Back from the beach

I'm back from a lazy week in Southern Shores on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. I shuffled my schedule around to make this a rest week. My legs had been pretty beat up so they needed the break...and riding on the roads down there would not have been fun.

This was an old-school week with a whole lot of sitting on the beach, taking naps, reading books, hanging out with family, eating good food, and drinking good beer. The weather was ideal and after the first day the surf settled down to family friendly levels.

Everyone had fun.



We dug a bunch of holes in the sand.
And chased seagulls (otherwise known as doo-doo's).
And played with an assortment of trucks.
It was a fun and relaxing week.

Needless to say by the time we returned home I was jonesing for a ride.

I got out for solid rides on Saturday and Sunday hitting the bone-dry trails of Avalon. After a week off it took a while to find my lungs, but by Sunday afternoon I was feeling good.

It was a perfect weekend for riding with mild temps and low humidity. There were a lot of riders out there enjoying themselves. I ran into the Singlespeed Outlaw and some of his crew a couple of times on Saturday.

I chickened out on the last steep, loose, stair-step descent down to the dam on the Baltimore Co. side. I went over the bars and cracked a helmet on that trail last year and now it's in my head.

I firmly believe in the saying, "When in doubt, dismount", but I need to ride that section to get over my fears. It's steep and has a lot of rocks, but I've ridden it before. At some point I'll nut-up and ride it again, but until then I don't feel too bad about walking it.

Anyway, it's back to the work grind and an attempt to build some 'cross fitness before the baby is born. I just rebuilt my cx bike so that I can do some early AM workouts over in Rockburn Park. With any luck I'll still have enough in the tank to help out my teammates in some late-season events. My personal goals are for the 2008 season.