Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Roxbury RAW



I always ride the dirt roads of Roxbury on the weekends, this was a first hitting it in the late afternoon on Tuesday.  The threat of thunder and lightning was imminent but it never happened.


Tried some new stuff.  At the advice of Stephen Badger, the Masters CAT1 road racer and resident of Roxbury who turned me onto riding here in the first place suggested that I ride the closed off (to cars) section of Rocky Mountain Road down to River Road.  It was an awesome descent and look forward to trying it in the other direction.


Then we hit the singletrack off of Minors Bridge, another first.  It was greasy in the woods and the climbing was hard but not really hike-a-bike.  I don't have a granny gear and I was able to clean just about all the climbs.  There is a lot more singletrack to explore in there but this evening was not the time.  We had only two hours of daylight to ride as much gravel as possible.  The other new thing for me riding here is doing so on my mountain bike, granted I think it takes out Gravel Grinder aspect but who cares about labels.  It definitely gives you a lot more options, especially if I want to start working Mine Hill in the ride.


I was riding the Spot and from the get go I noticed a few things.  Rear wheel wasn't true - did Bluff Point do that?  Also, my gearing was skipping in 3 or 4 of the cogs leaving me with a limited range of gearing.  I was able to make do but it looks like I need to spend a few days tuning the Spot back up for the next adventure!

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