Al's Moto Log

CVMX with the kids

I’ve taken the kids out to the Cache Valley MX track a couple of times this month. They’ve really enjoyed it and I think it’s helping them feel more comfortable on their bikes and it’s a pretty good deal @ $5/bike for all day. We went before noon on weekdays and pretty much had the place to ourselves.

Logan scared the crap out of me on his first loop around the big track. He’d watched the big boys go around a couple of times and figured he just needed to gun it over the jumps. I stood helpless as I watched him hit the gas on some steep 4′ jumps, catch air, land in the flat, bounce his helmet on the handle bars, recover, and do the same thing over the next 3 hits… I couldn’t believe he was able to hold on. When he came back around, I had calmed myself down and tactfully told him that maybe he should start on the smaller rollers… whew.

Landon’s little bike is still a handful for him and that backend loves to get away from him in the corners. I think I need to figure out how to adjust that clutch so the power isn’t so on or off. He did a lot better the second time out and only laid it over a couple of times.

Posted by al on July 23, 2009 in Tracks

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Worm – Turkey – Lil Bear

July 16

Well, this ride was cruddy compared to all the others this year, but at least it’s still riding… It was dusty, I got a flat and had given my tube away the last ride, I was sweating like a pig and Nate and Zac must have thought I was going into cardiac arrest so they kicked me off my own tire and took over changing it… or they didn’t trust me with their tools, either way I appreciated it. Then when I put the tire back on, somehow I didn’t get the brake rotor in-between the pads, went about 100 yards and about went over the handlebars when I tried to use the front brake and the pad flipped out and got caught in the spokes… bent the crap out of the inside pad and ripped off most the pad material. Once again, Zac and Nate helped me get it apart and bent that pad back to factory-straight and put it back together. Finally we were able to ride the rest of the ride.

It was a pretty big group. Zane brought his girlfriend, Katie, and she could ride! *Not that I’m sexist or anything, I’m sure there are tons of girls out there that could kick my trash all over the trail… you just don’t see them out in the wild very often 🙂

Posted by al on July 16, 2009 in Trails

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Card – Richards – Cart – Seep

July 14

This is still one of my favorite combo rides to do after a day of work. The trail is starting to get pretty dusty and grown over, but good nonetheless.

Chaz brought a long a new guy to singletrack, he did really well for his first time and Card is a heck of a trail to cut your teeth on. Nice job Shaun, hope to see you out some more!

Crew: Chaz, Shaun and me.

This is some “survival man” shelter on the side of Richards, Chaz said he hunkered down here with his little brother when they got caught on the trail in the rain.

Posted by al on July 14, 2009 in Trails

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Long Loop – Beaver – Gibson – Highline – Snowslide – Davis – Paris

July 09

I think I heard Chaz refer to this ride as the “Long Loop”, I thought it was fitting, so I’m going with it. We got up at the crack of dawn to head up and see what the day would bring. I heard a lot of “maybe” when we put the feelers out for this ride, but only 4 people showed up to hit it, I guess some people have real jobs.

Other than a few boy scouts we pretty much had all the trails to ourselves the whole day. The Egan Basin monster tried to get Chaz like it did Nate last week, but fortunately he was able to escape unharmed. Snowslide and Davis were awesome! I forget how much I like those trails. The whole loop was actually really good, but by the time we got to the rocky section on the highline trail we were all pretty beat. Ken hit a pretty good rock with the rear, dented his wheel, popped the tube, and ripped his tire. He ended up having to fix it twice. Chaz ran out of gas, put some in, ran out again, put some more in, ran out again and coasted the last 1/2 mile to the trucks. Ken has the same bike and hadn’t hit reserve yet. We were curious to see how much he had, so we emptied it into a bottle and he still had over a liter. Phil also ran out of gas. I took two little water bottles of gas and put them in, but decided to see how much I had left when I got home and emptied more than 4 of those little bottles. I guess Ken and I don’t know how to get on the throttle like Phil and Chaz do!?!

*Notables

black tape seems to work for a temp rim strip, already replaced the roll we used.
make sure you have plenty of tubes on long rides, we only had two and used them both with 20 miles yet to go

Crew – Chaz, Ken, Phil and me.

Full album here: http://picasaweb.google.com/alhill/LongLoopBeaverGibsonSnowslideDavisParis

Posted by al on July 9, 2009 in Trails

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Family moto with Kully

June 30

Chaz and Megan brought over Kully, Chaz’s little brother, to go riding with my boys up Hyde Park canyon. It was a good time, I think my kids liked riding with somebody their age for once. Kully is riding that CRF80 really well even with the clutch, although he does like to shoot straight for the mud puddles.