The heat just keeps rolling. This time I managed to wait until the slightly cooler hour of 6 to get out on my bike. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I loaded Sophie into the car and headed up to Rothrock. We started at 3-bridges, went up Lonbererger, Tuxedo, and the Ridge. To mix things up a bit we went down the extension and hit Wort and came back down lower Lonberger.
Sitting in the office, thinking of what to ride (um, that’s not really all I did in the office) I pondered a bunch of more exotic ride options, but the truth of the matter is that I’ve been having way too much fun on that route. I’ve never been one to ride the ridge that much. It usually gets incorporated in group rides often enough so I don’t have to do it on my own. But, among the many things I’m trying to work on this year is my technical riding, and the Lonberger-Ridge route gives a pretty nice mix of gnarly technical features and smoother single track so that I can both play in the rocks and spin in up in the flatter sections.
Its always a challenge to make it a little bit farther than the last time without dabbing. Alas, I got hung up on the first rocky up on the Ridge Trail, so this was by no means a record setting ride. But, on the whole I managed to handle the rocks pretty well, and while Wort was humbling as ever, it was at least not frustrating; not once was I compelled to go Buckland on my bike in the middle of the rocks.
I bumped into Roman on the Ridge and we discussed the possibility of heading down to the Fair Hill race this weekend. I’m not too excited as he was the second person to tell me he hated the course, but beggars can’t be choosers and this is the one month when I can try and get a few races in for the year. I suppose having company on the ride and not paying for the entire tank of gas will make up for it a bit.
