Today was the MMBA Annual Meeting and Expo at the MSU Pavilion. From my perspective, the big attraction for most visitors was the swap meet and bike shops with booths of stuff for sale. There was also a silent auction and some seminars and meetings. I volunteered to sit at the MMBA merchandise table in the morning, which involved little more than sitting near the Pavilion entrance and directing visitors toward the event. My presence wasn't really needed, but I suppose I was there just in case.
After lunch, we all came back to ride the other main attraction at the Expo: the pump track. In a matter of a few hours, a small group of men with machines and shovels constructed an indoor pump track. It was a blast. Quinn rode his Trek and Abbey her Chameleon. That green Chameleon makes a pretty good pump track bike, and Abbey and/or her bike attracted the attention of couple of the guys on dirt jump bikes. She even got some personalized instruction on riding the track. I decided to bring the Nickel, which isn't the best pump track bike around for a couple of reasons, but it worked. Cindy rode a few laps on the Chameleon, which seemed to be a pretty good fit for her. Quinn did really well -- he certainly the fastest of the 8 and under crowd. Even Abbey will have to admit that Quinn was quite a bit faster than her, despite the appeal of her green lizard. I think it's all about having the confidence to push hard, and overcoming the fear of going down.
Some pictures of the pump track have been posted: click here to see them. Look closely and you'll find Quinn in several of them and me in one of them.
Although it can be done, a dual suspension bike isn't really first choice hardware for pump tracking. The squishy rear end sucks up leg energy that should be converted into forward motion on each roller. I attempted to offset that by pumping some extra air in my rear shock before the ride, but it was still squishy. Also, even with it as low as it can go, the seat on the Nickel is still high enough that it gets in the way. You really need to be able to bring the rear wheel almost up to your butt for maximum pump track speed. Something like this should work: The Santa Cruz Jackal...
Nonetheless, I think I did alright with the Nickel, despite being the only rider with clipless pedals and dual suspension. I'm pretty sure I was one the fastest in the 40 and over crowd. Of course, pushing as hard as I could around the track, I blew over the top of the north berm twice, and each time went down pretty hard. It was too much fun.
30 January 2011
24 January 2011
Basketball and a Winter Idiot
Q&A are playing basketball on Okemos Community Ed teams again this year. It's a lot of fun and they have really great coaches. They each have one practice a week and a game on Saturday. Games are eight minute quarters with a substitution at four minutes, so every kid gets approximately equal playing time. This year Quinn's age group is playing four on four; I'm not sure why.
They do not officially keep track of score in Quinn's games, I suppose to keep the focus on fun and learning, although some of the kids always think they know the score. The unofficial score this week, according Quinn (he's likes numbers so it's likely that he's right), was 22 to 26, with Quinn's team on the losing end. Quinn's ball handling is getting quite a bit better this year, and he's doing a nice job of grabbing rebounds and quickly following with shots. He took several shots this game, and a couple of them sunk.
Here he's grabbed a lose ball after a missed shot, and is getting ready to take it back to the basket.
Quinn is really good at sticking with his quarry on defense. By the way, those black and yellow things on his feet are his brand new Reezigs. We tried, but they have their own ideas, you know.
This was Abbey's third game of the season. In her age group they are keeping track of score, and the games can be pretty intense. They won their first game quite easily, lost the second game in a really close 22-20, and tied 22-22 in this week's game. They even played 2 minutes of overtime, but the tie remained. Abbey is among the taller of the girls on the court, and has a pretty good shot. I think she made two or three shots this game. Like Quinn, she plays a really tough defense, and is starting to get comfortable with fighting for rebounds under the basket.
Here she's grabbed a rebound and is heading down court.
On the move to receive a pass, we can see her taped fingers. Rebounding can be painful. It's still swollen and turning purple, but she got through her piano lesson tonight without Mrs. Black taking notice.
This is the Winter Idiot. This guy lives in our neighborhood and we see him out bicycling all the time. Can't he figure out that cycling is a seasonal sport? Sunday morning the low here was -9 degrees F! In the afternoon the sun shone and the temperature rose to 10 degrees, so the guy rolls his bike out his back door, flies off his deck through a big snow drift, and pedals down the sledding path through the ditch in front of his house, shouting something about training and riding in the woods and pedaling to the pump track as he raced off down the snow-packed street. Idiot. The pump track is covered in 8 inches of unpacked snow with a hard crusty layer on top. He couldn't ride there even though he tried.
Cindy saw this picture of the idiot and said something that sounded like "dork."
They do not officially keep track of score in Quinn's games, I suppose to keep the focus on fun and learning, although some of the kids always think they know the score. The unofficial score this week, according Quinn (he's likes numbers so it's likely that he's right), was 22 to 26, with Quinn's team on the losing end. Quinn's ball handling is getting quite a bit better this year, and he's doing a nice job of grabbing rebounds and quickly following with shots. He took several shots this game, and a couple of them sunk.
Here he's grabbed a lose ball after a missed shot, and is getting ready to take it back to the basket.
Quinn is really good at sticking with his quarry on defense. By the way, those black and yellow things on his feet are his brand new Reezigs. We tried, but they have their own ideas, you know.
This was Abbey's third game of the season. In her age group they are keeping track of score, and the games can be pretty intense. They won their first game quite easily, lost the second game in a really close 22-20, and tied 22-22 in this week's game. They even played 2 minutes of overtime, but the tie remained. Abbey is among the taller of the girls on the court, and has a pretty good shot. I think she made two or three shots this game. Like Quinn, she plays a really tough defense, and is starting to get comfortable with fighting for rebounds under the basket.
Here she's grabbed a rebound and is heading down court.
On the move to receive a pass, we can see her taped fingers. Rebounding can be painful. It's still swollen and turning purple, but she got through her piano lesson tonight without Mrs. Black taking notice.
This is the Winter Idiot. This guy lives in our neighborhood and we see him out bicycling all the time. Can't he figure out that cycling is a seasonal sport? Sunday morning the low here was -9 degrees F! In the afternoon the sun shone and the temperature rose to 10 degrees, so the guy rolls his bike out his back door, flies off his deck through a big snow drift, and pedals down the sledding path through the ditch in front of his house, shouting something about training and riding in the woods and pedaling to the pump track as he raced off down the snow-packed street. Idiot. The pump track is covered in 8 inches of unpacked snow with a hard crusty layer on top. He couldn't ride there even though he tried.
Cindy saw this picture of the idiot and said something that sounded like "dork."
16 January 2011
The Chaos and Tranquility of Winter
Chaos usually dominates. Especially when we travel to Kansas for Christmas and Q&A's birthdays. Sometimes in the midst of all the chaos, we find some tranquility, usually associated with snow or sleep. Chaos can be at once social, temporal, visual, and auditory. Tranquility can show up anywhere in the mix. The kids and Grandpa Nick often seek tranquility painting houses or landscapes in the train room in his basement.
Recent tradition on trips to Kansas has been dinner with Cindy's parents and a semi-quiet evening opening a few gifts Christmas Eve. Christmas morning the kids usually open a few more gifts before heading out to Grandpa and Grandma Nick and Bonnie's for the day.
Here's Quinn on Christmans morning in his skulls and crossbones.
With a day or two respite from all the Christmas gatherings and festivities, it's time to celebrate a couple of birthdays. We split the difference and had a party on December 29th.
Abbey happy with sock monkey hat and moon chair.
It's traditional that we visit the Sedgwick County Zoo while we're in Kansas for the holidays. This time we went with a group of seventeen, if my count is correct. It was a beautiful day to be outside. See the blue sky?
Our return trip to Michigan was mostly uneventful. We had sun and a tailwind most of the drive and nobody stole any of our stuff this time. It was interesting to note that within half an hour of crossing the Indiana-Michigan line, the sky became cloudy and snow began to fall.
Now we're back to the usual post-holiday mix of work and school, basketball and music lessons, running and bicycling, and paying the bills.
This winter I've been getting in one good snow ride each weekend. Last weekend, Amos and I went to Anderson Park. When it's just the two of us at the park, I don't feel too bad about letting him run leashless, although on that trip we shared the park with one other cyclist and his big fluffy dog. The dogs were civil. Amos is getting really good about returning to my side when I call, and he so loves to run the trails. There was only a little snow, and it was light and fluffy with hard frozen ground underneath. The riding was not difficult, but a little slippery. In this I find tranquility of the mental or spiritual sort, although with a substantially elevated heart rate, my body finds it less tranquil.
It's hard to imagine getting by without a mini-van. The Nickel and the dog and gear all fit inside. Visual chaos.
The following day, Amos and I took Quinn out for a neighborhood run-and-ride in the snow. We had such a good time -- I wish I'd had a camera. We probably ran only four miles, but with stops it took us more than hour. First we stopped at the local sledding hill and Quinn rode his bike down the hill a few times. After that, as we continued our ride, Quinn worked on getting up speed and grabbing his rear brake, spinning 180s on the snow pack (he was using flat pedals, not clips). Finally, stopping at the school where the kids play on mounds of snow pushed up from the parking lot, Quinn worked on riding his bike up and down the icy mounds. It was a crazy good time and nobody even got hurt. Quinn said it was the "best run-and-ride ever!"
Yesterday was another day of big fun in the snow. Cindy had the day off, so she took Q&A to Abbey's basketball game at 9 a.m. I left about the same time to go meet a group of MMBA guys at Anderson Park. I wish I'd seen Abbey's game: her team lost 22 to 20, in a really tight game with other team scoring the winning points in just the last few seconds, but my ride at Anderson was interesting; I won't go into too many details here, but with six inches of new snow on the ground it was very challenging. The snow hides slippery roots, any corner is precarious, and any climb presents a traction challenge. It was an aerobic workout at the bottom of the gear range. There were four other riders and three left after the first 1.6 mile loop. One of the riders who left early was on a single-speed 29er, and despite his big hoops his 32-17 gearing was just too tall for the conditions. The other two riders were probably hindered by their slightly narrower less aggressive tires. I attribute some of my advantage to my tires: Very lightly used, aggressive tread, with lots of sharp knobs, and running at only 20 psi. The other evident advantage I had was aerobic fitness.
After the ride, I changed into dry clothes in the car and met Quinn at Burchfield Park for an afternoon cub scout "Polar Bear" outing, involving cross-country skiing and sledding. We rented some boots, skis, and poles for Quinn at the park and spent almost 2 hours skiing groomed trails along the Grand River. These are some of the same trails the MMBA maintains for bicycling during the summer, but are officially closed to bikes once the first snow falls. I'm really bummed that I left the camera in the car for this. Quinn did very well on the cross-country skis, and he really loved it. We will definitely have to do that again and bring the girls.
After the skiing, we swapped ski boots for snow boots and trudged over to the sledding hill. We brought one of our sleds, but the park rents tubes that were even more fun. The hill was icy and fast, at (I'm guessing, here) about 100 vertical feet and maybe 100 yards long. I don't know how many times Quinn (and I) slid down that hill and trudged back to the top (sometimes I pulled him up on the tube), but we were really tired by the time the cloudy sky grew dark. I was pleased that Quinn asked several times if we could go back and do more cross country skiing. If the sledding was chaos, the skiing was tranquility.
Packing the gear into the van after another day in the snow.
The boy in the office. Chaos.
Recent tradition on trips to Kansas has been dinner with Cindy's parents and a semi-quiet evening opening a few gifts Christmas Eve. Christmas morning the kids usually open a few more gifts before heading out to Grandpa and Grandma Nick and Bonnie's for the day.
Here's Quinn on Christmans morning in his skulls and crossbones.
With a day or two respite from all the Christmas gatherings and festivities, it's time to celebrate a couple of birthdays. We split the difference and had a party on December 29th.
Abbey happy with sock monkey hat and moon chair.
It's traditional that we visit the Sedgwick County Zoo while we're in Kansas for the holidays. This time we went with a group of seventeen, if my count is correct. It was a beautiful day to be outside. See the blue sky?
Our return trip to Michigan was mostly uneventful. We had sun and a tailwind most of the drive and nobody stole any of our stuff this time. It was interesting to note that within half an hour of crossing the Indiana-Michigan line, the sky became cloudy and snow began to fall.
Now we're back to the usual post-holiday mix of work and school, basketball and music lessons, running and bicycling, and paying the bills.
This winter I've been getting in one good snow ride each weekend. Last weekend, Amos and I went to Anderson Park. When it's just the two of us at the park, I don't feel too bad about letting him run leashless, although on that trip we shared the park with one other cyclist and his big fluffy dog. The dogs were civil. Amos is getting really good about returning to my side when I call, and he so loves to run the trails. There was only a little snow, and it was light and fluffy with hard frozen ground underneath. The riding was not difficult, but a little slippery. In this I find tranquility of the mental or spiritual sort, although with a substantially elevated heart rate, my body finds it less tranquil.
It's hard to imagine getting by without a mini-van. The Nickel and the dog and gear all fit inside. Visual chaos.
The following day, Amos and I took Quinn out for a neighborhood run-and-ride in the snow. We had such a good time -- I wish I'd had a camera. We probably ran only four miles, but with stops it took us more than hour. First we stopped at the local sledding hill and Quinn rode his bike down the hill a few times. After that, as we continued our ride, Quinn worked on getting up speed and grabbing his rear brake, spinning 180s on the snow pack (he was using flat pedals, not clips). Finally, stopping at the school where the kids play on mounds of snow pushed up from the parking lot, Quinn worked on riding his bike up and down the icy mounds. It was a crazy good time and nobody even got hurt. Quinn said it was the "best run-and-ride ever!"
Yesterday was another day of big fun in the snow. Cindy had the day off, so she took Q&A to Abbey's basketball game at 9 a.m. I left about the same time to go meet a group of MMBA guys at Anderson Park. I wish I'd seen Abbey's game: her team lost 22 to 20, in a really tight game with other team scoring the winning points in just the last few seconds, but my ride at Anderson was interesting; I won't go into too many details here, but with six inches of new snow on the ground it was very challenging. The snow hides slippery roots, any corner is precarious, and any climb presents a traction challenge. It was an aerobic workout at the bottom of the gear range. There were four other riders and three left after the first 1.6 mile loop. One of the riders who left early was on a single-speed 29er, and despite his big hoops his 32-17 gearing was just too tall for the conditions. The other two riders were probably hindered by their slightly narrower less aggressive tires. I attribute some of my advantage to my tires: Very lightly used, aggressive tread, with lots of sharp knobs, and running at only 20 psi. The other evident advantage I had was aerobic fitness.
After the ride, I changed into dry clothes in the car and met Quinn at Burchfield Park for an afternoon cub scout "Polar Bear" outing, involving cross-country skiing and sledding. We rented some boots, skis, and poles for Quinn at the park and spent almost 2 hours skiing groomed trails along the Grand River. These are some of the same trails the MMBA maintains for bicycling during the summer, but are officially closed to bikes once the first snow falls. I'm really bummed that I left the camera in the car for this. Quinn did very well on the cross-country skis, and he really loved it. We will definitely have to do that again and bring the girls.
After the skiing, we swapped ski boots for snow boots and trudged over to the sledding hill. We brought one of our sleds, but the park rents tubes that were even more fun. The hill was icy and fast, at (I'm guessing, here) about 100 vertical feet and maybe 100 yards long. I don't know how many times Quinn (and I) slid down that hill and trudged back to the top (sometimes I pulled him up on the tube), but we were really tired by the time the cloudy sky grew dark. I was pleased that Quinn asked several times if we could go back and do more cross country skiing. If the sledding was chaos, the skiing was tranquility.
Packing the gear into the van after another day in the snow.
The boy in the office. Chaos.
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