A Good Ride

Two weeks ago I started to get flashing lights in my left eye . After putting up with it for a week, I did a little research and became concerned and this can be a sign of retinal detachment....which rapidly leads to blindness in that eye if untreated. So it was not something optional to get checked out.

I got an appointment with the ophthalmologist next day after a 1/2 day at work. Rode this bike to work and appointment:
Note bitchen looking new road wheels courtesy of a trade with Dan.

Ophtho says everything is okay and that I suffer from Posterior Vitreous Detachment which is normal with ,ahem, aging. It is also usually no big deal. I had the rest of the afternoon off, so I figures a celebratory ride was in order.

With my eyes looking like this:

I headed out up Iron Springs in full commuter garb and one water bottle turned off into Granite Basin at the top of the climb on trail 332. From there it was all trails on the CX bike for the next 1.5 hours. 332-349-351-348-347-341, and out Katahn to the street, all streets home.

I had a ball. I didn't know skinny tires could be so fun off road. Don't need suspension because the tires won't really let you go fast enough downhill to need it. Climbing feels weightless compared to the usual huge meats. I think I actually enjoyed riding the narrow tires rigid more than MTB rigid because I really didn't have any choice but to slow down in the nasty bits. The larger volume tires give one unwarranted courage. Don't need disc brakes because you never really need a lot of braking power and the narrow tires wouldn't put it to the ground if you had it anyway.

The only downer was the nasty toe overlap I get from my fender.

On the streets, the narrower tires blow away the larger one's for sure. Nice to get home in a hurry.

Moral: Pretty much all bikes are fun nearly all the time.

PS: I found the limits of the little tires on this weeks road/dirt foray from home, up Copper Basin, to the Prietta overlook and down. I thought the CX bike would be perfect for the road/dirt road combo. It sorta was for the climb; No pack, light wheels and tires, very nice. Descending was another matter. The dirt road portion beat the tar out of me. The visibility and straightish, widish dirt road were too inviting, and I very badly out rode the limits of the tires, bashing over everything, hardly in control, and yes, I was wishing for more brakes. I can't remember the last time I was wishing for a descent to be over!

The moral here is that I lack the self control to slow it down descending if I think I can get away with it. I liked the skinny tires much more on the trail where I was less tempted to let 'er go.

I hope to get some Lunchbox stuff up some time, but no time to blog. Suffice to say that I love it, and am now a Lenz zealot. More info in this thread.