The weather was surprisingly nice on Memorial Day, so Chris, Root, and I hit the ditch for some punishment. Having not ridden in over a year, I was surprised that I didn’t immediately drop dead. The climb up Government Road was not terrible, even in the brutally still humidity, but then I ran my front tire through some stinky dog poop. The conditions along the top traverse of the side loop were good, but things were a little squishy along the bottom stretch.
After returning to the road, we went out along Ditch to the normal turnaround, then after climbing up to the bottom of cardiac hill, we backtracked and took a look at some of the recently cut side trails between the upper and lower lines, and the same awful “below” trail that Root and I went on in the rain with Ted Lincoln. It sucked just as bad in dry weather as it did in the wet. We stopped at the boulder over to play around, but the mosquito level was simply outrageous, so that drove us back to the start and off to Serg’s in Waimanalo for some post-ride dinner.
One day later and the worst of it is not the legs – it’s the seat contact points and the triceps, shoulders, and neck from the forward lean and pack and helmet weight. The bike still feels good, and although I was thinking of changing some stuff out, it really does feel pretty well balanced as-is, so I might just not mess with it.
Pictures here
D = 9.78 km (6.08-miles), Vavr = 7.8 km/h (4.8-mph), Vmax = 27.0 km/h (16.8-mph), T = 1-hour, 15-minutes, total ascent = 242m (794’), total descent = 210m (689’)
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