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Nassahegan - 9/1/08

bvibert

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Did a two stage ride today with Greg, Mr.Evil and I meeting up at 7:00 to do a fast paced loop before heading back to the lot at 8:30ish to meet up with the rest of the riders for a more mellow paced ride.

At a few minutes after 7 we headed into the cemetery twisties at a good pace, only stopping a few times. Apparently Greg went OTB early on and Tim fell off a bridge after he got off to the side a little and one of the planks fell off. Luckily the bridge was over an area that's normally dry and today was no exception. I had my share of mishaps, but nothing as dramatic, though I did narrowly miss taking a stem top cap my boys at one point. From there we headed up the climb where we all made it about the same spot before forward progress stopped. We continued on, but took the trail heading East towards the Devil's Kitchen instead of doing the standard loop. The original plan was to head over and do all of the Devil's Kitchen from the top. Unfortunately we were too short on time when we got over there so we decided to head to the long, fast, gradual down hill, until we remembered the trail that cut over into the middle of the kitchen. After some deliberation we decided to hit it and I don't think anyone was disappointed. It was a first time down it for all of us, I had climbed up it once with Jeff (walked mostly). It was much more ride-able than I anticipated, especially for Tim, though Greg and I were able to ride a lot of it too.

Once through the kitchen we high tailed it down the DT back to the lot to meet up with the others, getting there only a few minutes after 8:30. Powhunter (Steve), severine (Carrie), and gmcunni (Gary) were there and waiting for us. We took a short break to re-fuel and then headed back out. gmcunni had never been to Nass before so we planned on giving him a nice tour. First up was the warm-up twisties, which were pretty uneventful. I hung in the back with Carrie so I didn't see how Gary was doing, but at one of the stops I learned that he was hanging in there with Greg really well and seemed to be enjoying himself. Carrie has been down with bruised ribs for a bit now, so she was having a bit of trouble with her legs and confidence, she seems to be doing much better with the clipless though. So we hung in the back. The only thing of note in the warm-ups was the series of bridges over the swampy area, I was too far back to see who made them, but on my second attempt I was able to finally make it up onto and over the first one, which was a goal of mine. :D I got caught up on the last one, but now I know I can do them all so it's just a matter of tying them all together.

After the warm-up twisties we headed across the street to the section south of scoville. Normally Carrie and I don't do the section of newer ST that goes off to the left towards the beginning. It's a bit more technical through there and some stuff got her hung up, but she made it without any major problems and seemed to enjoy the additional challenge. Once back onto the main stretch things went well, with out incident that I know of, the group seemed to be picking up the pace a bit. Carrie tried and made the little dip in the trail just after the last of the muddy sections for the first time, she also rode the knotted log without pause which was impressive.

We crossed e. chippens and headed to the big intersection where we sessioned the little rock drop a bit before hitting up b-street. The plan was to ride what I refer to as the Red loop, not because of red blazes, but because it's the loop that Tim's buddy, Red, broke his ribs on. The loop starts off on B-street and then heads over to one of the blue trails and doubles back towards to big intersection. We played on the large roller right at the beginning of b-street a bit, I was impressed that Gary rode it from the top on the looker's right a couple of times. I made on attempt at riding back up it and almost had it, but got hung up in about the same spot that Tim did right before me. Greg rolled it almost effortlessly. Steve took a more straight approach, which looked at first like it might pay off, but he got stopped short and almost fell backwards down the face. Gary attempted the climb as well, I think he went a bit too far to the left though and got caught up. The group gathered again shortly at the first cut over to the main trail while waiting for Carrie and I to catch up. This was the last time we would see them in the woods this day as shortly after Carrie expertly caught a stick in her chain and managed to rip the derailleur clean off, twisting the cage in the process. :(

BentDer.jpg


It was kind of a freak thing, but it does happen. Several minutes later we were on our way with Carrie's newly converted SS bike. The group was long gone, we rode on for a bit, hoping that they were waiting for us down the trail somewhere, but they must have gotten sick of waiting. I finally got a hold of Greg on the cell and let him know that we were done and heading back.

Carrie was able to ride her SS back to the car without too much trouble. While we were getting situated at the lot Steve came riding in with a severely bent front wheel. I'm not sure what exactly happened, but he was missing at least on spoke and several others were bent. I guess Nass was hungry today. :eek: The rest of the group wasn't too far behind him, they had finished the loop and headed back on the blue trail to the lot. We shot the poo for a few minutes and then everyone headed on their way.

All in all a good day to be riding, the weather was beautiful. I'm glad I got out, but I could have done without the mechanical failure, mostly because I wanted to finish the loop and get the extra riding in.
 

severine

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I could have done without breaking my bike today - I wanted to ride more, too!

I felt extremely slow compared to everyone else. Part of the problem was I had my seat too low again in the warm-up twisties and that was killing my quads. I had lowered it when I first converted to clipless, but it wasn't doing me any favors. After adjusting, I felt much better.

The new technical stuff kicked my butt a bit but I enjoyed it. I did some old stunts that I skipped last time due to the clipless (doing some better than ever) and tried some new stuff that went well. Still, I was slower than everyone else and felt like the biggest newb of all. :oops: But I did my best and I was having fun - that's all that matters.

Aside from destroying my derailleur, it was a decent day. First time on the bike in a little over a week. Beautiful day. Great company. Got some good advice from Tim. Saw a little bit of new stuff. Not bad at all. :D
 

MR. evil

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Apparently Greg went OTB early on and Tim fell off a bridge after he got off to the side a little and one of the planks fell off. Luckily the bridge was over an area that's normally dry and today was no exception. I had my share of mishaps, but nothing as dramatic, though I did narrowly miss taking a stem top cap my boys at one point. From there we headed up the climb where we all made it about the same spot before forward progress stopped. We continued on, but took the trail heading East towards the Devil's Kitchen instead of doing the standard loop. The original plan was to head over and do all of the Devil's Kitchen from the top. Unfortunately we were too short on time when we got over there so we decided to head to the long, fast, gradual down hill, until we remembered the trail that cut over into the middle of the kitchen. After some deliberation we decided to hit it and I don't think anyone was disappointed. It was a first time down it for all of us, I had climbed up it once with Jeff (walked mostly). It was much more ride-able than I anticipated, especially for Tim, though Greg and I were able to ride a lot of it too.
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I didn’t see Greg OTB until much latter on in Devils Kitchen, but falling off that bridge was something I could have done without. I pretty much landed on my feet and then my ass. If I was wearing clipless I would have been toast. But that fall sure got the adrenaline going for the next 30 minutes or so. Devil’s Kitchen was Radical. I had a blast on some of those DH’s. There were only a couple of areas that I got held up on, but with a few more runs there I am sure I could clean it. Next time I want to shoot some video of us trying that area. No one could possibly under stand just how insane it is without seeing it.


The only thing of note in the warm-ups was the series of bridges over the swampy area, I was too far back to see who made them, but on my second attempt I was able to finally make it up onto and over the first one, which was a goal of mine. :D I got caught up on the last one, but now I know I can do them all so it's just a matter of tying them all together.
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I think you and I were the only ones to try the bridges in the warm up area. I made it up onto the first bridge and briefly had to touch a foot down, then cleared the remainder. I was really PO’d. If we didn’t have such a large group I would have tried again.


We crossed e. chippens and headed to the big intersection where we sessioned the little rock drop a bit before hitting up b-street. The plan was to ride what I refer to as the Red loop, not because of red blazes, but because it's the loop that Tim's buddy, Red, broke his ribs on. The loop starts off on B-street and then heads over to one of the blue trails and doubles back towards to big intersection. We played on the large roller right at the beginning of b-street a bit, I was impressed that Gary rode it from the top on the looker's right a couple of times. I made on attempt at riding back up it and almost had it, but got hung up in about the same spot that Tim did right before me. Greg rolled it almost effortlessly. Steve took a more straight approach, which looked at first like it might pay off, but he got stopped short and almost fell backwards down the face.
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I was standing on top when Steve made his run up the face. He went straight up the middle and rode right into the face of one of the steps. It stopped him cold and even knocked him back several feet. Thinking about it, that could have been the beginning of the end for his front tire.

Gary also did great. He hung right with us the entire time. On the last leg after we lost you guys and Steve parted ways, we kept a pretty good pace and he was right on my but the entire time. I managed to ride down the easy line on Red’s rock to the left. I also cleaned the ensuing climb and all of the rocky fun-ness that followed. Even after my fall on the first bridge I managed to make it across that last bridge on the blue trail right before the parking lot. Though it took two tries.

BTW – we didn’t take off on you two. We stopped at a trail intersection and waited for about 5 plus minutes, then tried calling.
 

Greg

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Really great ride. Brian summed up the first leg pretty well, but I didn't OTB in the cemetery twisties, but rather on the way to the Kitchen. Devil's Kitchen is pretty intense and we probably only rode half or less of it. I hope to ride more of it next time.

After meeting up with the rest of the group, I took the lead through the warm-up. I went at a moderate pace and noticed Gary had no trouble keeping up so I picked up the pace a little. Nice job to the guys that attempted the bridges. I guess those are next on my list.

After crossing Scoville, I continued to lead it. Again, I noticed Gary and Steve alternating not far behind me. At one point, Steve was right on my tail so I pegged the pace a bit more. Crossed E. Chippens and sessioned a bit on the rocks at the merge as well as on the B-street ledge. HUGE props to Gary for taking that drop on his first ride out here. How long did it take Jeff? :razz: ;)

We then headed deeper into Session Woods and waited at the merge for the others. Soon Steve arrived wrecking just up the trail, apparently his second crash within minutes. The first wiped out a spoke and made riding his bike a questionable endeavor. He hit 69 back. After hearing of Carrie's derailleur destruction, we headed back towards the blue trail.

I was running short on time so I sorta pinned it, not at all worrying at that point whether Gary could keep up since he already proved he could. He did really well on the last and probably the most technical section of the ride. Overall, I was very impressed with his riding coming off a recent injury and being someone new to MTB. I would ride with him anytime. I hope you enjoyed your Nassahegan introduction, Gary!

So, the full ride was almost 9.2 miles with the second leg being 4.3. Here's the Crankfire track record and map. Definitely an excellent morning to rip up Nass. Could have done with out the mechanicals, but oh well, that's part of the game.
 

o3jeff

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Glad all of you got out and had a good ride. Wish I could of made it out there. Hopefully by next weekend I will be back out pedaling. The pain/bruising is very slowly starting to subside so I will continue taking it easy this week.

I also should be picking my bike up on Wednesday which will be nice to get back on and try out the rebuilt fork and I also received a new seat last week so want to try that out too.
 

gmcunni

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Great ride this morning. Greg/Brian/Steve, good to see you again. Tim/Carrie, nice to meet you today.

Thanks for the tour of Nass. I don't think I’ve ridden anywhere so twisty and turny before but it was a lot of fun.

First half of the ride was a complete blur to me; I had no idea where we were going. I was just trying keep up with whoever was in front of me and get out of the way of whoever was behind me when I stumbled. I got more comfortable in second half of the ride but still had no idea where we were going!

Only downside to Nass is the hour ride each way for me, but I’ll definitely be back up there a few more times before the MTB season ends (when ski season starts :) )

Carrie/Steve, too bad about the mechanical difficulties. Hopefully repairs will be quick (and inexpensive) and you get going again soon.
 

MR. evil

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!

Only downside to Nass is the hour ride each way for me, but I’ll definitely be back up there a few more times before the MTB season ends (when ski season starts :) )
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Well the next time you come to Nass you will just have to do a longer ride so you can justify the drive :razz:
 

Greg

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First half of the ride was a complete blur to me; I had no idea where we were going. I was just trying keep up with whoever was in front of me and get out of the way of whoever was behind me when I stumbled. I got more comfortable in second half of the ride but still had no idea where we were going!

Nass can be very confusing. It took me a lot of time studying the tracks/maps on Crankfire, buying a GPS, and just riding there a lot to get a handle on it. I feel comfortable getting around now on basically any of the trails accessible from Lamson corner. Again, take a look at the map here. that should give you a pretty good visual on just how all over the place we were. :lol: FYI - the second half of the ride is that funky looking figure 8 in the SW corner of the map.
 

MRGisevil

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Kinda bummed I missed this. I told Tim Sunday I was thinking it'd be cool to show up for 8:30 and before I knew it he was up and out for the 7:00 ride, which I was too damned tired to wake and shake for. Nice of him to let me sleep in though, it was quite refreshing :)

Glad all you kids had a good time.
 

powhunter

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Nice riding with y'all......Thanks for showing me some new stuff!!! Replaced and tightened some spokes after the ride (was supposed to ride in the aft with JP) but my front wheel was too bent.....gonna bring it to the shop and see what they can do....if not dish out some $$$$$ for a new one.........At least ya dont have to pay for lift tickets right??? Im hoping to get 2 more months out of this bike, then a MAJOR upgrade


steve
 

bvibert

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I think you and I were the only ones to try the bridges in the warm up area. I made it up onto the first bridge and briefly had to touch a foot down, then cleared the remainder. I was really PO’d. If we didn’t have such a large group I would have tried again.

I was under the impression that others tried them too, I guess not. It was very rewarding to finally get that one out of the way. :D
 

bvibert

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Kinda bummed I missed this. I told Tim Sunday I was thinking it'd be cool to show up for 8:30 and before I knew it he was up and out for the 7:00 ride, which I was too damned tired to wake and shake for. Nice of him to let me sleep in though, it was quite refreshing :)

Glad all you kids had a good time.

Tim told us he made you stay home so you could have lunch ready when he got back, is that not true?

Nice riding with y'all......Thanks for showing me some new stuff!!! Replaced and tightened some spokes after the ride (was supposed to ride in the aft with JP) but my front wheel was too bent.....gonna bring it to the shop and see what they can do....if not dish out some $$$$$ for a new one.........At least ya dont have to pay for lift tickets right??? Im hoping to get 2 more months out of this bike, then a MAJOR upgrade


steve

Good to ride with you again Steve! Bummer about the wheel, hopefully the shop can straighten it out for you. It would suck to have to buy a new wheel for a bike you plan on getting rid of soon. Do you have anything in the mind for this major upgrade?
 

Greg

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Kinda bummed I missed this.

Yeah yeah yeah. :roll: Even that big crybaby Tim pulled his lazy ass out of bed and made this ride (and was there early to boot!), for his third day of riding in a row. Gotta give him props for that!
 

awf170

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What are these sketchy bridges you guys are always have trouble? Like this?

phpThumb.php


Because there is no way in hell I would try that.
 

bvibert

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What are these sketchy bridges you guys are always have trouble? Like this?

phpThumb.php


Because there is no way in hell I would try that.

No, not like that. I wouldn't try that bridge either.

I don't think I ever said they were sketchy... Not the ones that I've hit anyway.
 

Greg

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What are these sketchy bridges you guys are always have trouble? Like this?

phpThumb.php


Because there is no way in hell I would try that.

No. That's a log crossing. They're actual bridges. Some are solid and well built with lumber and some semblance of actual carpentry skills. Others are built of of 3 or 4" diameter logs, or pallets and whatnot. The one Tim wrecked on is getting beat. It's basically a log with 10-14" boards nailed onto it. Some of those boards are popping off.
 

awf170

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I don't think I ever said they were sketchy... Not the ones that I've hit anyway.

But most people walk them, and some people, like Tim, fall off. So they must be somewhat sketchy. So are they like a foot wide?

I'm terrible at bridges. I actually came about an inch of away from falling of a 3' wide one the other day. :dunce:

Edit:

No. That's a log crossing. They're actual bridges. Some are solid and well built with lumber and some semblance of actual carpentry skills. Others are built of of 3 or 4" diameter logs, or pallets and whatnot. The one Tim wrecked on is getting beat. It's basically a log with 10-14" boards nailed onto it. Some of those boards are popping off.

Oh I see. That would be sketchy for me. Sounds really fun though since we have no skinny bridges at all in Lynn woods. NEMBA replaced all of them with rock solid 3' wide bridges and the ranger destroyed all other obstacles.
 

bvibert

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What are these sketchy bridges you guys are always have trouble? Like this?

phpThumb.php


Because there is no way in hell I would try that.

Stuff more like this:
phpThumb.php

and this:
phpThumb.php

Though I'm not sure where either of those two bridges are, they're more representative of what we're talking about.

ETA, the one that Tim fell off of was much narrower though, and sketchier in construction.
 

Greg

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Here's the one of the well-built bridges on the north loop right before crossing 69:

phpThumb.php


It's not as wide as it looks in that pic, probably about 18" wide. It's short, but if you wreck, the area around it is not that forgiving. Also, it's right at the bottom of a steep washed out downhill. You need to turn slightly onto it, and there's a small rock to climb right beyond it. It's nothing to me now, but it was a major mindf@(k when I first started riding it.
 
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