Skip to main content

A Hike up Indy

 




Ok, I'm gonna see if I can write a post before my 13 year old wakes up, she had a derby bout and then a sleepover up 'til midnight. So, I got up and took my dogs for a walk up Indiana Jones, one of the premiere trails in the Left Hand Canyon trail network.

As I drove up the canyon I spotted some old friends and stopped to say hi. I used to ride with them a ton but now they are both on ebikes and I still ride acoustic. I do miss riding with them. The dogs and I began our hike up. Of course I was listening for bikes coming down. I kicked loose rocks out of the way and trimmed branches that had grown into the trail.
People sometimes ask how they can help dig at the trails and that is a touchy subject. As we'll see later people have very strong thoughts about trail digging. So my advice is to just do low key trail maintenance. Start by kicking off loose rocks especially above and below a feature. And if you are riding down and a branch bounces off your helmet stop and snap that branch off. I trim branches not just because they are annoying, but that's also how ticks get you. They climb out to the end of a branch and hold out their pinchy little arms just waiting for something to go by

I reached the fun angled rock about half way down and thought about the day I cut down the brush on the far left edge. I like dropping off the rock, even if it slows me way down. I didn't plan to make the default go-around but when I did it I knew it matched the flow of the trail better than cutting to the inside. I enjoy watching the evolution of the trail. Some of the trails wander side to side losing and then reclaiming main lines. Sometimes on Start the Party I shift the line just by sweeping pine cones from one side to the other. Riders take the cleanest line presented to them. 
The rest of Indy looked pretty good, the dirt is positively hero quality.

At the entrance to Indy I met one of my failed repair projects, Over the winter I came out several times to this spot and tried to smooth the giant brake bumps. I cut down the highs and filled in the lows. I moved buckets and buckets of dirt back into the craters. Then as soon as the snow cleared my work didn't last a week. The same thing happened on Dead Ass. It's as if all the dirt I piled in the low spots transferred to the high spots and amplified them. I had a theory that if I could just disrupt the wave pattern of the brake bumps they wouldn't be so deadly. 
Sometimes I've noticed that I'm the only one complaining about brakebumps. Then I realize I'm also the only one riding a 140mm trail bike and everyone else is on an enduro. A guy once said it's not about the bike, but that guy turned out to be a liar.
Above Indy I found another one of my great struggles, The Double at the bottom of Brown Town. This has been intimidating since the trail was built. I know that dimensionally it's nothing bigger than a hit on the Large Slopestyle at Valmont. I stepped up to it when it was knew, but I kept it on a list of things I wouldn't do alone. Then the more I rode Brown Town, I couldn't keep riding past it so I started hitting it every run. This year I wanted to try doing tricks on it and I even had a couple sessions of hitting it over and over. It didn't have much pop and the best I could get was a one-crank ET but that's still a trick!

Now I feel like I missed my chance, the jump has been drastically changed.



I don't begrudge the Brown Town Diggers. That's the thing about Left Hand, the only reason we love it is because riders have given up a day of riding to dig. Each turn, berm and jump tries to match the vision in someone's head. The trail is modified to fit their preferences. In this case they wanted more of a left side hip with a lot of kick. After the change I hit it once with a soft case, then I hit it perfectly, then I hit it a third time, nose cased and was slammed over the bars. It was one of those falls where you really can't believe you're not hurt. Ironically I did it trying to keep up with riders too fast for me. 

Further I climbed and found another engineering failure. One of Brown Town's flaws is it's tendency to turn into a stream bed. I tried to counter this with a waterbar. But my dirt pile was no match for a thousand skidding tires. So I rebuilt it, we'll see how it goes.


It was at this point in my journey I reached up and noticed my sunglasses had fallen off of my head somewhere. I looked all around and retraced my steps to no avail. I only wear SMITH sunglasses and have since the 90's. Last week I went OTB on Ginger Booty and my shades took most of the force.
Maybe sunglasses are like helmets and you should replace them after a big impact. Or maybe they are another sacrifice the the dark lords of Left Hand.











Comments

Popular posts from this blog

You only have to be the best until the best show up

   a tabletop   I still make dirt jumping part of my life.  There’s really nothing like it. I've been doing it for twenty years now and I kind of feel like I've earned my place. I love pushing my bike into the line-up.  I always greet the other riders just to check the attitude. A dirt  jump session should be an inclusive and positive scene. It’s one of the few times in life that you are really putting yourself out there. It’s not like a party or work or any situation where people can talk about how good they are. Nobody fakes their way through a dirt jump line.      I have a mantra I use at the park. You only have to be the best until the best show up.   And I love it when the best show up! Kickass riders are awesome to watch. I can usually spot one in the drop-in line as I roll up. They won’t wear any gear except a helmet.       It’s great when the best riders are fun and friendly. Sometimes they’re not. That’s fine. If a guy is throwing down sick tricks he  can be withdrawn

The Signs

The tale of the Left Hand Canyon trail signs is a story about art. Art in the woods, and corporate timewasting. I had become hopelessly addicted to Left Hand, and I had access to a sweet welder. I thought the broken shovel design fit with the asthetic of the trail system. A system dug by hand with sweat and shovels. My signs would be a tribute to the guys spending their free time out there digging. I started with Indy and Bon Scott since those were the existing trails, quickly followed by Deadass and the RZA GZA sign. The early signs were kind of crappy as I developed my technique. I eventually decided the best way to make the letters was a multistep process. I would lay down a layer of weld, then grind the top smooth, then lay another bead and repeat. I actually carried some of the originals down off the mountain and applied more weld to bring them up to the new standard. Also the first ones were unpainted and nearly invisible to a passing rider. The new trails started coming fa

Working in a bike shop Part 1 The Tube Shortage

   Bikes are so hot right now! The global pandemic has brought massive popularity to a thing that many of us already knew about. Bikes are cool. Riding Bikes is fun. It's conceivable that social distancing has killed many sources of recreation that people had come to rely on and enjoy. Obviously bowling isn't a sport, but it did provide entertainment to many people, and now bowling alleys are closed.    It would have been great if bowlers had taking the sport back to it's rough and tumble roots. I'd be interested in watching some gritty, underground 'street bowling.' I picture it in an abandoned warehouse run by bowling gangs. But that didn't happen. Instead everyone in the country said, "Hey don't we have some bikes still in the garage? We should ride those." or even better, they said, " You know, I think I'd like to try mountain biking, that looks fun!"   And so the Golden Horde was unleashed on an unprepared cycling industry. B