I don’t remember his name, but there was a comedian from the Texas panhandle who once said something along the lines of, “One of the things about the Texas panhandle is that you can stand anywhere and see 20 miles in every direction. Stand on a tuna can and you can see 200 miles in every direction.” Another long-standing joke around here is, “What do you call a day where the wind is sustained at 40 MPH? Great golf weather.”
When I first told people that I was really starting to get into biking and mountain biking, most thought I was just kidding. They would look all around them and say, “Mountain biking? Really? Are these mountains in your head?” Most of them would also rather shoot themselves than try to ride a bike in 40 mph winds that seem to blow every direction at once.
Maybe this isn’t the most ideal place for riding. And true, I’m not really “mountain biking,” but most people have heard of mountain biking and have some idea of what you mean when you say it. When I talk about “trail riding,” I get a lot of blank looks.
The guys who cut the trails around here did a pretty bang-up job… especially when you consider what they had to work with. While it is true that my basis of comparison is non-existent (since I haven’t ridden anywhere but here yet), I do know that our trail system is pretty good.
How do I know?
The guys I ride with on occasion and who first introduced me to this sport are pretty dedicated. They take a couple of trips each and every year together to go riding. They will research and learn all they can about trail systems around the country and then find one they can all agree on and go. They have been to Moab several times. They have been to Leadville once. They have gone all over the state of Texas, ventured up to Oregon, and pretty much played “connect the dots” in Colorado. They all agree that our trail system is not the hardest or most technical or biggest trail system they have been on, but they still speak very highly of it. They say that our system is a fantastic training ground for all of the big rides and that even after hitting the hard trails, ours still offer a challenge when they come home.
Not far from here, very close to where I grew up, is Palo Duro Canyon. I believe PD Canyon is the second largest canyon in the US, but don’t quote me on that. The trails in PD are apparently very elaborate. My riding friends will say, “It is no Moab, but it comes close in places.”
That all makes me feel good. It is nice to know that I have a very good training ground here to work and improve my style and ability. Once I have these trails down and can handle them pretty well, there is a great location less than 2 hours away that I can visit with a relatively minimal time commitment. Hopefully, in time, I’ll be ready to make a trip to places like Moab for myself.
I have quite a bit of work to do first though. After riding for roughly 2 months now, one of my big struggles is still the uphill climbs. There are a number of things that factor into my difficulty, but a lot of it can be attributed to conditioning. Still, I can’t discount the other obstacles either.
The first is that my bike still has the old standard strap pedals on it. I have my eyes on going clipless, but I don’t have them yet. The second is my right foot. My right Achilles is torn. Some days it doesn’t bother me, but others… I really notice it on the uphill climbs. When I really start leaning forward and driving the pedals, it starts screaming at me. Lastly, I’m carrying a lot of weight for a cyclist.
I’m just under 6’3 and weight about 240. While I do need to lose some fat weight, a lot of that weight can be attributed to the love affair I had with body building some years ago. I have a fairly large task ahead of me to drop not only the fat weight but to also reduce the amount of muscle mass I’m carrying around. My goal is to get down to about 180-190. I have to be careful though. You have to work your muscles in order to properly burn the fat, but at the same time, I am looking to trim my overall muscle mass rather than putting more on.
Like being on a bike, the whole thing is a balancing act and will be very difficult at times.
Nothing worthwhile ever came easily though, huh? That’s what they tell me anyway.
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[...] Mountain” biking? Really? « Off the Gravel Road by rao I don’t remember his name, but there was a comedian from the Texas panhandle who once said something along the lines of, “One of the things about the Texas panhandle is that you can stand anywhere and see 20 miles in every direction. Stand on a tuna can and you can see 200 miles in every direction.” Another long-standing joke around here is, “What do you call a day where the wind is sustained at 40 MPH? Great golf weather.” [...]