Here's a few pictures from my collection.
1. The Walt Works 29er on trail at Stanley Gap in May 2006

2. Me riding a granite section of the Conyers course at the 24 Hours of Conyers by Granny Gear in May 2006

3. Riding up a short but steep climb at the same race

4. This picture was taken at the 2004 version of Southern Lights 24-7, where a teammate and I finished 1st in the 2-man category

Getting ready for Fall

Well, the days are getting shorter, the night breezes cooler and that means my favorite season is drawing near. I love everything about Fall but especially two things: (1) getting to wear fleece and (2) mountain biking. I have a couple of events forthcoming that I'm also excited about. They are: the Firewater 50 on 9-16-06, the Fall Pisgah Gathering on the last weekend of September, the 24 Hours of Adrenalin the following weekend, the Double Dare and the Swank 65 -- both in Pisgah, NC. The Double Dare is not really a race by many folks' standards, but it not a race for most folks. It's two days, back to back in Pisgah. The race director picks 10 checkpoints each day and you and a teammate (required) have 12 hours to go find them, in any order.

This past Saturday was the Firewater 50 - a ride in celebration of a guy named Barry's birthday. It all started about 13 years ago on his 30th birthday with 6 of his closest friends going out for a Cohutta Epic. This year there were 87 folks who rode 50 miles of very tough terrain on the southern border of the Cohutta Wilderness in north GA.

The route was Windy Gap > Milma > Tibbs > Potato Patch > Mountaintown Creek > Bear Creek > Potato Patch > Windy Gap. Until Saturday, I had not ridden about half of this route so the climbing was expected, I just didn't know how much.

Stats on the day:
48 miles, ~7700 ft climbing
6:21 ride time, 7:38 total time including SAG's (I gotta work on this!)
146 avg HR, 184 max HR
7.9 mph avg speed, 38 mph max speed