James Pearl Thinks Blogging is Dead

stb222

Love Drunk
Jerk Squad
It was another 100% humidity and dew point was at 73. It started to rain at somepoint and it didn’t feel any different / wasn’t even refreshing. Hopefully some relief soon.
 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Vacation, day 12:
Summer 2020 Family Vacation Camp – Day 12 End of the Journey

On the last day we wake up early to squeeze one last ride in, then hit the road and make our way back home, wrapping up our 2020 summer vacation.

@BCurry - we did not. With the kids in tow, that would have been too much for Julia & Simon. I am pretty sure Zac can handle anything we throw at him these days but that would have been too much. We could have taken that bus up there but what fun is that?

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I spent a bunch more time outside today and I finally got the main pile of junk burned up. This includes a lot (but not all) of the stuff that was strewn about the yard when we got home. It also includes a massive swath of wasteland that is no longer wasteland, but is shaping up to be the biggest jump ever made here at our own little backyard bike park. We've got a little ways to go before that happens. However, like I said, after Killington our aims are much higher now.

But we did complete 2 things today:

1. The new double. I posted a pic of this the other day. We looked at it and decided it was a tad steep so we added more dirt to make it a bit less vertical. We also did a lot of work to the berm that catches you on the downside of that. Zac rode it, and it seems to flow well. But I think it needs to be built up more.
2. I added a drop off the wall.

Video of both here:

 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Hey @Robin thanks for the link. I had never seen that channel and I watched one video. Pretty solid stuff. I admire his copious use of wood. The more I watch this stuff of course the more I want to do stuff. I caught Zac watching one today so D passed the link on to him. He hadn't seen it yet. Thankfully we do not have a pond or a lake...

We did start building the next piece of the puzzle but this one is going to be a much larger project. It hinges on 3 key items:
  1. Building a raised platform
  2. Fixing the bern-jump line to be just a berm and redirecting it slightly in a different direction
  3. Building a huge jump at the end
In reality my idea was to construct a big tabletop but Zac started this while I was burning wood & working and before I knew it, he had 40,000 logs piled up after the jump. So we're going to make this a double with logs in the middle. This is a trick I read about somewhere, maybe the Red Bull site actually, about building jumps. If you make a big double one of the tricks is to fill the middle with logs while you get it right. So if you case it or come up short or whatever, you minimize the shit eating part of the learning curve. Vocab word 1 of the day: shit eating.

The platform is also something I have been ruminating on and the video I posted yesterday is a test to see how this would work. That was an existing 2' tall platform and I wanted to see how the speed was on the roll. I think it's pretty solid so of course I may make one that's 4' high because more potential energy turns into more kinetic energy.

It's all science. Vocab word 2 of the day: science.

The berm jump destruction has happened, as I cut the log out of the end of it so the jump is now gone. This was a necessary step and it'll be better in the end. The idea is to catapult you down the platform, to blast into The Artist Formerly Known as JB Line, then go straight into the big launch, which actually sends you into the yard. The approach to this is a super WIP right now.

We went to Nassau today and I was totally not feeling it. Really run down from the heat and this work week. I knew from the moment I started I was not all there so of course I pretended this was not an issue and I hit the drop. A little sloppy & short but no big deal. The double after that was smooth, no issues. Then we did that new trail to the field. On the way back I tried that keg-double and planted my front wheel into the second keg.

Time for vocab words!

So about that science thing. Things in motion tend to stay in motion, even when your bike stops going forward completely. As an awesome aside, I fell hard on the very same spot I hurt myself at Sterling a month or more ago. I have to stop doing this shit. Shit eating.

Tomorrow we are doing a metric century at like 8:30. I'm almost absolutely positive it is going to be really rough between the humidity and the fact my body hurts. But it's just one of those things you gotta do. I have worked a lot outside this week and not ridden my bike so much, so this will help my hours for the week.
 

mattybfat

The Opinion Police
Team MTBNJ Halter's
If your NOT eating shit then your not PROGRESSING! Its natural to learn from mistakes or eating shit :)
 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
Hi, it's been a while.

There's something to be said about taking a hot shower when it's not hot out. Such was the case today. I know many of you will groan at the shorter days, the cooler days, the exiting stage left of summer. I, myself - as opposed to I, someone else - welcome the cooler days. If nothing else, you should start to enjoy your showers more. As far as the light...well, most of you are working from home these days so you have whatever daylight you can muster. There's also something to be said about a nice, hot fire.

All sorts of things have gone in other directions this year. Some are bad, I grant you. But not all of them. With the limited travel of 2020, we're certainly spending less money this year than ever. This is a good thing, as it's allowed me to spend more money on wood to build stuff in the backyard. We've been plugging away at things since we got back from Killington/North Conway. Some weeks we turn around a bunch. Other weeks not so much.

We have put together an alpha version of the starting ramp:

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I'm gonna be perfectly honest in saying that it's probably worse than it looks right now. While it seems stable, it really could collapse fairly easily. Tomorrow I will be firming it up with more wood slats and wire to tie it together. Since this picture was taken, it has been beefed up a bit already. I will be adding more structure to support this mess.

By the way, last week it was nothing more than this:

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Eventually, this will morph into a big pile of rocks covered in dirt that resembles a hill. But I am too impatient to build it up properly right now. We need to get the starting speed set so that we can fine-tune everything downstream of this. So what's downstream?

1. A sort-of tabletop but not exactly flat. So like a tabletop where the table has uneven legs.
2. A small double - this will probably get edited into something different
3. The sideways approach to the original tabletop we build post-Killington. Legit air on this one
4. The whale tale
5. TBD from here. It's going to be a long project. I see a wall ride in our future

I'm doing this update mostly for @rottin' and @JimN who are not on the socials. Though Jim did say the other day that his wife randomly asked, "What's a whale tail?"

Sadly you have to watch this Facebook video to see it:

Ok so this is the backyard situation. So other than that, there's work. And riding - both mountain and road. And school started. I guess we all know that. But I think this post is long enough for now. So we'll save some of that stuff for another day.
 

Norm

Mayor McCheese
Team MTBNJ Halter's
A bunch has changed since the post above. Specifically, we've been kicked out of the common land, and informed that it's not actually common land, but solely owned by some people, or a guy, I don't know. The guy was nice about it, and I played it off with a good, old-fashioned Elmo Shrug. It's all good. In the end this was possibly a blessing in a way. We're revamping the whole approach now and it will all be on our land, which is limited but at least it's ours. Those of you on the IG know a little about it. More on that later. That is not the topic for today.

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Topic for today: The Scale

I came back from KT at the end of September and decided I wanted to actually try to lose weight. Again. While I'm often trying to stay on a healthy course, there's also a lot of ice cream in my world. So I revamped the routine* and set sail to see what October would bring. I decided I was going to start getting on the scale again on the 1st of the month. When was the last time I was on the scale? Beats me. Probably not in 2020. I didn't know what to expect but I knew I wasn't going to see a 1 as the first number. I was hoping for 215 if I'm being honest. When I stepped on that morning, it was 220.

Now, 10 years ago that would have bothered me a lot, but I'm long past the point of caring that much. It's a baseline and something to work with. Before I stepped on it, I was hoping for 199, or maybe 200 flat, by the end of the year. After seeing 220, 199 seemed a little aggressive. We'll play it by ear, I suppose.

A few days passed and the reality was that the 220 was still some vacation weight I had picked up at KT. In a few days I was doing 215...actually, scratch that. The next day was 215 and with a 217 on the 4th, every day was 215 or less. So when I was hoping for 215 I was probably about right. My low in this stretch has been 210. So we're sitting at a start of 220 and a low of 210. I still have a few days to see a 20X**, which may or may not happen.

Removing the ice cream as well as not eating after 9:00pm have probably been the 2 things that have helped the most. I admit I'm pretty hungry some days after 9:00 but this is life. In October I've had 2 mochi balls as well as a few scoops when we went to see @jmanic for dinner. Otherwise, I have been good. In total, that's about 400 ice cream calories this month.

Weight loss is not a thing I care much about in terms of biking prowess anymore. Might I race again some day? Maybe. Not super likely but maybe. In reality, as I head towards that big 5-0 I need to ask myself: how many people sit at this weight and live to be, say, 90? Probably not a lot. The reality is, as we age we need to think about this kind of stuff.

All told, it's been about a month and I have lost, in reality, about 5 pounds. If i can keep that track there's a shot that I see 200 by the end of the year. I know the holidays are often a difficult time to lose weight but who are we kidding in 2020? There's no Thanksgiving for us this year, we won't be going to Canada for Xmas, and neither of us will have work holiday parties. Even our yearly party won't happen this season. So the glut of food things won't be as much of a problem this go around.

I will try to stay on track. And I will try to keep you posted.

End Topic***

* routine - not sure I ever laid that out. But not sure it's worth it. Just think of it as a daily checklist of ways to stay on track.

** where X = some number between 0 and 9 but if I am a betting man I am thinking the 9 is more likely than the 0.

*** I haven't been blogging so much because I've been super busy, and at the end of every day I'm pretty beat. And thinking takes a lot of effort. I'm hoping to pick a single thought and run with it, as often as possible. Today's thought was a bit longer than expected. I was thinking that each thought would be a paragraph. I guess not so much.
 

MissJR

not in the mood for your shenanigans
Team MTBNJ Halter's
@Norm do you or have you ever kept a food log? Sometimes we eat way more then we realize but when you have to start writing every little morsel down, you start to rethink some of the food you eat. (Not that I have to lose weight, but I started writing down what I eat to try to narrow down some of the food issues I seem to have lately.)
 

2Julianas

Well-Known Member
Team MTBNJ Halter's
I told D this when we were in Stowe - when i started running ~3 miles 3x a week I lost 12 lbs without changing anything else. I know its not for everyone!
 

stb222

Love Drunk
Jerk Squad
you know 50 is only a number too?
Yes, a moderately high.

My bro just turned 49 and as the 6-year-younger brother and youngest of my parents kids, it is my duty to constantly remind him of his old age. Also, I am basically the polar opposite than my bro in basically every way. When I turned 40, each year in my 30's I was probably in better shape than the last, so 40 was just a number.

But even when I turn 43 in 2 weeks, its seems like that it starting to fade. Slump? Not really, but mtb fitness, especially slow uphill, fast DH fitness isnt the same as road fitness. Anyways, the reason i say this, is I am 7 years off from 50, but don't think it will be the same as turning 40. 50 seems older. And when you compare me to my brother, I would say his 50 will be my 55-60. The reason I say this is because yes, 50 is just a number, but seems like each decade, said numbers gets a little bit different. Compare my bro to Norm and he is in the same boat as me, you are much better off at 50 than most. IMO, riding wheeled things keeps you young...

It kinda stuck with me when @ChrisG mention to Norm and Ilya maybe 10 years ago, that they were still on the up swing. When does that swing level out. I am thinking it is 50. Or not,
 

Patrick

Overthinking the draft from the basement already
Staff member
Yes, a moderately high.

My bro just turned 49 and as the 6-year-younger brother and youngest of my parents kids, it is my duty to constantly remind him of his old age. Also, I am basically the polar opposite than my bro in basically every way. When I turned 40, each year in my 30's I was probably in better shape than the last, so 40 was just a number.

But even when I turn 43 in 2 weeks, its seems like that it starting to fade. Slump? Not really, but mtb fitness, especially slow uphill, fast DH fitness isnt the same as road fitness. Anyways, the reason i say this, is I am 7 years off from 50, but don't think it will be the same as turning 40. 50 seems older. And when you compare me to my brother, I would say his 50 will be my 55-60. The reason I say this is because yes, 50 is just a number, but seems like each decade, said numbers gets a little bit different. Compare my bro to Norm and he is in the same boat as me, you are much better off at 50 than most. IMO, riding wheeled things keeps you young...

It kinda stuck with me when @ChrisG mention to Norm and Ilya maybe 10 years ago, that they were still on the up swing. When does that swing level out. I am thinking it is 50. Or not,

i just took a nap. so there is that.
 
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