I’m pretty certain that today was the first day that I rode the my geared Swerks since the Iceman. All that I could think of was 27 gears toward freedom. It seems like I’ve constantly struggled with finding the ‘perfect’ bar set up since I’ve owned the bike. This year would be no different. I picked up a new 100 x 0 degree 31.8 stem and a pair of team handle bars over the winter. I was running the same riser (25.4) last year but only with a 100 x 5 degree stem. Well that felt good on the marathon and point to point races but never super responsive because I was so up right. So after changing the stem out, shortening brake hoses and preparing to cut a brand new pair of carbon risers I opted to throw on the straight bar. It felt a little twitchy for a while but I think that I’m going to stay with it at least for Iola, plus I think that it’ll be a perfect set up for WORS #2.
I got out to Kettles this afternoon as planned. I don’t even know what they calling the “new trail” but I know where it is and it was basically the only route to travel today as the Blue loop was closed off due to standing water. This is a look at it’s base. Even since last being out here it’s been beaten down pretty good.
Well once at the top of the climb for the “new trail” there was a choice of left or more climbing to the right. I was pretty certain of myself when I opted for the right. I was wrong. I took a wrong-turn.JPG and soon found myself en route to the trail head..Snap. Well just keep pedaling and get back to the same spot and keep it left this time dummy. Well by the time I got to the base of the “new trail” I was 7.17 miles into ‘er. Plenty of food and plenty of water on tow so I’ll continue my push towards the Emma Carlin. It definitely seem allot quicker to get to the connector so I’m sure that I my navigation skills were off but what did I care.
Made it to Emma, knocked out the couple of climbs there and the race was onward back to civilization. I havent seen a bike for what semed like hours. Surprising too as the weather was perfect out west away from the lake. The route back is so, so smooth and flow-ie. I was starting to relish in the solitude. The recap looked okay. I was initially hoping to get a rough estimate of what kind of time or pr I could establish with the connector and the Emma Carlin. That’ll have to wait for another day due to the extra miles looged in on do to the prolouge.
The low down looks something like this 26.13 miles in 2:32:15 with 3, 831 feet of climbing at an average speed of 10.3 mph. I don’t know how I ever lived without a Garmin. Now only if it could tell me to turn left or right when needed. Rain is expected for the next couple of days, we’ll wait and see.
