Stump-N-Back

DaveW, DaveW's friend Dave, TrailAce and I made the trek today.

We left Cater's in Moscow around 7:45 and arrived at the Stump in time for the breakfast buffet. Along the way DaveW's friend took a spill which left his shoulder stinging. That East-Texas mud is slick. They decided to slab it back from the Stump while TrailAce and I retraced a bit of the trail and added in sections we hadn't hit in the morning. I only took a few pics.

The roads were pretty dry, but there were patchy muddy spots. Our group:




Dave on the KTM




DaveW on his KLR




TrailAce riding sweep...



The other guys got the "good" photos.

Thanks for a great ride guys. Hope the recovery time is very short!

Opps hadn't realized I should have posted in the after the ride section, so here is my summary
Hi all, Just wanted to say thanks for a great ride today. Met up with Richard (PigTrail) and Rick (Trailace), along with my friend Dave. Headed out of Moscow to see what the weather had done to the trails. Slight delay on the ride dealing with a nagging intermittent electrical issue. Still sorting out the new to me KTM that my friend Dave was riding. Got it working and we were off. Didn't take long for Richard to set a brisk pace. Although it seemed like we were racing along to me, he was being considerate to Dave and I, given our rusty (or non-existent) riding skills
Rick (Trailace) was also very accommodating riding sweep, so I tried to provide entertainment by keeping him guessing whether I was going to pull out of some ugly spots. We covered a lot of territory with the roads being mostly in pretty good shape. Every so often we would find some nice sloppy ruts to keep things exciting.
One section got the better of Dave when we had to go through a couple hundred feet of wet slimy Texas clay:

After getting Dave checked out, everything seemed to work for the moment, so we carried on for another hour and a half or so before grabbing a late breakfast at the Stump. After food, Dave realized that he was having a pretty hard time getting his arm to work right, combined with a nice little lump on the shoulder. After a bit of discussion, we decided that discretion was the better part of valor, since we were about 70 miles from the truck. We parted company with Richard and Rick and headed down to Jasper to catch the loop back through Woodville to Moscow. One plus was that Richard and Rick were now free to blaze along even quicker, since it was pretty obvious their skills were significantly better than ours Another bonus was that I got to try out the KTM for a bit of extended riding. While it was only on slab, it did give me a better feel for it. We found a couple of twisty farm to market roads on the way back. I discovered the vibration that seems to be a feature of rimlocks when we were cruising along at 65-70 mph on the way back. Dave was glad to be on the KLR, as the extra vibration wasn't feeling so good on his arm.
We got back to the truck as Trailace was loading up, so we got to say a final thanks for the ride. Meanwhile, we headed back so Dave could get his shoulder checked out. Just heard from him, looks like nothing broken (we had suspected his collar bone), but he does have a separated shoulder from the spill. Looks like a couple of weeks of light duty for him
Aside from the injury and a couple of minor issues, it was great to get out on the trails, even if it reminded me how much more I need to practice.....
Hope everyone else had a great weekend of riding. I looking forward to meeting more folks on the trails
Dave

Barnett makes wheel weights that allow you to balance the vibrations caused by the rim-locks - at least to some degree. I set about 3 opposite the rim lock and valve stem positions.

The spoke mounted ones seem to stay in place better than the stick on type.

Thanks PigTrail, will look into those.

Can you post your route in google maps or somewhere that people without Garmin MapSource can see?

Will do. In the meantime (until I get home from work and in the future), you can always convert .gpx routes to google maps with the applet on the front page of gpsvisualizer.

Nice, I guess the .gpx file will work then.

I live in the Heights, I've probably seen you riding around here.

sweet pics. looks like some nice riding grounds. i dont want to jack this thread, but can you guys tell me at what pace you ride these dirtroads? mph? its all pavement here with a little east tx in the mix when its cool out.

Varied depending on the surface, but anywhere from 15-20ish for muddy rutted sections, to 40-50 on dryer stretches per the speedo on the KLR. Of course, probably a little faster than we should have been going on some sections for Dave and I, but Richard and Rick were handling it quite easily.

per my speedo i was running some nice dirt roads in east tx at anywhere from 45 to 65 mph. going to take the gps next time. i like to ride fast but also like to chill most of the time. just wondering if i would be able to keep up with some of you guys

The way Dave were going shouldn't be a problem, Richard and Rick might give you a better run for it
Dave