Apparently it's getting to be the end of the riding season. I can tell because this is my first mountain bike ride of the week! Last ride was last Saturday. So today, I could have ridden indoors, but I was looking at more than 2 hours, so it didn't sound good to be started doing long trainer rides before winter has even started!
From home, it's a ride through a suburban neighborhood, then past our version of a few McMansions, then into an abandoned quarry. As I turned into the quarry, I saw this lovely trail ornament. It's an abandoned car tire. Once side is still mounted to the rim. But the tire's been turned inside out and trimmed to a very attractive pattern.
I rode the new trails, around and around, trying to get my bearings. On the less-used trails, it was hard at times to pick out the trail from under the leaves. Fortunately, I found my way just fine.
In other places, where the trail is more heavily traveled, it's easy to see the trail, despite all the leaves.
The weather was sort of 50deg and raining. That meant that the rocks were wet rocks. Even when the tires weren't muddy, it could be challenging to maintain good traction. Fortunately, this was a MAF-intensity ride, so I was generally moving pretty slowly.
Of course, when the trail is wet leaves on wet rocks, it doesn't matter how great your tires are - you just don't have any traction. And you can't see most of the rocks.
After a bit, I headed home to finish up on the trainer. By the time I got home, I could still feel my thumbs.But just barely. I did 30 minutes, watching studio 60 on the laptop.
I liked this ride, coming after a long run yesterday in terms of my fitness. But in terms of skill, I didn't have my mojo working at all. I didn't feel smooth and balanced. Only occasionally, when I was in the pine woods did I feel feel relaxed and smooth.
I also noticed that, in many places, I was slower on the bike than I was running these same trails yesterday. I also noticed that I didn't remember lots of the trail from yesterday's run. It funny how different what you notice is. When running, I can easily step over an obstacle that I can't ride over. But when riding, I can easily roll over things that would trip me up.
