Vampires In The Park

Saturday’s dig sessions were made a bit uncomfortable by the vampires that reside there. Specifically, our State bird, the mosquito, populates the park heavily. Those pesky flying blood suckers were playing a game of Russian Roulette with me to see which of them might infect me first (1st) with either West Nile or malaria. Fortunately, Deep Woods Off does as advertised.

Despite the vampires much work was done. Saturday morning nobody wanted to come out and play with me so I took matters into my own hands. Falls Area SingleTrack (FAST) now owns a weed whacker. I put that to good use. I also trimmed the corridor as needed on the north half of the first (1st) loop. I was able to correct one (1) tough corner. One (1) down, two (2) to go. Weather permitting, I’ll handle those corners weeknights this week.

The downside to making progress in the park is I’ve little time for anything else. Like riding. I bagged Dirt Burger and have serious reservations regarding the Leadville 100 qualifier in Crested Butte at the end of July.

Perhaps I need to resign myself to the fact that 2011 is “do non-riding stuff” year and 2012 will be “make up for lost time” year. I willingly got myself into this and have no regrets.

I may take a break in July, whether it is the race in Crested Butte or for the fat tire festival in Idaho. “Fat tire fest in Idaho?” you might ask. Yes. Wydaho it is called. It’s based in Driggs, ID, not far from Jackson, WY and Yellowstone National Park. I’ve not been to Idaho or Yellowstone and this might be a great opportunity to see both.

Back to digging in the park – I’m very much hoping for a more typical low humidity South Dakota summer and less of the high humidity Florida summer we seem to be having. Three (3) liters of water in my CamelBak are barely enough for a three (3) hour dig session. I didn’t see anyone tip over that were down wind of me yesterday. I imagine the combination of gasoline, bug spray, and sweat made for quite a pungent aroma.

In order to get things done sooner rather than later I’ve elected to add two (2) weeknight dig sessions. For those around and wanting to help, we’ll be digging Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 6:15 PM until beer-thirty. Be there or be square.

Ride On.