Paleo Vélo

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Desert camping in the winter is spectacular, and Anza Borrego Desert State Park is one of the only places I have found in the state where you can camp wherever you want and even have a little space to yourself. As the sun sets on the campsite, it’s almost quiet enough to hear your heart beat.  And the canopy of stars at night makes me feel like Bowman from “2001: A Space Odyssey.”

At one level, riding in the park is nothing too exciting.  All singletrack is off limits to bikes, restricting you to a bunch of sandy dirt road slogs. But the scenery more than makes up for it:

(Photo by Kreechan)

(Photo by Rob)

(Photo by Rob)

(Photo by Rob)

That’s what they ought to call this MASSIVE lower cup that was installed to allow for a tapered steerer on my Pivot frame:

In terms of bling, it’s a bit like getting a couple of gold caps for your bike’s two front teeth.

And here’s the whole thing, fresh with new 120mm Talus fork:

What an improvement from the old Reba that was on there!

To paraphrase Kurt Harris, unlike white flour and sugar, no society on earth ever grew fat and acquired the diseases of civilization from the introduction of the russet potato.  Since adding them back in to my diet, I have a lot more energy for hiking and biking, and I haven’t gained an ounce.

Grass fed lamb, broiled with a little rosemary.  Chard sauteed in bacon ends. And good old russet potatoes smothered in pasture butter.

Times were when riding your bike through the woods to clear your head out was enough. But these days it appears that if you aren’t getting shocked with a cattle prod as you exercise, you just aren’t extreme enough.

I do understand the need to take yourself out of yourself and enter into a “flow state.”  That’s part of what I like about long road rides and challenging MTB rides. But fire, barbed wire, and electric shocks?  That’s some masochistic shit.

From marathons to mud running
By Lucy Townsend BBC News Magazine

Then there are those who go a stage further. By day Lloyd Smith is a clean-cut professional, but come the weekend and he can be found covered in mud, cycling down mountains and running through barbed wire and broken glass. While some go to the gym, Smith takes part in Tough Guy, dubbed “the safest most dangerous event in the world”.

“There’s underwater tunnelling where you have to completely submerge yourself in muddy water to swim through a small, dark tunnel,” says the 32-year-old from Stratford-upon-Avon. “Then there’s the suspended electric wires so you get electric shocks as you run. Then it’s the broken glass, mud pools and fire to run through.”

All this is done in the middle of winter, with this year’s event taking place at the end of January.

“When you work hard and do long hours time becomes very precious, ” adds Smith. “When you go out and do exercise you really try to get the most from it.”

Will Dean echoes this view. Two years ago he launched his Tough Mudder event, another gruelling assault course with the strapline, “probably the toughest event on the planet”. It includes jumping into a skip filled with fluorescent green ice, dragging a log through mud and again, the electric shocks.

Full article here.

But maybe it was just the sunset as seen from the top of McGinty.

Starting just north of Phoenix, and heading nearly 80 miles north, this trail is nothing short of sublime. I was only able to cover the lower half of it on a recent trip to Arizona, but I will be back. With the exception of the 6 miles closest to Phoenix, there are no junk miles on this trail. It’s a surprisingly slow-going and taxing trail given how buff it looks, but the desert scenery more than makes up for it.

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