Now Begins the Waiting Game

On Saturday I made the trek out to Charlotte, MI to pay a visit to Scott Quiring of Quiring Cycles. http://www.quiringcycles.net/ I met with him to get fitted up for a custom frame. It will be a 29er singlespeed specific frame, titanium, with a brushed finish. Also, it will have Paragon sliders for tensioning the chain. No more EBB (eccentric bottom bracket) for me. The one on my Rig is basically good for 2 things: creaking and slipping.

Scott is a great guy to work with. He measured the Rig, measured my body, and we discussed riding and my riding style. In the end, the overall dimensions for my new bike will end up being close to the Rig, with one notable difference, a steepened head tube. This will address the slow handling issue.

After the fitting stuff, he offered to show me the new trail which was opened in Charlotte just this summer. We got ready and rode down to the park, a short 1 1/2 miles away. I thought it was really cool that he offered to ride this with me.

The trail was very fun. Not a lot of elevation change, but some technical spots and an all-around great flow. It was slow due to Friday's rain and the fact that the trail is brand new. This trail seems like it'll be a blast after more people have ridden it to pack in the tread.

After finishing up, I loaded up and made the drive over to Yankee Springs. I rode there in the spring for the race, and really liked the trail. I was excited to be able to ride it at something less than a race-pace. With the Pontiac Lake XC on Sunday, I wasn't planning on riding hard. Actually riding Yankee probably wasn't the smartest decision to make (20+ offroad miles the day before a race).

Yankee was a blast. It was very dry despite the deluge received on Friday, and even had some sandy spots still. There were a few downed trees I had to lift over. Although not as fast as the race, my pace was still quite quick... quicker than it should've been with a race the next day. But the legs were feeling good and I was having fun. I did stop at a few spots to take in the views. Around 4~5 miles in, there are some large ravines the trail winds around, up, and down. During the race I couldn't fully appreciate the size of the ravines, especially compared to what we have in SE Michigan.

At the end of the day, I had put in 23 miles, had a blast, wore myself out, and ordered up a frame!