Took 7 people from the bomb/fca groups to the east mountains Saturday for a nice ride. Despite rain, snow, wind, cold, and even sunshine, we had a nice time and nobody out on the trails either.

Sunday, Patrick gave me a carbon composite Kestrel fork for my Klein he picked up at a teammates garage sale. Fits perfect on the big 59cm frame. All I can say is my neck won't be hurting so bad on the road anymore after that aluminum fork I had. I also had him take a look at the Dean shifting issues, and turns out it needed a new chain, and chainring......dohh! Nothing like having the obvious staring you in the face and don't realize it! The chainring had big old hooks on it, similar to what you see in the above picture I pulled off the web.

Sunday eve, took the 1x9 Dean out for a quick ride in the foothills. Rode it hard for an hour on the usual loop. Found some guys digging up rocks in one of the few, fun technical sections on the lower rock garden. Geez guys, if you can't ride it, don't destroy it for the rest of us who enjoy it. I told them they shouldn't be doing stuff like that and all I got was a dumb look in response. Probably the same guys that eradicated the nice rock drop leading down into the neighborhood. Don't get me started on this kind of stuff........

Here's a couple pics of some friends mountain biking in the Ukraine with the local BOMB chapter. That's the Black Sea in the background. Quite the contrast to New Mexico!

Some good miles last week. Monday thru Thursday got 1.5 to 2 hours in every day on the single speed. Saturday got together again with the team for a devotional and talk by new Hammer sponsored triathlete Hector on nutrition and fueling your body. Thanks again to Hammer for providing sampler bags for everyone! After Hector's coaching session, got another 20 miles in on the SS in the foothills on an overcast morning. Trails were moist and fast and I focused on staying in HR Zone 4 for the climbs and 2 and 3 for the descents and flats. Forgot to set my timer but estimated 2 hours riding time.

Sunday was about long, steady, distance (LSD), so, I got out on the roadie and Ann and I started out heading down Tramway to the casino, then climbing the five miles back up. After a while on Tramway, Ann peeled off and I continued down Tramway, then went up the Canyon to Tijeras, then headed down South 14 a ways, and came back the same way. Once back in town, I had another hypoglycemic episode creep up on me along with the telltale signs; could only spin about 12 mph, and my concentration becomes non-existent and confused. After the gels kicked in, my senses rebound and the legs start to work again, but it's a horrible feeling. Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever be able to get a fueling plan dialed in, short of a new pancreas.

As I got closer to home, I needed another half hour to hit my target of 4 hours saddle time, so I hit some of the neighborhood climbs, but trying to hold back some to keep the heart rate out of the 4 zone. I eventually came down San Rafael to Tramway again to do some cool down, just in time for Damian to fly by me on his team Cannondale MTB. He was doing at least 25 mph down Tramway until I lost sight of him. It's fun to watch folks who are gifted cyclists! So, the good points of the ride were I burned 3,000 calories, which equals 1,000 calories for every 1000 feet of elevation I climbed. The average heart rate was 133 since I held back some on the climbs, and it was a beautiful, sunny day. Our team finished off the afternoon with an outreach to a local homeless shelter and everyone had a great time.