Far North BMX

I've been attending (and raced once) the Far North BMX race track over
the last few weeks. It's a fairly well maintained track that the kids
of Fairbanks can race around in a constructive manor. But what was
really fun was to take photos of the races. I took over six hundred
photos in the one hour the races lasted. I think there were about nine
moto's, and I'm not sure how many riders there were, but needless to
say, the little buffer on my camera got quite the workout, and even was
full for a few of the shots... Too bad too, because I know that I missed
a few good shots while it was churning away.

The class that I raced in (the one time) was the cruiser class... for
non-BMX bikes... but it was a nice change of pace from the downhill
mountain biking that I usually do. Now, this doesn't mean that I was
any good at it, just that it was fun to try once. ;-) What was really
nice was I didn't gash my leg open, or break any bones... or worse...
What's worse? I dono, but it didn't happen to me on this course.

Not that the page is all that exciting, but here is a link to the ABA site that tells you about the track in Fairbanks.
Russ (the guy that runs the track) is a good friend of mine that goes to
my church as well... Zion Fairbanks.

Paul

MTB - Pemberton

Do I really need to say it?

The sun woke me up today at quarter till six in the morning. Since I didn't figure the bike shop would be open this early, I rolled over and went back to sleep for a few hours. I finally rose about nine in the morning and on my way out, that helpful lady was there again. Of course I had to talk to her again, and I got the distinct feeling, from all the 'dude' and the rocker symbol she flashed me as I drove up, that she was one of those neo-hippies. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but my stereotype of the youth of Canada was a little bit off. Anyway, she was awesome. From her directions I drive right to the bike shop and looked around for a bit and then asked about the trails.

The guy that told me about the trails got me to buy a map from him for over $12 after tax. I was less than enthused with paying that kind of cash for a map, but since part of the trails are on private grounds, and sales of things like this map goes to that cause, I guess I can look at it like a park fee and then it wasn't as bad.

The trail recommended to me was Happy which was rated as a medium trail. For those of you that know the rock section at Platte River State park, almost the entire trail was just like that. Well, the rocks weren't quite as sharp, but it was that steep and completely rocky. To say I did well at the course is an over statement, in fact there were several sections that I just couldn't find a place to get back onto my pedals to continue the course, so I had a little hike mixed in with my bike in tow.

The biggest problem with walking, however, was the fact that you could scarcely see where you were walking for all the mosquitoes. If I thought the mosquitoes were bad last night, they were almost unbearable in the shadows of this forest. So after a few recovery steps, I forced myself back onto the bike to plod along up the trail. This was a great way to get in shape though, if you take it easy and walk, you get drained of your blood, otherwise you work hard staying just ahead of the mosquito herd.

After riding up several steep climbs, and walking a few others, I quickly referred to the map to make sure I was going the correct direction, and it seemed I'd made a wrong turn. No time to look at that now, the herd caught me. After I rounded another corner I saw in front of me what looked to be a wall. Now I knew I had made a wrong turn and headed back to the trail I wanted to be on. I had stumbled upon a black trail when I wanted to stick to the blue trails. Now back on track, this trail seemed like a breeze and I soon found myself at the lake, aptly named Mosquito Lake.

There were a few other bikers here, and after talking to them for a little bit, one of them recommended a black trail down to the parking lot. I thought I knew where the trail head was to it and could get to the actual black from a couple different blue routes. I must not have found the correct entrance because it was quickly apparent that I was on another black route. Meaning I did more hiking than I did biking, this time I didn't have much of a choice, I just had to wade through the herd.

Finally, time for the downhill. The black trail started out as a blue and I was moving quite quickly down the trail with little difficulty. Oh sure, it was more technical than most of the trail at Platte River, but only because of the rocks. Then came the black trail. I'm proud to say that I only had to walk down two parts of this trail. One was a huge granite slab with a steep drop off on one side, so I decided I wanted to keep the tire side down. The second I could have ridden through, but the trees in equilateral triangle fashion were just marginally farther apart than my handle bars, and given the speed I would have had going through them, my knuckles thank me for walking through this section.

When I arrived at my vehicle, I checked my watch for the first time since leaving and found that three hours had passed. Except for maybe a half hour at the lake, the entire rest of the time was spent biking, or hiking up hills. What's even more amazing is that my GPS says I went over seven miles. That makes this the farthest, and hardest that I've ever biked before, and I feel like it currently... I'm beat. I feel like it's time for a nap, or just drive about 400 miles to Prince George.

MTB Distance: 7.62. Elevation: 669 -> 1932

Continue with Day 19.

MTB - Moab

Did you miss the beginning of the Trip?

Today was a big day. The biggest. Literally. Today was the longest day of the year, and I saw ever minute of it. My phone woke me up at 5:30 with a glow coming from the windows. I threw on the same clothes I had on yesterday and headed out of town to 'Klondike' trail. When I got there, I found out not only that I wasn't the only one taking the trail today, but I wasn't even close to the first person there. At the trail head there were already two vehicles emptied of their bikes, and I followed another car in as well.

I have to say I greatly underestimated this trail at first. After checking out my gear I set off down the trail, which I would call more of a 4x4 track, I found myself switching gears. First it was about 1-4, then 1-7, then 2-4, then 2-6. The trail wasn't exactly going uphill, but it defiantly wasn't going downhill either. The dust was flying behind me and I was getting upset because I wanted a medium difficulty trail, not some path I could just as easily drive my vehicle down. But then it happened... sand... lots of sand... I hate sand. This wasn't even the nice kind of sand that almost supports your weight, it's the kind of sand that anticipates your coming and gets out of the way of your tire just to flow around it and bury it six inches deep rendering any amount of peddling futile. After walking my bike through it for about two hundred feet, there was another patch of the same sand later on down the trail. I hate sand. This one was only about one hundred feet long. In case you were wondering, still hating sand over here.

Now the trail splits into the full blown 'Klondike' and 'Baby Steps' trails. At the fork, the both appear to be quite easy, but I continue down 'Baby Steps' as was recommended to me. Pretty soon it narrows to single track. This is a welcome change from the tire track trail. Then it starts getting little ups and downs that forced me back down to my more normal gearing of about 1-5. Then the trail disappears into a slick rock, and begins to climb. And climb. And climb. And I begin to walk my bike. And climb. And climb... and this trail isn't quite so simple anymore. If I were in halfway decent shape, and if I wasn't at nearly 5000 feet the next part would have been awesome. Tight technical switchbacks with quick downhills and short climbs twisting around, through, and over large boulders. However, I've had enough, and when 'Baby Steps' meets back up with 'Klondike', I take it down. Even though I'm exhausted now, 'Klondike' is quite boring in comparison to 'Baby Steps'. It's just a gradual climb over granite slabs. Supposedly there are dinosaur prints in some of these rocks, but I was going much to fast down to see anything of much detail.

There are so many different trails to explore in Moab, so I would defiantly recommend it to anyone wanting to do some hiking or biking.

MTB Distance: 6.08, Elevation: 4583 -> 4987.

Continue with Day 6.

Days 3 & 4

If you missed part 1, go read it!

Well, it happened. Something not good. Something car related. That's right, I got pegged by a rock. Not your normal rock that is less motivated than your average pet rock, but a rock traveling at close to supersonic speeds on I-25. Then later that day, my car is sitting in the sun (lots of that during summer turns out) and the expansion causes a force on the windshield and, well, let's just say it's not a rock sized problem anymore. I guess I'll just drive with a cracked windshield for awhile. It's not like I've ever done it before though... lol.

Other than that, I hung out with Vern for a couple of days and that was a blast. I even got a tour of LSI before the drinking started.

On Tuesday, I decided I should sleep in, or rather the beer decided for me. You know that thing about altitude affecting the rate you get oxygen? Well, it has something to do with alcohol too.

After a while I got going and took the short trip down the road to Garden of the Gods and did some sight seeing as well as my first biking since my leg go so gnarled. This happened to be the first real exercise since that happened as well and exercising at 6300 feet when you aren't even in shape for 1200 feet might make a little bit of difference. What I'm saying is that I sucked... big time. Not only was I constantly out of breath, but I was so timid on the jagged rocks that I basically ended up with a fancy hike rather than a bike ride. But at least I can say I did it.

Tomorrow I'll be heading to Moab, hopefully I'll be more prepared for my excursion there.

Day3 Distance: 81.9, Elevation: 5180 -> 7270
Day4 Distance: 2.04, Elevation: 6352 -> 6444

Continue the Trip.

Some time on my hands.

Well, as you might imagine, I've had a little time on my hands as I've been recovering, but lucky for me I've got some new toys to play with. This post is to demonstrate the wonders of GPS. Now everyone can see the location and epic journey that took place the night my leg got beautified.

I purchased a handheld GPS unit a few weeks ago, and this was the first trial run for it in the wild. Oh sure I'd driven around town a few times with it, used the GOTO function a few times, but nothing as resourceful as picking out a nearby hospital in order to treat my wounds in a time sensitive matter. How did my Magellan eXplorist 400 fair? Well, you can now see for yourself.

Oh yeah, encase you were wondering why I didn't walk to the road that was close to the location of my injury it's because that's a huge hill, and the way I walked is nice and flat.

Isn't technology grand?

My new Scar

Story time kids,
To start, let's just say that I've had better days. Those of you with a somewhat weak constitution may not want to read this first hand account of the worst injury of my lifetime.

While Knudsen and I were just getting started riding at Platte River state park I had a little slip-up and I ended up sliding down the hill and got my leg caught up on a branch. When I looked down, all I could see was the gaping slice in my leg that revealed the muscle membrane below, just like a skinned rabbit. At that point I let out quite the scream, and Knudsen was quickly on his way down the hill to see what the trouble was. When he saw, he expressed little immediate shock and started trying to put together a tourniquet. He quickly came to the conclusion that his shirt bandanna were the only available bandages. Yeah, we weren't completely prepaid for such as large injury.
In the act of ripping his shirt of his back he said "I don't really want to rip my shirt." However, my massive thigh wouldn't permit the closure of the wound... ok... ok, it was more of a problem of the nine inch laceration that we needed more tourniquet, so the shirt quickly became ripped in two and a solid tourniquet placed around my leg.
Now for the fun part, getting out of the woods. As I started hobbling back to the car, Knudsen biked ahead looking for a park ranger, or a hiker, or just anyone to lend a hand. Wouldn't you know it, not a soul to be found. Since we were thinking so clearly, Knudsen had to return to where I was and get the keys to my car to get me to a hospital. When we got back onto the road who should show up? Mr. Park Ranger.
"Mr. Ranger, where's the nearest hospital?"
"Hospital?"
"Yeah, I have sever lacerations on my leg, and am in need of medical attention."
"Uhh... well, Lincoln or Omaha."
Thanks buddy, we know that... we were hoping that there might be something a little bit closer... I guess this is just not my day.

The interesting stuff happened when we got back to Lincoln. As it turns out, the emergency room was having it's own emergency as it happened to be one of the poorest displays of medical care that I have been witness too. Not that I have seen that many, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt as my injury was not life threatening However, it wasn't just the speed at which they reacted to my situation (somewhat slow as I waited in the reception area for about a half hour before being shown into a room), it was the organization and setup of the room I was put into. It seemed like the nurse that was helping me (she was new at it) was very unsure where many of the supplies were located. On top of that, when she asked for assistance (as she should have, so I have no fault with her, and she was fairly cute, so that might have played a part of it...) the other nurses were of little to no help. Unfortunately I have to report that this all took place at Saint Elizabeth in Lincoln, which I did hold in high regard before this incident.

One of the memorable moments came when the nurse started unwrapping my wound to clean it. As she walked to the far side of the bed she finally saw the extent of my injury. She was quite taken aback from the sight of my muscle membrane and quickly had to leave the room to get some more professional assistance. I should have started selling tickets at this point because I could have paid for my stitches by the end of the night. Nurse after nurse flooded into the room for the remainder of the night to see the freak show. Either that or they needed a reminder of what blood looked like because they hadn't seen any of it tonight.

Ok, I'm not really that upset about the whole fiasco because of the doctor that stitched me up. He was very patient with my questions, and joked with me when I joked with him. His main concern with the pandemonium going on around him was: "If I panic, it makes the situation worse, so it's my responsibility to remain calm and collected." or something like that. Yeah, it sounds like a very basic professional statement, but he was very good at what he does. Shortly after the nurse assisting the stitching started asking how long the doctor thought the laceration was. His response was a simple "Go get a tape to measure it." To which the nurse left the room. Later Jenna informed me that they need to know that anyway for records purposes. I should mention that Jenna (Knudsen's girlfriend) is studying to be a nurse and was a great help keeping me comfortable and helping to explain drugs and procedures when the nurse was out of the room, which, if you're keeping track was quite often. When the nurse returned, the doctor asked for something (I don't remember what it was, I was a little preoccupied at the moment, my leg kinda did hurt) and she set down the tape to get it. A little later, the question from the nurse returned, to which the doctor replied in a terse "No, I don't." She finally got the hint, and measured the laceration as the first stitch was going in. The final tally? Twenty-three centimeters, or approximately nine inches. Quite the little gouge from a pointed stick.

Well, I got my leg patched up, and sent on my way without too much more drama, but I do have to say it made for an interesting evening that I don't plan on repeating anytime soon.

If you feel like you would like to see first hand the gory details, then you can visit them at your leisure, but I recommend that you have a fairly strong constitution to do so. You have been warned: Scar.

Oh, while the nurse was removing the bandage Knudsen had field dressed, she mentioned how well the tournequite was applied to stop the bleeding and protect the wound. Bonus points for Knuds.

Platte River State Park

Well, it's been awhile since I posted, and I've really got to get in a habit of using this thing because it will be the only major way to keep people (who choose to remain informed) up-to-date with what's going on during my relocation to Alaska.

Now to what this post is really about: Mountain Biking.
Adam, Quinn and I went to Platte River State Park to get a little biking in... boy was I out of shape. And that was after almost a week of running ~four (4) miles a day and biking on Lincoln trails for around forty (40) minuets. However, the trip wasn't without it's rewards.