Brian Head ride report

Today was my first time to a lift assisted place to down hill bike. And I've only had a dh bike for barely a month. I had talked to other people and was given good advice about how to start in the sport so I wasn't too worried about all of this. Excited rather.

I'm going off a small pages of notes, so please bear with my fragmented, non linear ride report.

I rolled into Cedar City with no hotel reservations thinking it would be easy in a small town. Wrong. Summer time and a big Shakespeare festival had the place packed. I had to go to almost 10 hotels before I found a room. It is about a 35 minute drive from downtown CC to the base of the resort. The scenery on the drive is breathtaking. No need to speed past it.

An all day lift ticket was $24. One lift services all the bike trails. The chair uses a simple hook to hold the bike. It takes more time to ride the lift to the top almost than to do a run. They will shut the chair down for lightning. They did this for almost 80 minutes. After being in SD for soo long, being on a chairlift in the rain, hearing thunder and seeing lightning was kinda spooky.

There are basically 4 black diamond/ double black diamond trails along with two wooded sections at the bottom with what they call 'free style elements', basically man built wooden features. There was no snow at all but bits of mud due to run off here and there, only bad in one place. Generally the trails had steep, techy, loose rock sections along with highspeed single track. Some of each trail was just out in the open and then always a little bit into the trees. A very good mixture and I felt a great way to experience what one resort calls an expert/black diamond run.

I did crash twice. Once trying to pass a kid off the trail and he moved off the trail to get out of my way where I was trying to pass him. Too hard on the front brake and I went down. I have a pretty well bruised up hip. You will not miss a rock if you hit the ground here. The other time was doing a natural wall ride at the top of Timberline and just not having the speed for the line I chose. I definitely learned to let go of the brakes and let body english and the bike do its work. And things were better when I did so.

I also experienced my first bad interpersonal thing while biking. Two adults with a group of kids on Timberline. In two different groups they were stopped on the trail in bad places, just standing there. I was able to slow down and not hit anyone but the guy I happened to be riding with didn't/couldn't slow down and clipped the bikes of one of the adults. Words ensued at the bottom but nothing more than that. Both had valid points. My guy's, 'don't stop on the trail morons' and their's, 'don't be going so fast you can't stop'. The reason the stopped in the confrontation group was to stare at a kids scratches from crashing. Anyways.... the adult calmed down and the kids just wanted our GoPro footage to show their friends what a crazy trail they were on.

Pics will probably be on FB. Tomorrow I drive to Denver. Mon, Tues, Wed and Thurs I will be riding at Winter Park, Keystone and Solvista. So you'll see separate reports for them as well. After that I'll be going to Trail Side Bike Park and Deer Valley in Park City Utah, so vids and such of that as well.

I hope to not be a beginner anymore when I am done with this trip. I did every trail and every feature in this park but two. And I feel I could have/should have done one of them. We will see.......

i gotta do what i gotta do-chuck d.

Tomassi, Marco James (M.D.) 7/28/11 04:03 PM Signed
Let's revisit when you return to town. If still symptomatic, will plan for picc and TPN

Looks like I'll be tied to the couch for two months.

road tripping by the numbers. with pictures.

110F outside, 93mph inside.

yep, my bikes are still back there. phew. not too many turns though to dislodge them on this drive.

California to Nevada to Arizona to Utah. 9 hours.

safely in the hotel. at least for one night.... i made no reservations so as not to be tied down. this is a summer town and everything is full tomorrow, friday.. i might be sleeping in the truck tomorrow night, hahaha

Summer Road Trip Post #1

Just one more night till the adventure begins!
On the road, burrito in my Taco.
Self portrait, "driving"
The gear
The weapons
Gravity Pirate

The second most quotable movie of the past 30 years.

The most is Tommy Boy. Impossible to find a more quotable movie than this. The third, and this one is open to argument, is The Three Amigos.

But the second most quotable movie has got to be The Princess Bride. And here is the best one for today:

clockwork orange

if there is anything i could have erased from inside my orange haired head i think it would have to be high school. i'll keep any other suffering, illness or trouble to have those 4 years totally expunged from my life.

i'm sure there are people from then if i met now i could be friends with, but it seems highly unlikely.

i want my trip down memory lane to be a dead end.

What's your excuse?

I have a hole in my abdomen that leaks out from my small intestine. But yet I still ran 4.4 miles at 8:30 pace at 6am this morning.

What's your excuse?*



*super d gets a pass on this one.

ROAD TRIP!!

T-3 days

If I do the math right it should take 6-7 helium balloons to lift my GoPro camera so I can get some overhead 'crane' style shots. They could be really unique in a good way. I'm really enjoying the riding, the filming and especially the editing.

To me, it is looking more and more that I will have to be on TPN for my fistula. I'm not sad or mad about it, just resigned.

Which makes me super glad for the times I can have fun. So this vacation is gonna be a set of great memories before I'm tied to the house and basically tied to the couch and an IV pump.

It may be mainstream and summer blockbuster-ish, but I am really excited for the new Planet of the Apes movie. I have such fond childhood memories of watching the original ones on Saturday afternoons and my grandma's. Along with all the classic monster movies and B monster/sci-fi movies from the 50's.

I guess I should stop saying I'm afraid of jumping my bike....
The 1st and more importantly 3rd time of this jump went great. The second, as you can see by my body language right before landing, had me on my back headfirst on the ground sliding into a tree. Lesson learned, never skimp on your gear. My full face and Leatt let me get up and just walk away.

Coulda, Woulda, Still Can

Click the link to the right under the "Help" and "Donate" part. It is for the Crohns and Col1itis Foundation of America. The group that actually raises money and brings awareness for helping people with these diseases.

Right now there is no known cause for Crohns. There is no known cure for Crohns. If you've read my blog or know me in real life you know how I have suffered from this crappy disease. Real suffering for most of my life....

Last week if you donated more than $10 on Monday you were told you would get a treat for it.

So here I am making a rack of my famous beef jerky for those who donated. And I make delicious jerky!

You can still donate. I have dinner deals, gokart deals and other such things where if you go and eat or race gokarts the proceeds go to CCFA. If you feel like it, please click the link in the upper right column and donate today.

My 2nd mnt biking vid

Texas

Food, family, fun. I've now been to Hawaii, California, Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Georgia, Illinois, Texas, South Dakota and New York.

when the least is the most

Of all the dudes at the Korean day spa I was at tonight, I have the least to be ashamed of.......

Just saying.

In some of the things I've done, like say bikram yoga or jiu jitsu, you feel lots of pressure on your body. Certain positions in both can cause your throat to be blocked.

When the lady doing my massage walked on my back the pressure she could exert was so great it would cause my throat to close, stopping me from breathing. I would gurgle and spittle would come out of my mouth.

Just saying.

the simple things can also be the most complex

Take the t-shirt for instance. Seemingly the most simple of all garments. At one time it was just white, cotton and crew neck.

Not so anymore. I have 4 distinct types of t-shirts. (can you tell I did laundry today?) First I have what I like to call my "nice" t-shirts. Things from Gap, Banana and such. Something classic or in style right now. Solids and prints. These are all on hangers in the closet. I do live in San Diego, so a t-shirt and flip flops are something you can never have too many of.

Then I have my "exercise" t-shirts that live in my dresser and fill up a full drawer, even when I clean them out twice a year. These are all my tech tees, things designed to wick sweat away from you. Running and working out in the garage give them their use. I wish this was more often. Like 90% of America.

Third I have my two wheel tees. T-shirts dealing with motorcycles and mountain bikes and often they are one and the same. Normally a bold color and some sort of large graphic. Fox, Alpinestars, Trek and the like. I guess I use them sometimes as a life style identifier but I also like the look quite often. Souvenir ones from races and such get worn a little and then either tossed or saved. A good example would be my autographed Kevin Schwantz shirt. Or the first Moto-GP race at Indy. Or my invite only shirt to DC Shoes motocross facility opening party. You get the idea.

Speaking of saved t-shirts I pretty much have stopped wearing jiu jitsu shirts unless they are ones from my school. All of my tournament tees are now folded and put away. One day I want to be able to to pull out these t-shirts, my medals, mountain biking medals and trophies and be able to say, "See kids, grandpa used to be awesome!" Just like how I feel when I look at the picture of my dad from the 70's with shoulder length hair, shirtless and in a rock band. Pretty cool and definitely a nice surprise.

T-shirts, who knew they could be soo complex?

can you tell i'm obsessed with bike riding right now??

The plan is set. I leave for my almost two week mountain bike roadtrip on Thursday July 28th! Watch out Colorado and Utah!

Today is the first day in the past 338 days that I will not have a bandage or contraption of any kind on my stomach.

I guess I'm kinda obsessed with biking right now.....

better view

Kinda boring front curb.
Thanks for letting me know before I stick my bare hands in this.
Pygmy date palms make the front yard curb look better.

Next project is to make a set of house numbers to hang from the tree so folks can find us easier.

And I plan on going much bigger.

I love my new bike!

For Daniel

Dude, you can do it. Fight through it all and don't stop having hope. Get involved with the CCFA, Crohns and Colitis Foundation of America.

Leslie, thanks for recommending my blog, and thus me. It makes me happy to know someone else is reading this and putting it to good use.

If you know me, or just want to help, please follow the link to the right about donating in the fight against crohns. Please.
I'd rather be remembered like this!!

Than like this.....

I love having a garage. I love having a place to safely keep all my various toys and sporting goods stuff. I love having tools and a work area. Some guys love their TV room and such. I love my garage.


And I love strawberry milk shakes too!

I absolutely hate the pharmacy at my HMO. They are worse than the DMV!!! Horrible management, horrible service. The worst thing ever!!! This line stretched out the pharmacy and out the front door!! See any happy faces? Not one.

Now I know why I have seen two people totally fly off the handle in the past two days. Oh yeah, and in 3 days of trying at two different pharmacies they still haven't correctly filled one of my prescriptions. They are calling me tomorrow.... Lame-Os!!