depressing day last autumn when I took some better local
riders—Harper, Unirene, and John Childs—out on these trails.
“This hill's tough", I said. "I’ve never made it all the way
up without falling”. “What?” they said, as they all rolled
it without missing a beat. I’m amazed I ever found the
motivation to try it again. But I did…and did…and did…again
and again without success. The little train that couldn’t.
Insert Card...Credit Declined. But the persistence finally
is paying off. As of last weekend my record was 59-0. As of
today it is 63-2. Things are moving in the right direction.
Miles: 5.01. Average speed: 5.4. Top speed: 9.2. Pedal Time:
55 minutes. It was nice to hit the trail today, and for a
change not have the trail hit back.
--
tomblackwood - Registered Nurtz
Tailgate at your own risk.....
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