HNY - snow ride at the Snip

[Jisch]

HNY to all the folks out there in the ether. I wish the best for each of you in the new year.

I finally got a ride in during this break. Usually the Xmas/NY break allows many opportunities for riding, not so this time around - mostly due to the snow on the ground. And it just won't go away! And we keep getting more!

In any even Slider and I did an excellent, if tiring ride in the snow today. The first part of the ride we were on an inch of icy, crunchy snow - plenty of traction, but also a lot of resistance which made climbing quite the chore. After an hour of riding it started snowing and the conditions changed, though not necessarily for the worse, the snow on the ground softened up a bit and following our on tracks back in was actually not that bad, though staying in your own tire track has its own challenge...

Did he make it? (answer later on)
http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d91/Jisch/DSC05551.jpg

Most of the rest of these are not exactly high motion shots, but you can see the snow pouring down in the latter shots:

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d91/Jisch/DSC05559.jpg

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d91/Jisch/DSC05560.jpg

http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d91/Jisch/DSC05561.jpg

The answer
http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d91/Jisch/DSC05552.jpg
Slider went for the wheelie drop and lost traction...

John

[chqm8]

Wow. Winter wonderland!

Looks like a lot of work pedalling through all that.

At least Sliders wipe out seemed to have a soft landing.

[MtnBkr]

Wow lots of snow..

That must of been HARD to ride in haha nice job!

[Jisch]

The pedaling wasn't all that bad - not a lot of coasting going on - we pretty much had to pedal up and down :D

John

[Slider]

It wasn't as deep as the pix make it seem. We followed some pre-freeze MXer and ATV tracks for a while, but even virgin snow was rideable. The downhills were fun and you could set up big sweeping slides in the turns. Jisch, on bigger tires and a lot heavier bike, was still scooting up the climbs. I had to walk the last few feet of a couple of the steeper ones.

No complaints, though. It was a fine winter ride, especially since the health probs have kept me idle and fattening over the last few months. This was the first real ride I've had in a while.

Slider