Bike on!

It's not like I am totally out of breath. It's that I went from riding flats to climbing so hard that my lungs hurt. They don’t like what I’m doing to them, but they can suck it up. Because the hill can’t be that high, right? I am in the east.

I am reminded of this every time I go riding in New England. I assume that since I am in the east the hills will be small hills, and riding should be short and easy. One would think that I would understand that with trail names like "the spine" and "coronary" that the reality would be different.  So, here I am on another NE mountain bike ride, with a pair of lungs that are in the midst of mutiny. I finally top out over the first pitch, but the flats also have a way of reminding me that I am on an eastern trail. I stand on my pedals attempting to get enough torque to continue moving through a combination of slick roots and ill-placed rocks. It is almost a relief to reach the next hill, until I remember that my lungs and I were in the middle of an argument. By the time I top out on the measly 550’ ‘peak’, I’m just about exhausted, and that was just the uphill of lap 1.

NE downhills are similar to going down the Heavenly Daze ski trail in Steamboat on a crowded day, after a few inches of fresh snow at mach speed. By that point everything that had once been nice and flat was now a long irregular bump line topped off with a crowd of people, skis, gloves, and other ‘things’ to dodge. (Not that I would ever bomb Heavenly Daze in peak season!) Similarly, on the bike trails every speck of dirt that has ever been flat has washed away, and all that is left on the trails are rocks and roots waiting to snag my tire out from under me. So I hang on, willing my bike to go straight.

One would think that after all this I would hate NE riding, but I surely don’t. In fact, after riding over every rock and after making it down each pitch in one piece, I usually have a perma smile that doesn’t get washed away with the dirt after my ride.