Car tire, bike pump

Woke up this Wednesday to find out my car had a flat tire. I really didn't feel like putting on my donut tire which doesn't ride well on the highway, so I got out my bike pump and filled my tire. It's actually amazing how long it takes to pump a car tire with a bike pump.

The leak was slow enough that I easily made it into the auto center without any issues. There was a screw in the tire which was patched for free in less than 45 mins, so I wasn't too late for work.

It's snowing in the mountains, so hopefully the ski season will start on time. These next few weeks are always the most boring for me as they represent the rainy weather days between the nice biking/hiking/camping days of the summer and the snowy boarding days of the winter. Just a couple more weeks and we'll hit Whistler again. I can almost taste it.

Maybe I should go on a trip of some sort...

One last run with the Tiger

Egad!

I wanted to start this one off with a word other than 'well' or 'so' to see how it felt... Not too shabby.

It was the last weekend of the season for Tiger Mt. I took this as another opportunity to torture my bike. I went out with a couple of my esteemed colleagues from work who not only brought a neighbor, but also a couple of dogs which was a first for me. The dogs kept up for the most part, but over the downhill gravel roads where we can top 30mph we had to slow down to ensure they didn't hurt themselves.

It had rained recently, but it was sunny on Sunday. The trail was fairly good for the most part, but really wet on the second half of the first section of singletrack. About 1 mile of flowing water on the trail made it a very wet and cold experience. Biking in this river is one big reason the trail closes. Not only is it a painful experience when it's cold out, but it also really wrecks the trail if done repeatedly.

We had one mechanical (flat tire), but that was all. No big injuries.

That night I had a v-ball game out at SPU. We dominated the games we played. The team we played was good, but didn't have much of a presence at the net. Another thing that really helped was that we were actually passing fairly well for a change.

Anyhow, it was Canadian Thanksgiving this weekend. I wanted to invite folks over for a microwave turkey dinner, but my v-ball got in the way. Shawn and I made turkey pasta today, so I suppose that counts.

XC race in Eastern Washington (abridged)

So, I hit up the Methow Valley Mountain Bike Festival this weekend which I've been to two years in the past. I've noticed the past few posts have been really long, so here's an abridged version to help the readability factor. When I get more time I'll write up the long version...

• We drove to Winthrop and hit the town's bars.
• The town was surprisingly quiet compared to previous years.
• One bar had a $3 cover, we decided that was enough, and called it a night
• A deer jumped out in front of Nick's new Aztek on the way back to his property
• We hit the deer with enough force to throw it across the street into a ditch.
  
• It died, and the Aztek sustained damages to its left light casing rendering the high beam completely useless, and causing the vehicle to automatically call OnStar...
• We had a $6 all you can eat pancake breakfast on Saturday morning
• Scott and I did a practice run on the XC course to give us an idea of what we were up against
• The course was harder this time than last time we competed
• I decided it was a good thing I was competing in the beginner category
• We hit the $12 all you can eat salmon dinner that night...
• Saturday Scott and I continued our Winthrop unbeaten streak in pool
• We consistently beat people who are better than us somehow
• This tends to upset the locals, but they somehow got over it again this year
• Saturday night we got pulled over by the police for not having a left high beam...
• They mentioned that we were speeding a bit, but mainly they were upset at the lack of light emanating from our vehicle...
• They let us off once we explained the deer story
• Sunday we had a great breakfast at Duck Brand
• We started the race at 1pm
• Took me 55 mins to complete the 11 mile track
• Good for a second place in my division
• There wasn't the turnout this competition usually gets unfortunately
• I accepted my medal and also won a draw for a pair of socks which was nice...
• Sunday night we drove back after Nick duct taped his light fixture back in place