Keweenaw Chain Drive Pre-Ride

Pat and James after conquering a Maasto Hiihto hill I can't climb.

My team mates James, Pat, and I embarked on a "32-mile" ride today. Our course wasn't really 32 miles because we were doing the Keweenaw Chain Drive long course sans parade rollout.

The "long course" consists partly of all the trails in the Churning Rapids trail system. These are the trails near my home that I will be riding the most this year. The course was creatively plotted and amazingly includes all the singletrack, however not in the order I prefer. Great Oaks is a wildly fun, technical trail on the descent, but a beast on the ascent. It is a climb in the race and I found it quite challenging when we rode it today. We did the usual favorites such as Drunken Sailor and Pow Pow and headed back to Maasto Hiihto to finish up the race course. Towards the end, both of my knees were getting achy, we were all talking about pesto pasta at the Michigan House, and decided to cut out the last singletrack and simply head back to our vehicles.


Di riding under the Twisted Tree, also the name of the trail.

One of the new trails in the race was recently created because a beaver dam caused flooding of our singletrack. Here is the beaver dam and its newly created reservoir:


Pat noticed how the beaver dam, the sticks and brush at the bottom of the picture, is concave resembling the Hoover Dam.


Pat riding across the new bridge adjacent to the beaver dam (on the right).

We rode at a leisurely pace with me leading the way – twenty-seven miles in three hours and forty-seven minutes. We might have gone a little faster had I not been suffering from a hangover resulting from the previous night's Stanley Cup Finals festivities.

Even considering my less-than-preferable physical state, I decided that the thirty-two mile course was not on the agenda for this year's race. I have every intention of completing it this year and will continue to concentrate on climbing and endurance for my training this year. Next year, I plan to move up to the longer races.