mudpit mountainbike race

Did a mountain bike race yesterday, called Hornings Hideout, fairly close to home.
It was really wet and like a mudpit, not too enjoyable. I'm a little bitter about the 3hrs I spent racing in the mud, crashing 15-20 times because the mud was 4" thick on the downhill sections... and the organizers didn't know what the bugger they were doing and oh it cost me 20quid to enter... yeah. utter crap. not fun at all.
The good news is because of it I also missed getting home to watch the Paris - Roubaix race on the telly. Bad Sunday.

2012 Up Yours, Hornings

march, bloody hell

just heard on the news. March 29 out of 31days raining. 23 consecutive rain days. 6.6" rain for the month total. bloody hell.
oh also if you like great photography, motorbikes, architecture and arty shots of boobies, you will love this, one of my fav daily reads www.lecontainer.blogspot.com

A recent obsession with mountain bikes

I got bored, mid season cyclocross racing last year I was bored, same scene not too motivating yeah. I decided to change things up. Its been a while, in fact Kentucky since I have done some real mountain biking, I declare :-

 2011 is year of the mountain bike.

I got my shit together and decided what I wanted. Something fun, something to take a few small jumps and large bumps, yet something I could race on. A sort of of do all. Yep in most cases that means big compromise, but I think I chose a generally fun bike setup at the expense of pure speed, but FUN which is what mountain biking should be about. Ordered some stuff up and about mid Jan,

Lets build a bike
Joy, Joy, happy joy... here she is. A new MTB frame, soon to be lovely and dirty.

Add some components, wheels and a little elbow grease:-

Add a sweet fork from Fox 150mm of travel

Built up she looks like this. not yet ridden- super fun Trail bike , full suspension 5" of travel front and rear and weighs about 28lbs. Not superlight, not superheavy:-

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A nice mountain trip with bikes
A trip up Syncline with some pals. Lots of climbing and some great descent (of which I dont have photos)

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And a little snow:

I was also fortunate that last week we had a little snow in town. Just about 3" on my regular commute. Why not ride your mountain bike to work, I hear you say, well I did.