Rocky Hill Horror Show

So somehow I convinced Sonia to come out to Rocky Hill to ride and check out some sweet singletrack even though both I and another one of her friends told her she would hate it the first time. I'm pretty sure that is what happened.

We went out on Friday so we could get out for an early pre-ride on Saturday. It was effin' hot and super humid!! I had originally planned on doing a short Cat II lap but was stupid and hadn't realized the Cat II and Cat I loop was the same 17.5 mile loop. So off we went, like I thought, Sonia hated all the climbing at the first part, I do believe the line, "I hate all of these stupid rocks on this stupid hill!!!" came out at one point. Then she realized why the course was Rocky Hill : )


Once we got out of the first part of the climbing and into the flatter, more flowy singletrack the riding became fun!! We were cruising along at a pretty good clip, stopping every once in a while. The ride was a great pre-ride. Then the ride started getting a bit long, I was getting some looks from Sonia saying, "How long are we going to ride for?" After a bit more riding I started thinking the same thing... Then we stopped and Sonia asked, "How far in are we?" to which I responded, "about three-quarters of the way," I had no idea...

We kept trucking along, Sonia being a champ, and giving me dirty dirty looks until we got to the spot I knew was getting pretty close to the end. I sent Sonia down the easier trail with another lady while I rode the rest of the trail, good thing, it was significantly different with a lot of sweet, new singletrack. I ended up passing Sonia and other woman on the way down to the finish, I stopped by the turtle pond so the turtles could cheer Sonia up a bit, she was NOT happy with me. But after seeing turtles and having ice cream things were a bit better. We met up with Kyle and Mom for dinner on Saturday, it was great to see them!

Sunday brought on the race, it was warm and a bit muggy. I got a good warm-up in and felt pretty good, the legs were a bit sore from the long-than-expected pre-ride but they felt ok. As I expected, it was a hammerfest up the hills, the singletrack was feeling pretty good until about mile 7, then the legs started going. I eased up a bit but the legs did not come back and I couldn't get the heart rate to drop. No Bueno!! I held a bit easier pace but I was toast. I settled with pacing it in feeling the legs the whole way and trying to enjoy the singletrack. It was a bit of a disappointing end to the season but I learned to check the race course before riding from now on. I got some food after the race, the worst decision I made the whole day. Thankfully, Sonia was there to drive me home. The next 28ish hours after the race were pretty ugly but I'm better now and back to training!!

I ended up 5th overall in the series, not bad for only having five races and forgetting to turn in my Paydirt.

Wisconsin again...

Wednesday brought about some unstable weather. As Dan and I were out looking for morels as ways from home the thunder started rolling. It was coming fast so we B-lined it back to the house. Dan headed on back to Marshfield and I headed into town for my nephew's birthday party/cookout. I got to meet my new nephew at the party and I think he liked me. I didn't get pooped on or puked on and I held the baby so: SUCCESS!! We had a lot of fun, pinata and all.

On Thursday I ventured down to Grandma’s house to make her breakfast and so she could teach me how to make Cinnamon rolls and her legendary oatmeal rolls. It was loads of fun and we had some delicious cinnamon rolls.
Cinnamon Rolls:

Oatmeal Rolls:

After eating one more cinnamon roll than I needed I thought a bike ride would be a good way to burn some of those calories so I headed out to do some climbing. The original plan was to ride down to C, up Rough Rd. to Rustic Rd, down Denzer Rd. and then do another lap. I got to the part where I came down Denzer Rd. and noticed some storm clouds building and I didn’t know if I had time to make it all the way around again so I turned around and rode back up Denzer Rd., what an awesome hill! Then I flew back down and headed on towards home. I got hit with a pretty good downpour going through Denzer and by the time I got home I was pretty much dry again, since I was dry I decided to do some cyclocross laps around the field. Those cyclocross laps were hard but that was some awesome training!! Then I headed out to find a couple more morels, mmmm…

Friday

I had planned with Dan to meet up at Levis do ride some bitchin’ singletrack so I pulled in around 11 to meet up with Dan. It was cold and a bit wet but this made for nearly perfect riding conditions. With the trails a bit tacky and the weather just cool enough to hold of most of the sweating the riding was great. Dan was having a little trouble with his new chain and old worn out cassette so Levis was a little sandier than normal that day. Haha.

I hadn’t ridded a bunch of the singletrack at Levis but the stuff I hadn’t ridden was just as amazing as the trails I had ridden. What a great day of riding!

After a beer, a cinnamon roll and some trash talking with Dan’s friend we headed in to Eau Claire for some food… and a whole lot of beer. We met up with Laura, Dan’s fiancé, for food and then we headed back to the place we are the most familiar with, the Joynt. $3 pitchers of beer mean way more beer than one should consume in one evening... Thanks to our good friend Major for putting us up and taking care of us!

Saturday morning brought about a headache and fuzzy-headedness... After drinking a bunch of coffee and water I headed out to my Grandpa's Birthday party. It was a great time seeing the whole side of the family I don't typicall get to see! Post party I headed on back home with Katie and the new nephew. Then it was time to pack up for the trip back to Houston...

I got a late flight on Sunday so I didn't have to rush to the airport and I could have a little more time home. It paid off, we got to celebrate my, then upcoming Birthday with the most amazing cake ever created by human beings.

The German Chocolate Cake:

I packaged up a bunch of cake and headed to the airport, I got in pretty dang late and was very thankful that my good friend Sonia was there to pick me up!!