First Raccoon Mtn climb post op, and it was hard. Hard due to my declining physical ability, age, and lack of being able yet to sprint train on the track. That won't be for at least 2 more months.
Me and Bill M. usually do this in about 34-38 min, Sunday I did it 44 min, taking a few on bike breaks to drink. Bill was a minute ahead. It was hard enough that I felt it all the next day and was pretty inactive on Monday, save for putting my boat away and doing yard work.
This data includes two sit down breaks and the ride down.
As you can see in the last photo, I have become pretty soft around the middle weighing 146-147. This morning I was 145 and I'm now making a commitment to lose this 5 lbs of fat before I turn 65 in less than a month.
Lots of people talk about diets and exercise to lose fat, and yes it's important, but the bottom line is, in some measure, you have to starve a little.
Boat ran great. Monday morning was incredibly silent. I jumped in to try some water running and it felt good. I'm going to start doing it. Water temperature still a bit cool at 76º. The lakes here on the mtn might still be below 70º. I decided to leave at 11am to beat the coming rain, which I did.
Looks like decent mountain biking. More rock and roots than I’d prefer- i would have to get off and push now and then going uphill on this trail anyway. Rocks are always much bigger than they look in the videos. https://youtu.be/BZXgcVPjIXY?si=xnZZE3dw7XzK_JKk
ReplyDeleteFor me, I'm not experienced enough to take on MTB trails here, too risky. I tried once and had trouble.
DeleteI expect trails in the eastern US to be more technical than the west. And the climbs steeper and shorter. I probably would be frustrated. Also you probably don’t have a top end modern mountain bike. Actually I don’t either my bikes geometry is out dated. It was a top end race bike in 2016 but since then geometry has changed making modern bikes much more capable on technical terrain. If I stay healthy I will update/upgrade my bike (at least $8k for what I want) eventually. You could probably rent a good bike to see if you like it. Also you need to find trails they describe as “flowing or flowy”. They will have long smooth sections. The video of this trail looks mostly good. You could probably find a 5 or so year old used bike with appropriate geometry, 1x12 gearing, full suspension with a drop seat for 1k or so, it just wouldn’t be carbon and be on the heavier side. Likely lighter than your current mountain bike. Suggest you and Bill rent very good mountain bikes for a day shuttle up to the top of raccoon mountain and roll/ride down to the bottom. Make sure it has a drop seat. If up to it then turn around and ride back uphill to the car.
ReplyDeleteI’m lucky in Boise in that it is a gold star mountain bike city with 190 miles of interconnected trails and Forrest service roads. Plus world class Nordic skiing. Unlucky with Trumpers though. https://www.ridgetorivers.org/trails/interactive-map/
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