Yep. They still ride bikes on Sunday at Dirt Church. Unfortunately, they do a poor job of backblasting about it… let’s catch up, shall we?
Sunday before last, Pullout and I rode a gravel and road lap in a bit of rain at Gravel Church: Round Four. No Profit — he was Climbing to Beat Cancer. Dunno where Jenny Craig was with his badass bike. It was just the two of us. It was intimate… close… almost loving. And we rode bikes, too. Not going to say much more to say about that.
Last week, Pullout was late to the game (I got a “I forgot my damn shoes!” call at quarter ’til eight) and that wasn’t even the beginning of Dirt Church: the Sunday of Great Mishap Edition. Our friend John with the Kona couldn’t make it… got a text at 7 saying he was sick. Haven’t seen him in six weeks due to injury, and we were looking forward to seeing him again. My Jeep started leaking coolant as I pulled into the parking lot. My worn out chainwheel ate my brand new chain for most of the ride, so I bailed early, but not before I watched Profit eat it and take a brake lever to the naughty bits on the rock garden on ‘Setter. An hour later, I got a call from Roper that he hit a tree and maybe he broke a rib? Poor Roper. He’s still basking in the afterglow of New Bike Day and now this happens. Please wish him a speedy recovery.
This Sunday, though, was Old Dude Edition. Two of Roper’s young (40ish) friends who are fast and fit and well-equipped (bike-wise, I mean) returned from last week to kick the asses of a 50-year-old (YHC), a 55-year-old, a 63-year-old (Profit) and a 65-year-old. That’s right, readers: Profit’s not the oldest MTBer we know. His friend Fred is a hell of a guy and a talented rider. Anthony (a customer of Profit’s and our new friend) rode his new bike well, and he and I had a nice chat about bourbon, mostly.
The route: Fendley Station to the Hub, Blueberry down, break in the middle for some old school Morgan Green Trail, and back. Blueberry up, and take the old guys down the Freight Line so they can no longer say they ain’t never done it. (One mile an hour, so no bones were broken.) Blue Jay Way to Moonshine Run, which was a VERY rad deviation for us, since we usually take BJW to the tail of Corksucker Corkscrew. We like Moonshine Run. A lot. Next Sunday plan on seeing that one in the cue sheet. It dropped us into the swoopiest part of Sunsetter, and we returned to the Hub via Bell Return and then punched out.
Seventeen miles of smiles, and even the young guys had fun.
