This blogjacking brought to you by SOT2.0

Ladies and Gentlemen, hold onto your seats. We've been blogjacked. Try not to panic. SOT2.0 seems to have boarded our peaceful (yet stagnant) blog in the dead of night, taken over, and is now piloting this ship to the top of Flattop Mountain and beyond. Yes, he's the pilot, pirate of this ship. So prepare your landlubber souls for more time spent reading the details of explosive bonks from sea to shining sea and back again, neveryoumind the misplaced modifiers.

You see, a few weeks ago I sat down to purge some of the excessive things from my life in the name of being a better father when November rolls around. And since excessive riding wasn't something I was prepared to cut just yet, I thought maybe excessive blogging about riding might work instead. See below a sample of the list of cuts from Dave's excessive lifestyle:

MTB Tire collecting
Frequent dangerous consumption of non-FDA-approved energy drinks
brownie crits where I eat all of the brownies
100+ hours of trailwork/year
NBA man-crushes
Blogging

All of that, I'm OK with. I'm going to be a great Dad, I hope, and maybe it's things like knowing the things you don't want your kids to know about you that make you a better man. But, two things happened, and now I'm back in for the blog.
1) Turns out my hot wife finds the fact that I'm a writer sexy.
2) SOT2.0 stepped in, scurvy and all, and boatjacked this thing for places further on up the high sea of bike blogs.
So I'm committed to jotting down a thought or two here and there as long as Toph is. And, worried though I was, I'm quite pleased to see this blog is still technically about Kev29er, as he'll certainly be on the bow of the boat as Toph turns the wheel onto gravel and up up up tomorrow AM at whatever godforsaken hour they decide to set the landspeed record up Wyant Mountain. Pass, thank you. But I'm giddy to see the results.

In the meantime, a few pictures that I hope will help me acheive immortal Pivot Glory, courtesy of Jude Monoco Ortiz.

Proof positive that rumors of our bike blogs death are unsubstantiated and incorrect.

Now if you'll pardon me, I've got to go watch grown men sweat and cry over a bouncey leather ball.

Up, up, up.

Summer of Toph Eve

Greetings and salutations! May the Summer of Toph 2.0 sweep over you and bring you endless cheer and happiness.

To celebrate the beginning of SoT 2.0 I will be riding from my house in Cville Sunday morning through Eville up Shifflett Mtn. down through BRS and then back home. If you want to join me, email me.

To prepare YOU for this joyous season of light and divinity I have enclosed this excerpt from the forthcoming Q&A section of the official SoT2.0 owner’s manual.

When does SoT officially begin?
Sunday.

Why Sunday? Is this a set day every year? Does it coincide with another celebration of significance, like your birthday?
The SoT is similar (but completely different) to Three-fer Thursday…it’s not tangible, accomplishable, plausible…it’s simply a state of mind.

Much like magic certain stars and events must align for SoT to commence.

For this year the following has occurred to ignite 2.0:

1) I got a sweet new ride,
2) At Shawn and Jenny’s wedding I scored a partner for 9 hours of Hilbert AND Paranormal (If Earth as we now it still exists –read on), and
3) I have at least two reliable sets of sunglasses for the summer.

Figure 1 In purple: Sally Field, In orange: the Bandit

Why have you chosen this route to celebrate SoT?
Best chance of not getting hit by a car, best chance of me mates joining me along the way. And that spot atop Shifflett’s Mtn., by the mailboxes, is where I first witnessed mountain bike racing at its purest. Dave was flying up Brokenback , Shawn was chasing yelling at us to tell him how far back he was, and the rest of the crew was charging like wild animals. Pure 100% radness. I’ve been chasing those guys ever since.

What is the SoT trying to accomplish? Was anything really accomplished with 1.0?
Well first of all, something was accomplished since there is a second version. Duh.

Keep in mind, last summer I lived through 3 music festivals, shoveled 2 tons of rock into my backyard, completed Ride Idaho in addition to 10,000miles of riding, found the beauty in single speed mountain bikes, and decided I would do something special at work (I started a mountain bike club for kids).

You seem like you are out to prove something with the whole SoT. Are you hiding some insecurity deep in your psyche?
Last time I checked, I completed my last lap of my nightmare performance at Lodi 2011, in nothing but my BRC team bibs twirling my shirt at any and all spectators that would behold my beautiful body. Kiss this! (makes pointing gestures to his backside area)

Ok, in summation, it seems that SoT is almost a mix of religious belief and science. What is it that the SoT believes in?

I can assure you that the SoT has no religious ties. Especially, with Saturday night’s impending rapture slash apocalypse. If you can’t join me Sunday for the ride, I will assume the Almighty hates me and not you, but wants me to stay on Earth, and rock the Bacon Holla Bonk, which I had no plans of doing, but will technically be the last VORS race with the whole Armageddon thing. However, when you think about it…if you can make it through disease, war, famine, natural catastrophes you truly are ready to race at Blue Ridge School.

If anything, don’t subscribe to my plans. Make your own Summer of (insert name here). Summer of Danny, Summer of Coleman, Summer of Scott

Figure 2 Is this guy at my left still alive?

I know we are all waiting the details of the Summer of Iron Mike!

So you are pursuing SoT 3.0, I guess?
Nope. Next year is the Spawn of Toph.

The Toph abides.

2:30? Douthat doubts that.

A work trip gone wonderfully astray yesterday found me alongside the mighty Ken Tank for a 2 hour rally down by the river, pedaling my brains out to just hang on, wondering if he's gotten faster or if I've gotten slower. Could be a little of both. We rolled a fast, tacky loop from i-64 over to YRSP and back, hitting just about all of the goods along the way. The experience made me draw two conclusions:

1) Despite his claims to the contrary, Ken Tank is going to roll Douthat in under 2:20. I really hope I'm right about this. Because given our relative performances yesterday (him dropping me on the road climb back to the car), he's either rolling a 2:20 in the XC, or it's going to take me about 7 hours to finish the XXC. I guess that's the nature of training without a power meter. Although in a lot of ways, a Ken Tank is way better than a power meter (measuring ones own performances is apparently not one of those ways.) So I'll either see you around 2:00 on Sunday for some cake, or I'll make an effort roll in by dark. Save me a corner.

2) In terms of life-affirming, interstate 64 experiences, parking your car on exit 231 at Pierce's BBQ, saddling up, and hitting York River before digging into the chicken dinner platter is probably among the top 5.

One might also put a similar experience at Douthat on that list if one could find some BBQ.

Some bits and pieces from the mailbag:

1) The Tour De Moore (no relation to Erico Moortani) is way the hell down in North Carolina on Saturday. It's a road race, which if you're not familiar with the concept is a lot like a mountain bike race, but with skinny tires and better posture. If you're going, drop a line to BRC, because FOTP JoJo Cook wants to finagle a carpool.

2) The Giro De Ville route is out and about, or about as out as the Giro route can get.
Stage Sneak Preview:
Friday Night: Prologue Time Trial
Saturday: Sherando
Sunday: BRP Hugging
Monday: Whetstone, TTT, Vesuvius.
Be Prepared and a BadASS

3) Last but not least, no children were harmed in the making of this Video. And Danny survived. So I think this is technically legal.



Directionally, and as a piece of motivational paraphrasia, up, up, up.
But try to keep your wheels pointed down.

I call shotgun to your group ride state of mind.

Say what you want about celebrating the anniversary of the resurrection of Christ; whatever your opinions are about it, Easter weekend is usually a damn good weekend to do some riding. Dogwoods blooming, great temps, clean rain-washed spring air, and the near-constant availability of cadbury eggs to bring you back from the precipice of whatever hunger-induced, ghost-of-Jesus-seeing bonk you might be on your way to.

always, always pack a lunch.

Let's get to the nitty-gritty. From Shawn at the shop, like Spring itself, the ride schedule has bloomed. A few reasons to ponder why you ever ride alone:

Wednesday Night BRC Fast Road Rides - Led by the Fortuna Crew, 6 PM from BRC. Your chance to stick it to Morgan in all his post-'Stan obesity will likely be short-lived, if indeed it ever happened at all. Dude's been training, I'm told. And not in the "wears desert camo and low-crawls around the desert" sort of training anymore. Regardless, you are the enemy. Come armed.

Wednesday Night MTB ride - Led by Blue Ridge Racing - 8 PM at BRC. A super sweet loop up the RT to OHill and back. Lights optional. A motivational pace. Make of that what you will.

The Thursday Evening Shred Like Ted ride - Led by the original Ted Shred at 5:30 PM from BRC. Look, there have been a barage of applications in the past few years to usurp the name Ted Shred, but really, there's nothing like the original. And now the original has better gear. But typically only one of them.

Saturday C/D road rides. 8:30 AM from BRC. I could go on and on about who I think this ride is appropriate for. Fast riders. Slow riders. Easy Riders. Beginners. Siteseers. The hungover. Those new to town. Those who have been in town for 15 years but have never really looked around on a road ride because they're barely hanging on by their eyeballs while Morgan shows them no mercy. Etc. C/D means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. All of which are near and dear to my heart. Show up. Seize the day.

And two rides that aren't weekly, but instead, once in a lifetime.
1) Shawn's bachelor party. May 7th. Lodi. Kegs and BBQ. Perhaps a blow-up animal or two.
If any of that sounds like something you shouldn't have been left off the notification email about, that's probably my mistake and, preemptively, I apologize for forgetting about you. Hit me up, then hit me.
2) I turn 33 on May 1st. That's a Sunday. 6 the hard way, in Vegas terms. And I'm hoping for some luck at the XXC of the Middle Mountain Momma. Douthat, bright and early. To follow, beer and birthday cake at the finish line for all. And I do mean right at the finish line. Then perhaps a BBQ if the weather looks worthy. Come get some.


Up, Up, UP!