Chilly night, ended up double down blanket night.
Today i am going to ride the trails below snow level from 1 edge of ski area to the other and a little extra. Rider @ brewery the other night laid out a ride. Drove down @ parked intown parking lot. Found trail & I immediately recalled Brian’s evaluation of trails here as a C-. Pumice w/ duff added into energy sucking tread. Practice for Bachelor. The ski area is huge w/ chair count to support. Made a mistake and dropped down too early riding this really loose stuff. The trail had a deep center rut and peppered w/ loose volcanic rock. Junk. I recovered by riding back up another trail and figured out the ride. Well designed & built trails when they stay out of fall line. Big firs. Pumice is rock filled w/ air bubbles. Upon enough force they crumble which sucks forward direction. The trail gradient was below 10%. Design of ride was to make big climb @ start and then the rest would be a descending traverse w/ short climbs mixed in. Trail up high was in big firs. I finally emerged in treeless high desert. One day was enough. A race would be incredibly dusty.
view:
Grocery shopped then returned to camp spot.
Cloudless till just afternoon and then clouded as if to rain. Today breaks a string of 21 days of rain falling here. Still was knee warmers and light long under wear top ride.
Tomorrow I will drive up to Tahoe.
IMBA epics: no guarantee that they are repeatable in that they weren’t permanently marked, had sustaining permission, or are being maintained today. Virginia City is the next epic to ride.
Heater evening @ 8200′.