I'm lovin it! Last night I finally made it out to the Rosaryville night ride with MORE. Couldn't have been a better night for it. My lighting situation* (which I also raced Leesburg Bakers' Dozen and 24 Hours of Big Bear with) is in need of some serious improvement but otherwise the ride was amazing. It was a little chilly hanging out in the parking lot and I was almost contemplating wearing my heavier cycling jacket for the ride but thankfully remembered how quickly I tend to warm up and start sweating, not to mention how nice a dry jacket was going to be post ride.
The group mostly showed up pretty early, assuring traffic wouldn't cause a missed ride, and by 7 we had 7 guys ready to roll. We rolled in clockwise (in my experience the best way) and immediately the pace was a quick and even tempo. I rode in at 5th wheel and stuck close to Eric also on an SS rig as I quickly realized my helmet light was terribly angled and my handlebar mount lost a spacer and was constantly slipping. With Eric's lead and light I was able to keep up with the steady and quick pace though I noticably fell back when I dropped off his wheel.
We rode quickly through the park regrouping now and then as the front 3 were tearing through the trails a bit faster then we were keeping up at times. The dry earth was producing a ton of dust which at times was a pretty tough hinderence but overall I think we avoided any major issues aside from a lost contact by the third single speeder (Greg?). We took the inner loop and At this point riding a wheel wasn't a wise idea so my pace slowed fairly dramatically as I kept running myself off the trail, unable to spot in the somewhat heavier cover of leaves where to go but I avoided any serious mistakes and was assured by those behind me I wasn't causing any issues there.
Once back on the main outer loop the trails were more visible and with less logs to go over wheel sucking was once again not a terrible thing to do and we sped through the rest of the trail. Definitely an awesome way to spend a Wednesday evening. I will definitely be making this a regular part of my routine.
*My lighting set up consists of a handlebar mounted nite rider road rat (big, bulky and not that bright, plus now missing a spacer) and the old performance bike light helmet mounted using electricle tape since the helmet mount didn't actually come with it and they are no longer available anywhere that I can find. Lots of tape...
2 comments:
Kev, I will get out there eventually! Show me your performance light might know where to get a mount.
The other spacer trick is to take an old tube and cut it up then electrical tape over it on the bar. That way you get some additional cushioning for the light.
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