Dawn Patrol

I was up early today, so early that I watched the sun rise over the mountains to the east and climb in sky warming up the cool morning air as I climbed up the mountain. It's been months since I've actually seen the sunrise. Every time I see it I make sure to pause a moment or two to take it in.

At Goldmine (the top of The Woodlot) there were a few centimeters of snow which made the ride oh so entertaining on the frozen icy roots.

Goldmine is the trail that I always use as the barometer of a bike's performance. I use it as the shakedown run for any new bike I get. Todays run down Goldmine solidified my opinion of the Legend MkII. This bike is truly fantastic. It's fast in the rough stuff, corners really well and has a solid pedal platform which makes picking up speed a very simple task. One thing I did notice is that it sits higher in it's travel than the MkI which means less pedal strikes (thumbs up).

There is one section of trail where I've never been able to go completely brakeless until today. I was able to pick a line and stay on the gas with 100% confidence and then lay the bike over in the corners without any issues.

After Goldmine I hit Snakes and Ladders where I've been doing some work recently to fix a broken bridge. Today I rolled up on the section to do some more work only to find that another tree had fallen in the area directly onto the teeter totter. Thankfully Tim and Rob had solidly built the teeter so once I cut the tree off, no repairs were needed. I then got to work framing and gathering rung from the broken ladder bridges. By the time I left today the ladder was fully runged and rideable. I'd put it at 80% fixed and rideable for those that really want to.

I only had time to put two nails in each piece of rung and then I packed up my tools and headed home. Shotgun was in great shape but hadn't quite thawed by the time I made my way down so in spots I was little sideways over frozen roots.

The weather today was amazing and when coupled with a decent ride on a fabulous bike and a productive morning of building, I'd say I was one happy rider at the end of the day.

Legend MkII - Installation Lap

Today I took my Legend MkII for it's first ride. I must say I love the look of this bike.

The build turn out to be rather light.

A little artistic flair

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My ride took me to The Woodlot. I made my way to Karpenter, Blood Donor, B-Line, Bloggy Style and finally Shotgun. Usually the first ride on a bike requires a bunch of tweaking of suspension settings and adjustments, but today I didn't touch a thing. I left all the settings on this bike the same as they were when they were on my Legend MkI and I don't really see myself adjusting anything in the near future.

The MkII rides really well. One thing I really noticed is that on roots and larger square edged hits, I just kept rolling over things and kept my momentum up. I'm not sure how he did it, but Keith made a good bike even better with this 2nd Gen Legend.

One this I should also mention is that people are starting to build again at The Woodlot. Tim is back to work on Karpenter and Lou, Eric, Garrett and ??? fixed the broken bridges on Blood Donor. Seeing this new building took this ride from good to great.

Krazy Karpenter

Blood Donor

Back-up Plans

Today I met up with Ryan late late in the afternoon at The Woodlot to start work on fixing a bridge on Snakes and Ladders that was in pieces from a tree falling on it.

I brought some nails, a hammer and my chainsaw. Once we were at the bridge I went to start up my saw and on my first pull, the starter cord snapped. I let out a BIG F-Bomb!! and then thought of how we could still get some trail work done.

Ryan and I went for a walk to my stash of tools where I have my bush saw. It's a McCulloch Eager Beaver that I inherited. I hadn't started it in over 8 months and had never used it on the trail, but she started without any muss or fuss and Ryan and I were able to dismantle the broken bridge and get the necessary materials for the replacement bridge. My parents always raised me to be prepared for the unexpected and today that preparation paid off.

A before and after summary

We packed up when we ran out of light and rode down to our vehicles a mellow pace because we couldn't really see the trail. It was was nice to be able to get out on the bike, but a little sad that I had to spend the entire time doing repairs to a broken structure.

Hopefully my next ride will involve more riding than work.