Where else but Tahoe can one mountain bike downhill and xc, surf, climb rocks, AND have the spectacular backdrop of a massive, clear alpine lake? Ok, so I haven't really researched it, but I can't come up with anything offhand. Tahoe wins!
After a groggy 5AM start to make an early work meeting in Roseville, I was cut loose by noon to enjoy the rest of my day and get a head start on the 3 day weekend. I chowed some leftovers and made a fresh glass of kale-cucumber-carrot-apple-ginger juice in my new juicer. Yum! (here are some recipes I use for juicing inspiration)
First up was Northstar for some practice, since I wanted to get a few runs on Dogbone before the Vista chair closed at 5, and maybe check out Livewire and make sure nothing major has changed. I made an interesting observation on Dogbone: riding rocks clipped in still terrifies me. Figuring I didn't need to swap out pedals to practice since I planned to race Livewire clipped in on Sunday, I had no idea how much it would mess with me not being able to dab a foot or detach from my bike in case I topple over...lesson learned. Add that to riding rocks in general; I've spent such little time at Northstar this summer that I probably should have ridden the rocky trails more. I only took 2 runs through and by the end of the second lap my arms were getting tired and stomach grumbly; the bottom section was quite out of control as I sketchily bounced off boulders and tried not to crash. Yikes! Time to call it.
I headed home and decided to jump in the lake, but as I stood there waves rolled in and crashed on the shore, and my friend Aimee was coming over to surf before watching music on the beach. Wetsuit recently acquired, I bummed a stand up paddle board from Tahoe Eco Sports where I used to work. I forgot how much fun it is to play in the water, taking some spills and catching a few waves; it probably helped that I was on a giant, wide standup paddle board because it seemed easier to stand up than I remembered. The wind gradually died down, waves got smaller, we got cold, and the music started so we got warm and settled in for the last outdoor concert in Kings Beach for the summer.
Saturday was a good day to hang out with Kit since I planned on racing the following 2 days. We decided to climb at Eagle Lake Cliffs, a rad crack climbing area up above Eagle Lake by Emerald Bay. We only did 2 climbs, a couple of times each; the first one was deceivingly sustained, often awkward, and ended with a terrifying off-width that needed a giant #5 cam to protect. Needless to say I didn't lead that one. The second was as fun as the first was awful, though I didn't lead that one either, with a beautiful steep headwall split by a widening hand crack that still was fist jam-able at the top. 2 or 3 laps on that and I'm spent!
Race day for Livewire brought me some crappy-feeling legs, thanks to the 45 minute rock hopping stairstep approach to and from Eagle Lake, whoops. One practice run in and I hung out and snacked till time to warm up, then did an easy lap on Vista Chair and went to the top. Livewire is honestly kind of scary to race because the jumps really aren't built for high speeds (the boys must have it really rough), and you go flying off at funny angles from the steep takeoff lips. I was pedaling my brains out any time my wheels were on the ground, so I must be getting in better shape, because my legs seemed to have enough in them for a good race run. I wasn't sure I could pull it off again, but I won the race for the second year in a row! Off to drink a beer or 2 and celebrate.
At the last minute I decided not to race Dogbone, feeling disgruntled about spending another whole day up at the mountain instead of doing something fun with Kit (who has no interest in watching those smaller races and I don't blame him at all). We hadn't done a big cross country ride in such a long time that it sounded like about time for one of those. Bikes loaded up, we took both cars over to Incline and set up a shuttle at the bottom of Chimney Beach, heading out from the Incline Flume trail on Mt. Rose Highway. Neither of us felt much like climbing thousands of feet so the shuttle seemed like a great idea, and the short section of climbing on Tunnel Creek road to the Flume, and another climb up to the start of Chimney Beach trail, proved to be quite enough. Beautiful weather, not too many people on the trail for Labor Day, and great company put such a big smile on my face! I even cleaned the hard part of the small technical climb on the Flume just below Marlette Lake, only to topple over in surprise just after. Chimney Beach trail was a blast, some parts a bit challenging on a little hardtail, and widened my stupidly big grin at every turn. Stoke-o-meter was high all the way back to the car and down to the beach just down the road where we capped the day with a swim in the lake to wash off all the dust. I needed that so badly!! I brought the camera along for the spectacular Flume Trail but only nabbed one shot of Kit as we were having too much fun to stop. I wore my colorful and comfy Loeka XC kit; we'll have to re-ride that soon and get some more photos!
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| Kit single speeding the Flume |
