A bit more wandering in the desert

Early Saturday I loaded up the car with the one speed in its new and improved state. The new fork and crank sure make a load of difference. The fork corrects the geometry close to what it was meant to be and the crank replaced one that had a non-drive side arm loosening problem. So off to White Tanks to the first race of the season. I promptly got my ass kicked but had a decent race anyway. I felt good, it was really warm and the trails were great. They gave t-shirts away but they did not even have a date on them so mine went to Goodwill with some other old shirts. Today I wandered around the Dry Creek area in Sedona on the Coconino. It just so happened that it was the first time on the Coconino in Sedona. I wound up somewhere I hadn't planned when I tried to get from the Lost Watch Trail to the Deadman's Pass area and it took me quite awhile longed that I thought it would. I ran into private property, a golf course and a trail that took me way up past where I wanted to be. I ended up backtracking to the Dry Creek Road, flatting, and meeting up with Anne an hour and a half late. She was starting to worry but luckily she hadn't reported me missing yet. I was having a great ride after all.

Mmmm.......red dirt

It has been relatively warm here in Northern Arizona the past week and Anne and I decided to head to Sedona yesterday to get a taste of the red dirt. I had just installed my new fork on my old Ibis Mojo one speed so I needed a test run and Anne wanted to go for a long run with Yampa. I rode up the Bell Rock Pathway to the Mystic Trail on to the Submarine Rock area to Chicken Point. Once past Chicken Point I headed down the Little Horse trail to the Llama trail and then back to the car in the Village of Oak Creek. It was all good and the fork is great but the perpetual crank arm loosening problem was finally too much. My old Race Face crank from '96 is getting swapped for a new SLX crank. I will give my first impression of it after this weekend down at White Tanks in Phoenix. Next weekend it will be off to Tucson for SingleSpeed AZ '09. Big fun with good people in the desert.

I wouldn't call it being sentimental...well maybe

The past couple of days I have been riding the trails of the desert. Saturday I was at White Tanks with my neighbor Jerrod and Sunday I rode the Templeton/Baldwin Trail combo down in Sedona. Both rides were phenomenal but of course I did not have a camera to document the outstanding conditions and warm weather. At home as part of the grand garage and house organization project I have begun to sort through things. I have decided that I would get rid of a bunch of my old work t-shirts and other miscellaneous shirts. I figured I would just take a photo of each different type of shirt (multiples exist of the same work shirt) and that would have the same value with less space. I also decided to post the photos here (a Steve Garro of Coconino Cycles idea) and tell a bit about them. I figured that would be good therapy and allow me to part with t-shirts. The first shirt today is from the Asheville Hotshots where I worked for a season and was fortunate to see a lot of the south and upper midwest that I never would have seen on my own. The second and third are from my 3 seasons as a wildland fire engine captain at Dinosaur National Monument. The Fish and Wildlife shirt is due to the crew being interagency and we were actually station at a wildlife refuge. Northwest Colorado is a really beautiful place and hardly anybody ever goes there with the exception of Steamboat Springs. The last shirt came from the Yeti factory when it was in Durango. They actually made their bikes there. I am fortunate to have come to love mountain biking as a sport when it was young and it seemed much more a grassroots type of movement. Cheers!

The holidays are over

Well it sure has been awhile since the last post but we've been fairly busy. We were in NM for Christmas but I forgot the camera so I could not document the festivities. We traveled around and saw a good portion of my NM family. We had a good time and it was really nice to see everyone. When we got back Anne decided that she would like to have nordic skis so we both decided to pick up a pair. We purchased them and promptly decided to check out Hart Prairie Road for a little ski in the falling snow. It is pretty fun and a good workout to top it off. Anne has been a couple times since then but I have been up at Snowbowl teleing instead. I miss being on the bike but will be down in the desert some in the upcoming weeks so that will be fun. I have begun sorting through old crap in the garage and will be slowly getting rid of stuff that I was sure I couldn't live without. To start will be some fire t-shirts (and misc. others) that I will be posting some photos of as a way of parting with them. Lots of hard work and some good memories in those shirts. I sorted through a bunch of old owners manuals last night and came across a sweet Rock Shox manual from 1998, took this picture and promptly recycled it.

Early Christmas trip to KC and snow upon arrival home

We arrived back in Flag the other day after a trip to KC for an early celebration with Anne's parents for Christmas. While we were there we experienced temps in the 60's until Sunday and then the temps fell like a rock. We had a few hours to check out the cyclocross nationals but only made it through the elite women's class where Katie Compton won her fifth National Championship. The wind chill was in the single digits so we bailed but it was cool to see part of. When we arrived back Monday night there was quite a bit of snow so we decided to go skiing today. It was Yampa first ski trip so we just headed up to Snowbowl and skinned up for one run down the mountain. It was pretty fun but seems like a couple feet of snow is probably still needed to open up. Yampa was going nuts in the snow and may just become a pretty good ski dog. My toe is getting better but still was a bit painful initiating turns on the skis. Oh well at least I can wear the shoes I want. Happy winter!

Trying not to puke

So I went back to the podiatrist this morning and got the results from my blood test. 8.7 on the the uric acid test which is high and pretty much proves that my foot problem is gout. So after a week of Colchicine I was prescibed another anti-inflammatory to take until the swelling goes away. This one is called Indomethicin and after reading about it I am now aware of some bad side effects after prolonged use. I took one a couple of hours ago and have felt like puking ever since so my taking of it may be short lived. I also did some investigating into dietary needs to decrease uric acid and learned some interesting facts about purines and what foods contain the most. Spinach, lentils, oats, and beans are all high in purines which elevate uric acid levels so along with beer and wine I was pretty much screwed from the beginning. I am going to try and am eat way less of these things but it will be tough as oats are in breakfast for me everyday and beans are a staple for dinner. On a different note I got a new t-shirt the other day from Bryce at AZ Bikes that apparently has been remade by popular demand. I also found Anne's Moab Marathon finishers medal which was a source of great humor this past spring. First of all the medal was given out at check in and not when people actually finished and secondly the medals are left over from 2004 and not made for the current year. Classic. Good work folks. It is a good thing that the course had amazing scenery of red rock country through the entire race course.

One of these is not like the other, Guitar Heroing it up over Thanksgiving, and Does this dog look like she can jump the 6 foot fence.

It has sure been awhile since I last blogged but not too much has been happening. My left foot is a bit less swollen than it was last week but still too big for a regular shoe. It is still a little painful in certain area around the big toe and ball of the foot but seems to be getting better. The podiatrist believes that I have gout which is odd to me. So over the next couple of week I have to skip drinking and eating red meat and cheese. The first one of the three is the only one that I am missing (not really but kinda). Over Thanksgiving Anne's mom visited and bought us Guitar Hero which we promptly had to play. I included a photo of Anne and her mom as they were getting booed off the stage during an exceptional performance. Most recently is the issue with Yampa the dog. I went outside a couple of days ago to see what she was up to and could not find her in the yard. As I got slightly worried I tried to figure out how she got out and then notice her playing with Humphrey the neighbor's dog. I went over to get her and brought her home and watched her to see where she got over the fence. She promptly attempted to jump the fence right where I figured she got over. It is amazing that she can get over a six foot fence with relative ease. Off to Home Depot I went and got chicken wire to raise the height of the fence. Unfortunately the fence is flexible enough to create little paw holds that Yampa can scamper up. Then I got about 30 feet of animal fencing that I had left and put it up on the section where she jumps and she was able to get up to about 8 feet but not all the way over. I will be off to Home Depot in the morning again to replace the chicken wire in the photo for some taller, more burley animal fencing. Maybe one of these day I will be able to ride again. My foot will probably be good enough to ride about the time it really starts snowing.