This morning I was driving in to Moab from were I spent the night along Kane Creek Road. There were a couple guys standing along the road looking up at the cliffs above them.
I stopped to see what was going on and noticed a parachute laying beside one of the guys. I asked him if he had base jumped. He said yes and that there was one more guy getting ready. I waited and got to see the guy jump. It was very cool! Here are some photos I snapped of him jumping.
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Yesterday I rode what has become one of my favorite Moab rides after a few readers recommended it last year when I asked for favorite Moab rides. I make a loop that includes Gold Bar Rim and then over to the Portal Trail and down.
I started from downtown Moab and rode out the old highway to the Gemini Bridges parking lot. From there I headed up the road until the Gold Bar Rim jeep road split off to the left.
Once the Gold Bar Rim jeep road makes it to the rim, there’s a very technical singletrack that follows right along the rim edge. Sometimes it is literally on the rim edge. This year there was fresh blue paint marking the singletrack and it was much easier to follow. I had to get off several times because of drops. It was well worth it for the views and the fun trying to ride what I could. I was thinking though a freeride bike would have been better than my hard tail.
A storm was coming in and before I got to the Portal Trail, the clouds started moving in. I thought I saw rain in the distance so I tried to keep moving at a good pace. About the time I got back into Moab, I discovered it was a giant dust cloud instead of rain.
The Portal Trail is not a trail for people that are scared of heights. The upper part of the trail crosses close to the edge and a few people have fallen off. It really isn’t that bad as long as you get off and walk and pay attention. Once across the narrow section, it’s a very technical descent to the Potash road but it isn’t on the edge.
I have the Moab Gold Bar Rim – Portal Trail GPS track uploaded. It also has small photos placed on it. I also have photos of the ride on Flickr.
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The Slickrock trail is one of Moab’s most popular mountain biking trails. It is one of the most unique trails around. I’ve ridden small amounts of slickrock in other places but I don’t of anywhere else where you’re surrounded by miles of rock.
I’ve ridden Slickrock several times over the years but it had been a while since I had done it. Yesterday I decided it was time to revisit it and rode up there. It’s not a steady endurance ride but instead an interval workout. You go all out to get up a steep section of slickrock and then recover and get ready to go hard again.
Although there were clouds, it was nice and warm. The views were incredible and I had a lot of fun riding around on the rock.
Because it’s sandstone, you get amazing traction and if you have the leg strength, you can ride up some very steep sections. One tip is to use a tire without a lot of tread to increase the contact area. Leg strength and balance though will generally limited you more than traction.
I was riding up a steep section yesterday and was running out of power. I hit a bump and stopped going forward. I started rolling backward and couldn’t get off gracefully. I slammed my knee into the headset. I got a nasty bruise and some soreness but thankfully it doesn’t seem like a serious injury.
I started with the Practice Loop since practice is always good. I got in 18.2 miles, 2908 feet of climbing in 3:14.
I have the Moab Slickrock GPS track uploaded. It also has small photos placed on it. I also have photos of the ride on Flickr.
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After spinning the legs out Friday afternoon in St. George, it was time for more mountain biking fun on Saturday. My plan was to basically do the first part of Day 1 of Camp Lynda from last year and then turn around.
I skipped the first part because it wasn’t obvious on my map. I Drove up Cottonwood Road and started with the Powerline trail. My asthma was bothering so the first hour and a half was a slow crawl but then I started breathing better.
When the Powerline Trail curved, I cut over to the Mill Creek Road. I bombed down the road nearly back to civilization and then turned and climbed up to the Dino Cliffs trailhead. On the drop into the first wash, I was sand surfing but then it wasn’t so sandy.
I really liked the Moab looking red rocks along the Dino Cliffs. The rocks were also pretty along the Church Rock Trail. The Church Rock Trail was after Dino Cliffs except for using a short bit of Grapevine to connect.
Next up was the Prospector Trail. This was a fun piece of singletrack that was easy to get into a rhythm.
I had been lazy in the morning and had a few things to take care of. I didn’t start riding until a little after noon. Along with my asthma at the start of the ride, I didn’t make it all the way to Silver Reef before needing to head back. I ended up turning around a bit after the trailhead along I-15.
It was a fun few hours of mountain biking and I hope to get back to St. George again to do some more riding.
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I left way latter than planned on Wednesday for a road trip. I made it to Green River Utah and then drove on to St. George, Utah yesterday.
I had hoped to get to St. George in time to do a few hours of riding. Instead I only had about 2 hours before dark by the time I got on the bike. I had stopped by Red Rocks Bicycle to get a trail map. The directions to the Barrel Roll Trail sounded straight forward.
It turns out the directions on the map aren’t right. The directions at UtahMountainBiking for Barrel Roll are the right ones.
Since the directions didn’t match what I was seeing, I parked just across the Santa Clara River and started riding. After wandering around on some dirt roads for a little while I did find the trailhead for Barrel Roll.
Barrel Roll is a nice 6 mile singletrack that is non-technical except for a tiny bit up on the ridge. There are some great views of the area from the trail. It wasn’t a long ride but it was good to spin the legs out after driving 700 miles. See below for more photos from the ride.
Today the plan is to do an out and back on the first part of Day 1 of Camp Lynda last year. My planned purchase of a Garmin Edge 705 got put on hold when I got laid off from my job so hopefully I’ll find my way. I’m just out to have fun so if I wander around a bit I don’t mind.
Related Post: More Mountain Bike Fun in St. George, UT
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When I came back from the 24 Hours of Moab a few weeks ago, I saw the Dewey Bridge for the first time since it burned last spring. It’s a landmark I’ve seen on many trips to Moab. It was so sad to see it destroyed.
The following photos of the Dewey Bridge are from when I rode the Kokopelli Trail from Fruita to Moab last year.
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The 24 Hours of Moab has long been the party at end of the mountain bike race season. A lot of the the teams are there just to have fun and the race is secondary. A few teams like the winning Pro Men Monavie/Cannondale team and the winning Coed Pro/Am PRO CYCLING team are serious about racing. Solo riders are either serious or don’t know what they got into.
One year when I was racing solo there was a team close to my pit that had a portable hot tub surrounded by pink flamingos and Christmas lights. Middle of the night, I so wanted to take a soak instead of heading back out into the dark.
Saturday I walked around camp looking for the most fun camps. Sadly I didn’t find any interesting ones. I don’t think it was because the fun has been lost but because of the wind. Saturday morning tent poles were snapping and tops had blown off Easy-Ups.
I think everyone was just trying to keep everything from blowing away. I did spot a disco ball lying under a camp table but I didn’t make it back later to see if they put it to use.
Even though the wind caused some problems, it didn’t keep people from having fun.
Want to see more of the fun at the 24 Hours of Moab? Take a look at many more photos I took at the 2008 24 Hours of Moab.
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The first day of the 24 Hours of Moab has been very windy but the wind starting calming a little before dark. At the end of the 1st lap, 4 of the top 10 were solo riders. Josh Tostado was the 3rd rider to finish lap one. He has continued to build his lead in the solo race with Chris Eatough and Tinker Juarez chasing.
Here are a few of the photos I’ve taken so far. I have plenty more to upload but it will probably take a few days after I get back.
Update 10/27: I’ve created a page for my 2008 24 Hours of Moab photos.
Update 10/14: I think I took over 2,000 pictures at the 24 Hours of Moab. I still haven’t downloaded the ones I took on Sunday.
Camp Area
Ergon Tent. The Table Had Been Clean an Hour Before
Racer Meeting
Bikes Lined up for the Lemans Start
Waiting for the Start
Granny
And They Are Off
Josh Tostada at the End of Lap 1
Watch the Sandy Spots
The La Sals
Chris Eatough and Tinker Juarez
Surfing in the Sand
Camp from the Ridge
Tinker Juarez
Lights at the 24 Hours of Moab
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Bicycling has put together a good preview of the 24 Hours of Moab with Cullen Barker. I’ve raced with Cullen since the early ’90s. This will be his 5th time racing the 24 Hours of Moab solo.
The video gives a bit of an idea of how sandy some of the sections are. There are a couple downhill sections were it’s feels like you’re surfing on your bike. It’s hard to capture Nose Dive and it’s really looks bigger when you’re riding up to it. It can be intimidating for less experienced riders.
With so many riders the good lines keep shifting during the race. Generally there is wind and that also keeps the sand shifting around. As a solo rider, I’ve noticed fair change between laps. The change is much bigger for team riders that will only see each section about every 5 hours.
Team riders will generally be doing their 2nd lap in the dark so they don’t always know the lines where there a drops. I’ve generally been on my 5th lap when it’s gotten dark so I already knew the good lines pretty well.
Bicycling has a Google map of the Moab course with the location of the videos segments marked. The video of each section are also longer.
Related Link: Headed to 24 Hours of Moab
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The 24 Hours of Moab is this weekend. I’ve raced there solo 4 times. This time I’m just going to hang out and ride around. I also have a new camera
Of course I’m most interested in the solo racers. Both Tinker Juarez and Chris Eatough are registered. It should be an interesting race between them.
Josh Tostado from Colorado is another guy that could do well. Pete Basinger who holds the Iditarod Trail Invitational record should also do well. My guess is the race is a little short for him but I still could see him in the top 3. I raced with him in 2003 at the Fireweed 400.
I don’t know if I’ll be able to get internet access out at the race course. If I can’t I’ll try going in to town Saturday night to upload at least a few photos. Granny Gear will also have a webcast during the race. The race standings are generally updated very often so you can so how the race is going.
The 24 Hours of Moab is where I first raced at night when I raced solo in 1997. Little did I know the path it would lead me down. I didn’t even have a light system. I was racing on the Schwinn/Grand West grassroots team and the team manager arranged for me to use one a demo unit of a new Schwinn dual light system.
It turned out the lights worked great. Unfortunately my lungs didn’t. A couple days before I was laying on the couch with fever, aches and chills. I was feeling better for the race but I was still very congested.
The race went really well for me for the first 12 hours and I was in 3rd place. During the night it started snowing and I got to the point I could barely breath. I ended up sitting in the back of my truck for 7 hours. If I laid down I couldn’t breathe. Even when I fell asleep sitting up, I’d start choking.
Once it the sun came up and it warmed up a bit, my crew convinced my to head out for one more lap. I felt good on that lap and had time for one more. I ended up with 10 laps and finished 8th out of 16.
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