Wear a helmet!

So, as Marshall can tell you, riding a road bike between bars is dangerous. Having the temerity that I do I disregarded this fact. I was riding down fifth street towards college. I was standing up and pedaling hard in 52x18 when I hit one of the 2"x6"x2" holes in the pavement that are so prevalent in this town and the next thing I knew I was sliding down the road. I slid long enough that I had time to think to myself "wow, I'm sliding down the pavement pretty fast on my chest".


Normally I wear a helmet on my road bike at all times, but the morning of the incident I couldn't find it and rather then search I left without it. When I endoed on the crack in the road my bike flipped around and the spiked platform pedal hit me in the back of the head. It left a 1/4" wound that bled like crazy for about 2 minutes before I stopped it with my glove.

damage:
Halfway shredded jacket, jeans, gloves, headphones, mp3 player and sunglasses.
1/2" long hole in my left palm and a small scrape on my left hip.
1/4" laceration on my head.

One of the hoods on the bars was bent from the impact, but went back into place without a problem.

All in all, I was pretty lucky, I was probably going between 20 and 30 mph when it happened and I slid around 10-15 feet on the pavement. My clothing did a good job of protecting me from the road at it's own expense.

I had had 3 pints of bud light in the 2 hours before hand so I wasn't really drunk. I had a headlight but the didn't see the hole at all before I hit it, probably because I was looking up ahead at the intersection of college and fifth.

Great Salt Lake actually really salty

So the salt lake is really salty, approximately 4x that of the ocean. Bennett got himself a hobie 18 over the weekend and we took it out sunday. Dead wind turned into the great white squall complete with the harbor patrol boat following us in.

Whatever night shift schedule, guess I'll be going to bed early tonight.

Fun with Everclear!

People were falling asleep around the campfire due to a late night the night before. Morale was low. There was a bottle of everclear that my other Utard friend James brought and a raging fire. Something needed to be done.

Fire is fun. I'm glad I didn't set my polyester shirt on fire.

Why is it that I'm the only one posting here any more? Do the rest of you have real lives that you are busy with or what?

Gas Holidy

stolen from here

"It sounds like a great plan. With the high cost of gas, let's roll back the federal gas tax for everyone over the summer to give drivers a break during the busiest travel season. McCain first proposed this plan and suggests that "Hard-working American families are suffering from higher gasoline prices. John McCain calls on Congress to suspend the 18.4 cent federal gas tax and 24.4 cent diesel tax from Memorial Day to Labor Day." After Obama came out against the plan, Hillary Clinton NOW supports it."

"On top of that, reducing the cost of gas will likely increase demand. Increasing demand will likely tighten supply. Tightening the supply will cause the price to increase somewhat thus taking back some of the $50 in tax benefits and giving them to big oil.

Finally, doing this also will cost the US treasury about $10billion dollars in money that is badly needed to maintain our highway system (remember that bridge that collapsed?)."

Sounds great. I should drive more to take advantage of it.

Happy Friday





more on that here

Weird fanatacism

Rifige Kru

Skiing Yellowstone

Liz, Laura and I did a little adventure skiing in Yellowstone yesterday. We skied from the Mallard Lake Trail head to the Lone Star Geyser Trail head, skied the Lone Star Geyser Trail and followed our tracks back. It was a fun day. Click on the picture for more.

Yellowstone

Temerity

Beehive Peak, north face

Sometimes temerity works out really well. You know how some things don't look that scary when you look back at pictures? Not so with this one. It didn't seem that bad when we were in it but looking back it becomes apparent why it's called "The Hanging Garden".

Spring, MMmmmmm

stuck in my head

So I started nodding off this morning at work. That lead to this being stuck in my head the rest of the day, especially when I saw people falling asleep.

so it begins

Wire Mtn.

Another trail right above town. Has what might be the absolute worst place to be in a lightening storm. I think I rode a good 50 yards on the uphill.

Seasons

shameless self promotion



"Seasons" Mountain Bike Film Premier April 24th at

The Emerson Cultural Center in Bozeman

Salad Days Productions presents "Seasons", the new mountain biking film by the Collective. The premier event will take place on Thursday April 24th at the Emerson Cultural Center at 6:30pm. Tickets will be available at the door for $8. Proceeds will go towards the Montana Mountain Bike Alliance's efforts to keep Montana's trails open to mountain biking.

Seasons is the Third release from the group of filmmakers, photographers and mountain bikers known as "The Collective". Their second film "Roam" was released two years ago to rave reviews and has since collected numerous awards. Seasons is the story of several of the world's best and most interesting mountain bikers, told through the course of four seasons of one year. The film starts in the winter and shows the activities of the riders during the off season. Some are training, some are building trails and stunts. Spring rolls around and all the pent up energy of the winter is released on the trails as their riding sets the tone for the rest of the year. As summer rolls around some riders are racing and competing in competitions. Others are off in the woods on their custom built lines. As fall rolls around those that are still standing have reached the peak of their form. Tricks have been perfected. For the grand finale, the stories of all the riders come together as one.

Salad Days Productions is proud to bring another creative masterpiece by the Collective to the Emerson in Bozeman. This years premier promises to be bigger and better then Roam was two years ago. Proceeds will benefit the Montana Mountain Bike Alliance whose goal is "To preserve, protect, and promote mountain bike access and diverse riding opportunities on Montana's public lands through education, communication, and unified action." For those who don't know, hundreds of miles of trails in this great state are in danger of being closed to mountain bikes and these hard working and passionate riders are working together to protect them. The premier event will include head to head roller racing courtesy of the Bozeman Fix, a Live DJ and an expo of local bike related businesses and organizations. There will be tons of raffle prizes from many of our gracious sponsors including helmets, Camelbaks, coffee and gift certificates. When the show is over there will be an after-party with bike videos playing all night long to stoke the fire for the season. Don't miss it.


More information on the film is available here:
On the web: http://www.thecollectivefilm.com/
Email: Info@thecollectivefilm.com

More information on the event:
Email: saladdaysproductions@gmail.com
John Parker (406)370-5048

Montana Mountain Bike Alliance
On the web: http://www.montanamountainbikealliance.com/
Greg Beardslee (406)586-8357

Happy Glasses

Untitled from lacemine29 on Vimeo.

That's mike curiak who is in the middle of alaska doing the iditabike "race"
http://lacemine29.blogspot.com/

temerity: use in a sentance

"Yeah, we just got pretty cliffed out. Luckily after an attempt of temerity I was able to hike back up. But I better go, we have to find another way down and ski the rest of this mountain before dark. I'll give you a call when I get back into town."

Word of the day

Temerity
Main Entry: te·mer·i·ty
Pronunciation: \tə-ˈmer-ə-tē\
Function: noun

Unreasonable or foolhardy contempt of danger or opposition

http://skisickness.com/

SLC

Still can't believe I live here. Guess I can't complain too much though.

30% riding mountain bikes

Economic Impacts of Mountain Biking
Montana, rich in great trails, beautiful scenery and down-home hospitality, is ripe to profit from mountain bike tourism. Two recent studies reveal information that mountain bike recreation provides a green and sustainable economy for rural communities surrounded by public lands. The findings document the economic power of mountain biking and verify the potential benefits for towns like Butte, Dillon, Philipsburg, Hamilton, West Yellowstone and scores of others across the State.

A study just released by Shimano and IMBA ranks Montana among the top three states in the nation with over 30% of the population riding mountain bikes. 50 million mountain bikers pump $26 Billion into the American economy in direct expenditures benefiting retail sales, services and tourism-related industries locally, regionally and nationally. Nationally, there are 1 1/2 times more mountain bikers than golfers.

Go to the Shimano Economic Study. (It's a PDF)


From montanamountainbikealliance.com

Two descents after two soul crushing 3,000' granny gear fire road climbs in the sun. We need to go riding in Chamonix.

last weekends ski trip

Went and skied mt. Timpanogos. It's to the East of work and I see it everyday, now that it's light out when I leave work.

We skied the south face off the farthest right point on the ridge. Here we are hiking out towards the summit. Turns out it is way further than we thought so we settled for the south summit, where we were planning on skiing. The skiing was actually about the 2nd worst backcountry run I've ever been on. On the other hand the scenery was right up there on the list, so overall it was a pretty good trip. I even got a ride back to the car and didn't have to walk up the road. That would have made a definite whiskey trip, as it was the emergency whiskey stash only got moderate use once back at the car.

that's right work, what do you think about that.