Patapsco. Yeah, that was fun.

I finally got to ride Patapsco state park. I’d heard a lot about it and its one of the places I’ve really wanted to get to. I evan ordered a map a year ago with some others from DNR but its so big I thought I’d wait until someone could show me around.

Punga from the MORE site led the ride. I’m always curious about peoples usernames that they pick. I knew punga was a name for a large cat in some language. I asked him what Punga meant. "Its my last name" was his response. Well thats boring!

My buddy Crashmasta (Dave) made it to this one. The bastard had the nerve to bring his SS. Dave really irks me. He started about the same time biking as me. Before my accident last year he was just a little better than me. Now he’s totally outta my league. Its good in that it makes me work harder at getting better.

The trails out there were fun as shit. Lots of rocks and roots. Not as many rocks as the places around Frederick but enough to keep it fun. The place is also set up with a lot of logs stunts. Now that I think about it, its good that I waited until now to go out there. If I’d tried the place with less fitness or technical ability it wouldn’t have been as much fun. I didn’t try every stunt we came across. I still got the thing in the back of my head about injuring my self like with the knee. I’m not afraid of any pain, just the consequences. I still think about how 1 little failed switchback at Elizabeths Furnace caused me all those months of grief.

I had my normal spot bringing the rear up. I was the slowest but not by a whole lot. Not where I was worrying about holding the group up anyway.

We started out with 10 people. After an hour we lost 3, 2 to mechanicals and 1 who wasn’t in shape for it. I contemplated leaving out with them, but I’m glad I stuck it out. Actually I was watching the guy Pat who was keeping me company in the back. If he had bailed with the others I was going also. He stayed. I knew if he could hang than I could too. I enjoyed talking to him and getting some tips about long races. He’d did the wild101 (DNF but hey that’s just an experience maker) and is thinking about that and the sm100 this year.

After the 3 left at the beginning, we had only 1 mechanical issue. For a ride that went that long and on this type of terrain that was freak’n amazing. The one mechanical was just an ordinary flat. No broken chain, derailers or frames. I did have issues with my granny gear. I rarely ever use the small chainring. I like to think I’m practicing for a SS. Anyways, as the day wore on the granny started getting use. Under load it was making a nasty noise. I thought it was the chain rubbing on front derailer cause it wasn’t aligned right. It didn’t effect the way the bike worked it was just embarrassing. Not only was it noisy, but when the others heard it they knew I was in granny. That just what I want. To advertise to everyone that I’m tired and using my granny. I found out Sunday that it wasn’t the chain rubbing the front-d, but the tire. I’m running a 2.3" on the back right now, I’m gonna switch back to a 2.2" and hope that fixes it.

Overall a great day. My only complaint with the place is the ascent to descent ratio. I swear it felt like I was doing more climbing than going down. I know, just my imagination. I can’t wait to go back but I’ve gotta start thinking about getting base miles in. We got in 19.5 miles, and I was just about at my limit.

Screw the base. If your going out there let me know.

seeya