August 6 (Afternoon)

Weather warmed up to 31°, and still lots of smoke. It was supposed to rain yesterday and today (with chances of thunder showers), but both days have come and gone with no moisture!

I had a really fun ride home. The trail down into Peterson’s Creek was fun and fast. In fact, the Billy Minor South section going down was maybe a bit too fast as I had a few little scares getting too close to the edge… I keep forgetting to say anything about the two sandy sections. I’ve been consistently making these sections without dabbing or stopping quite a few times in a row now. I think I’ve maybe dabbed once since the last time I mentioned them. It’s been good, learning how to sit back, give the front wheel some freedom to find it’s own track and power through when needed. Nice to see some skill improvement there for sure.

Today, for the first time, I made it down, through and up the 1st section of the creek bank! Normally I go down the bank slowly, with a foot down, then ride through the creek, and then walk up the other side. Today, however, I rode the creek right down (faster than before), which gave me good momentum to make it easily through the creek and then even up the other side! It was pretty sweet. The 2nd half of the bank is much steeper, longer and tougher and I still need to work at making that section (haven’t done it yet to date). I guess I was feeling pretty good, so I attempted the long, straight and steep climb up out of the valley instead of the usual bypass trail. I don’t know, but looking at this hill from a distance I kept thinking “Is it really as bad as I remember it to be?” As I’ve only attempted this climb twice, I figured maybe I was suddenly Superman now or something, so I gave it a whirl. Yep, it still sucks! I made it about half way up before completely bailing… I guess I’ll keep this climb to maybe one attempt per week at the most…

The rest of the trails were good. I made the one section around the fallen tree where I normally dab, so that was another first. I also just about made the down-and-up switchback (which has many rocks jutting out the side) without dabbing, but had to put a foot down at the last section. But, still better than I’ve done yet!

Overall, a really good ride. I had an awesome average speed, and really kicked it up a gear through Juniper’s pipeline section which was a blast. I can’t wait, though, to finally get this bike up on the stand to clean, grease and adjust it! It’s pretty rough right now… Another weekend is here, see you all on Monday!