Five days packed into two.

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That was a lot of sports.

Between whatever happened with the American Football Bowl, and The World Wide Cyclocrossing Championships, I think I’m all sported out.

As far as the latter is concerned, the UCI outdid themselves once again and had their YouTube channel actually restricted on American soil;
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(presumably because Pat McQuaid booed at last year’s race.)

There were a number of other options made available to me just after I made my Saturday’s complaint about it on Twitter, but I simply wanted to gripe, because as soon as I did, I immediately left my house to ride my bike.

Of course Vos slayed the women’s field again, and Stybar, the mens;
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No huge surprises there.

And somebody won the Superbowl. Maybe the Broncos. Or perhaps Seattle. (Just kidding. I watched it, and it was a shit show). One thing is for sure- Approximately one billion buffalos sacrificed their wings for the day.

But as far as my own engagement of sporting activities goes- Before my recent sojourn to the southlands, Robert Ives from Blue Collar Bicycles had asked if my better half and I would like to join him and his to do some exploration of a dried lake bed in Northern California aboard some extra fat tired bicycles.

I did very much at the time, but needed to stay home and prepare for our departure.

With a little bit of time on my hands over the weekend, I asked him if he’d like to try it again.

Luckily, we were able to do so with help from his LBS, The Bicycle Business;
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It seems as though they have a pretty cool thing they offer in regards to letting people try a fat bike before they buy a fat bike. For a hundred bucks, an individual can borrow the bike in question (they have Surly Pugsleys, Moonlanders, Krampus(es), and any variation thereof) for the day, use it, abuse it, fall in love with it, and at the end of your time together, you bring the bike back and if you want to go ahead with a purchase of that model, or one of the others they carry, your money goes towards it.

Shop proprietor Zach was very kind to us in this regard and set us up with bikes for three of the six of us, while Coop opted to ride her own cross bike, Smitty rode Robert’s Pugsley, and of course I was riding my own personal Krampus;
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The plan was to make the trek to Folsom (used to be a) Reservoir and survey the effects of the drought;
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As the remains of a town flooded long ago have begun to emerge, the landscape was absolutely otherworldly, and provided precisely the type of terrain I’ve long dreamt of riding my Krampus across;
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We finally had to call it a day to get food and wash and return the bikes, but it served as a foundation for a much bigger adventure somewhere down the road.

Assuming we don’t soon get a biblical rainstorm that fills the lake up again.

If that happens it will be bad for riding around the lake’s bottom, but it will be good for food production, so on the chance I have to choose between the two I’m afraid I’ll opt for the latter.

Speaking of dry times and the perils we face because of them, Jake the Battalion Chief and Impresario of Steel Wül Cycling made with the contact to prove once and for all that when ninety percent of us didn’t know what was going on, he was among the ten that did;

I figured you would appreciate the lid and shades not to mention the Koski fork and running shoes;
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SC to SB with four days left of our last summer before high school…

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That Jake is really one of the good guys, and an individual who I’m proud to call a friend;

I’d like to note that I’ve done a couple of his rides over the years, the first of which was on my 40th birthday. It nearly killed me, but it was nice to know that when push came to shove, I still have it where it counts.

At least two out of five days, anyway.

If that.
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5 Responses to “Five days packed into two.”

  1. DanLees February 3, 2014 at 8:41 am #

    Plural of Krampus should be Krampii surely?

    • Largo February 3, 2014 at 6:56 pm #

      No way, Krampussssss sounds way more better.

  2. scooper February 3, 2014 at 9:26 pm #

    Rad! Totes!

  3. SweetCheetah February 4, 2014 at 4:11 pm #

    Why is Surly so friggin awesome in every discipline?