gotdurt
12-04-2006, 11:52 AM
http://img233.imageshack.us/img233/1999/dsc2755c2um7.jpg
I won!
It's been 7 years since I've done any real woods singletracking, and 4 years since I've done any real off-roading (thanks to an injury that left me with about 50% use of my right wrist)... I've been itching to get back to the Sam houston National Forest for some play time, since my last loop back in spring of '00.
My friend Tony ("disbanded") an I have been discussing a 2-wheeled romp in the woods for about 3 years now. 2 years ago he also had a career-ending injury to his ankle, very similar to mine; infact we both had multiple surgeries and had to wear external fixating devices. I say "career ending", because for those of you who don't know him, or haven't heard of him (Tony Davis), he is a very accompished enduro racer and ex-pro MXer. We've done some street and DS riding together, and a short ride at Cross-Creek, but this would be the first time he and I would do any real trail riding.
The moons finally aligned, and we made plans... that actually stuck :-P . We talked about going to STrider's "December Dirt Days", but we were a little concerned about our time off of the dirt, mixed the idea of riding 315+lb bikes with 20+ people on enduro bikes on a short course sounded kind of scary... and not much fun for the others should my pig and I get in the way :lol2:
So we stayed with our original plan of a slow-and-easy day in the SHNF... sort of. We originally planned to come up friday night, camp, ride a couple of easy loops on Saturday, then head home... well, the weather put a damper on that, so we opted to drive out Saturday morning. This made for a shorter day of riding, but by the end, I'd say neither of us minded ;-)
After a few miles on a trail that I hadn't planned on getting on, my memory began to come together, and we were on our way through the south-east loop that I had planned. To my surprise, our "slow and easy" pace that we had planned went out the window almost immediately; I didn't push the limit, but the pace was brisk, despite our time away from the dirt and the shortcomings of the bikes. We made several rest stops for did-you-see-that's and general BSing, and at the last one before crossin back over the highway, I commented on how the wives will be happy that the ride was incident-free... of course shortly after I said that, I dumped mine in a low-speed sandy turn, twice :lol2: No harm done though.
We were content with our 40ish mile day (didn't keep track of the mileage on the first trail, guessing about 5 miles), so we wrapped-up the afternoon with burgers from the Country-Inn in Huntsville (man I miss that place), and high-tailed it back to Austin.
I decided not to wear the helmet cam I brought, because I really didn't think it would make for entertaining video, not this day anyway. I did bring the vid cam along though, as I thought we'd make lots of stops to record our struggles and general sillyness; sand, mud, etc. Little did I know, we rode quite well, even with our weight, width and painfully poor suspensions, and had so much fun the we never stopped for video; just twice at rest stops. Next time I we'll make an effort for more and better footage.
Here's what little video we took:
Me and Tony at SHNF (http://youtube.com/watch?v=zl5Di73l51w)
Be sure to reduce the size (rectangular button on the lower right)
:wave:
I won!
It's been 7 years since I've done any real woods singletracking, and 4 years since I've done any real off-roading (thanks to an injury that left me with about 50% use of my right wrist)... I've been itching to get back to the Sam houston National Forest for some play time, since my last loop back in spring of '00.
My friend Tony ("disbanded") an I have been discussing a 2-wheeled romp in the woods for about 3 years now. 2 years ago he also had a career-ending injury to his ankle, very similar to mine; infact we both had multiple surgeries and had to wear external fixating devices. I say "career ending", because for those of you who don't know him, or haven't heard of him (Tony Davis), he is a very accompished enduro racer and ex-pro MXer. We've done some street and DS riding together, and a short ride at Cross-Creek, but this would be the first time he and I would do any real trail riding.
The moons finally aligned, and we made plans... that actually stuck :-P . We talked about going to STrider's "December Dirt Days", but we were a little concerned about our time off of the dirt, mixed the idea of riding 315+lb bikes with 20+ people on enduro bikes on a short course sounded kind of scary... and not much fun for the others should my pig and I get in the way :lol2:
So we stayed with our original plan of a slow-and-easy day in the SHNF... sort of. We originally planned to come up friday night, camp, ride a couple of easy loops on Saturday, then head home... well, the weather put a damper on that, so we opted to drive out Saturday morning. This made for a shorter day of riding, but by the end, I'd say neither of us minded ;-)
After a few miles on a trail that I hadn't planned on getting on, my memory began to come together, and we were on our way through the south-east loop that I had planned. To my surprise, our "slow and easy" pace that we had planned went out the window almost immediately; I didn't push the limit, but the pace was brisk, despite our time away from the dirt and the shortcomings of the bikes. We made several rest stops for did-you-see-that's and general BSing, and at the last one before crossin back over the highway, I commented on how the wives will be happy that the ride was incident-free... of course shortly after I said that, I dumped mine in a low-speed sandy turn, twice :lol2: No harm done though.
We were content with our 40ish mile day (didn't keep track of the mileage on the first trail, guessing about 5 miles), so we wrapped-up the afternoon with burgers from the Country-Inn in Huntsville (man I miss that place), and high-tailed it back to Austin.
I decided not to wear the helmet cam I brought, because I really didn't think it would make for entertaining video, not this day anyway. I did bring the vid cam along though, as I thought we'd make lots of stops to record our struggles and general sillyness; sand, mud, etc. Little did I know, we rode quite well, even with our weight, width and painfully poor suspensions, and had so much fun the we never stopped for video; just twice at rest stops. Next time I we'll make an effort for more and better footage.
Here's what little video we took:
Me and Tony at SHNF (http://youtube.com/watch?v=zl5Di73l51w)
Be sure to reduce the size (rectangular button on the lower right)
:wave: