#CXWorlds Super Cross Sunday February 3rd

European Guide to Ohio Valley

Louisville isn’t Brussels.  Cincinnati isn’t Zolder.  The elderly Belgian men in overcoats and wool driving caps hanging over the tape shaking a fist aren’t coming to Louisville.  As much as supporters may like to deport him, the young man who threw the beer at Sven doesn’t have a plane ticket.  Frites aren’t the same as French fries.  While we may see a Dirk Hofman Motorhomes sign poke above the crowd, a rowdy bunch of Netherlanders in orange and a Lion of Flanders flag or two, the majority of fans lining the entry to “The Green Monster” at the Cyclocross World Championships in Louisville on Super Bowl Cross Sunday will be mostly bike racers and their families from Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana.  Sure, some Masters die-hards from the North East, a few Yoopers from Michigan, a handful of flatlanders and contingents from Colorado and North Carolina will find a corner of the course to call home.  For the most part however, the crowd will be the Ohio valley cycling crowd: OVCX racers, the mountain bikers, the roadies, and the century fueled members of the Cincinnati and Bluegrass Cycling clubs.  Louisville Worlds is what we make it.

Masters Worlds Finish 2012

We’ve all wondered how it would be to see a cross race in Belgium with a cacophony of languages drowning our ears, but that sound will be drawled out in Louisville.  About the only thing that will be the same is the sport, the cowbells and seeing your breath in the air.  On the bright side, you won’t have to cock your head sideways to read a confusing Flemish food truck menu.  You won’t need to bring Euros.  You can use Kentucky dollars.  Here in the Ohio Valley, in your Carhartt overalls, North Face Jacket and Hunter boots, you’ll be the scene.  The crowd on “Rachel’s Drop” isn’t going to be six people deep unless you pack the kids in your Caravan.  And by Caravan, we mean mini-van, not camper.  I’m not counting on Belgian waffles.  I’ll likely be armed with a concealed thermos of Cincinnati chili.  Of course, there may or may not be a flask of Bourbon tucked into a chest pocket.  If you dare to poach some free advertising, believe it or not the local motor home dealer is Tom Raper RV.  However, I don’t think you’ll go that far.  I do expect to see a tempting piece of bacon on a fishing pole.  I’m hoping for burgers and burritos under a wave of stars and stripes.  We’ll shout “go go go!”  And, we’ll heckle. 

A Bacon Hand Up at Eva Bandman

Boy will we heckle.  Because come February 4th, the sight of your European cross heroes blasting through the Eva Bandman sand, the chance to ring a cowbell in front of World Champion stripes, the opportunity to shout “Allez” in front of a real French rider, all of it will be gone.  The courses at Eva Bandman and Kings CX will return to the quiet dog walking parks they usually are in winter.  The barge traffic will be the star along the Ohio River.  Louisville will look ahead to the Derby.  The Cincinnati suburb of Mason won’t see another European athlete until the Tennis Masters Tournament.  You’ll go back to the gym and the Sunday group ride to once again day dream about the big day, the big race.  Only, there won’t be a race as big and as close for a long long time (Richmond in 2015.)

One Footer at Masters Worlds 2012

Still for some, sadly it’ll be too cold, too far, and they might have to pry open a frugal Midwest wallet to make the trip to (gasp!) watch other people ride bikes.  Oh yeah.  For the record football fans, no matter where you live in the Ohio Valley, the race will end right around 3:30pm Eastern, plenty of time to drive home before the Superbowl begins.

Set your excuses aside.  The days you’ve been dreaming about are here, a few days away with Kings CX in Cincinnati and the big show in Louisville.  World Champion Neils Albert and other European pros will mix it up with the best in the US.  This isn’t another UCI weekend, another USGP.  This isn’t a chance to see a European cross race.  This is a chance to see the biggest cross races, no, the biggest bike races you’ll likely ever see without a plane ticket to Europe, (California if you’re soft.)  For Sven Nys’ sake, you can’t miss this.  Because it’s not a question of whether you’ll experience something amazing, but what amazing thing you’ll experience.  

Click here for tickets and more information.

Sunday, We Raced The Train

A handful of riders were polled.  What makes a good group road ride?  They answered: a steady pace, the “best” riders in town, a challenging route.  Obviously those 5 riders skewed the results by having Bath Salts in their water bottles.  I’d answer with road rarity, pleasant conversation, good friends, animal sightings, blue skies, temperature in the mid 70’s, low humidity, great views, and a small general store.  If you said average speed, few stops or anything having to do with physically riding the bike, you need to stop treating your bathroom as a pantry. 

Rolling To Visalia on Decoursey Pike in Kenton Co. KY

“Looks like I missed a good one yesterday,” Mitch, the owner of BioWheels bike shop, said to me Monday night.  “Yeah.  Great route.  Nice pace.” I tossed back too quickly.  Before my Bath Salt brain could dig for specifics, the phone rang.  Mitch answered.  I finished the conversation in my head as I concentrated on wrapping my wife’s handlebars with new tape and getting the spacing just right, no visible logos.  I’m thinking maybe it was the chat at the Visalia convenience store’s picnic table that made the ride so special.  I’m not sure what it was about, but it was light hearted, definitely not politics or even a hint of negativity.  Then I remembered the turn off the beaten path up a road called Moffett in rural Kenton County Kentucky.  To date, there are only 4 people on the Moffett Strava Segment KOM list, all of them on Sunday’s ride.  The climb crested at a farm with two horses at the fence, one umbrella tree an infinite amount of green rolling hills.

In Cincinnati, people rave about the Hyde Park Kroger grocery store with an in-house Starbucks, Sushi chef and wine tasting bar.  While the price tag of the designer jeans and shades of Eastside shoppers may rival the carbon fashion show I see on the Wednesday night ride, the best cycling food stops have no aisles.  There’s nothing better than leaning your bike under a hand painted sign that reads “General Store” and hearing your cleats clop across boot-worn splintering hardwood floors.  You better bring cash.  They make change from a lock box.  If they do take credit cards, the scanner is the analog beep-booop-beee type.  Better yet, they don’t sell gas.  In our area I’m partial to the Claysville and Rabbit Hash General Stores.  It’s a well earned 2 hour ride to either.  Third on my list is the store we stopped at Sunday in Visalia where 536 crosses the Licking River.  While it’s not as historic, far away or nostalgic, it has a picnic table out front.  If you approach from the South, it comes as a nice highlight at the end of a two mile one lane road that parallels the railroad tracks called “Vises Trail.”  Sunday, we took the turn off under the bridge and raced the train as its whistle screamed loud enough to raise goose bumps on my legs.

Technically, it is a barn.

Even after living here for 12 years, a former cheesehead, Kentucky horse farms still hold a mystique for me.  The horse farm on Sunday’s ride was small compared to those outside of Lexington.  There you’ll see horses along the white roadside fence with gorgeous shiny brass bridals, some even with their name on them.  In the distance, the freshly painted wooden fencing leads to an exquisite barn that makes your suburban home look like a refrigerator box under an overpass.  Periodically, you’ll see horses with hoods over their heads, ghost horses.  At first glance it seems a little cruel their eyes are covered up.  Yesterday the horses didn’t have hoods and their whole heads were swarming with flies.  I learn something every time.  The two, one brown one black, were grazing under a tree near the top of the Moffett Road climb.  It was the only patch of shade in their corral.  I felt bad our presence made them shy away and saunter into the sun.  Still it was gorgeous.  We were on top of a ridgeline, horses in the foreground and a sea of soft green hills and valleys in every direction.

What were we talking about again?

Seen On Ride, Not Seen Tomorrow

Seen on Ride: Door County, WI

We call it the World’s Largest Swing Set.  Appearing as a Barnum & Bailey Circus cast off, the blue monstrosity towers in a yard on the summer time trial course in Cleves, OH.  Please tell me it’s for adults, because there’s no way someone would put their kid on that thing.  On the other side of the Ohio River, there’s “The Cult,” as some call it, the historic homestead at the western terminus of Route 8 in rural Boone County, most recently home to a church group.  A little creepy and always intriguing, this past week I noticed a for sale sign on the property.  It could be as eye catching as a catfish sculpture in Door County, WI or as mundane as a rusting front end of a 50’s era car just off the trail 5 miles deep in the woods at Caesars Creek State Park, but you notice when the sculpture is turned a few degrees or the day the bumper falls away from quarter panel.  As cyclists, those ride markers hold the same sway for us on our daily rides as the picture over the mantle.  In the past few weeks in Cincinnati, we learned we’ll keep one, and sadly, lose another.

Storm Damaged Wesley Chapel in NKY

If you’ve ever raced Shababerle near Flag Spring, KY or took part in the summertime time trials on KY 10 in Northern Kentucky, you may not have noticed the intricate details of Wesley Chapel.  Standing at the top of a hill at the intersection of KY 10 and 1121, for 156 years Wesley Chapel Church has withstood war and weddings with its wrought iron arch and two entry doors (one for women, one for men).   Like the Civil War soldiers who staged there years ago, I’ve stopped to swap water bottles and tuck a vest in my rear pocket while allowing stragglers up Shababerle Hill to catch up.  Now, with it’s piano lying under a debris pile, without a roof and windows, the Chapel appears shoulderless after being damaged in the high winds and tornados that swept through the area on March 2^nd.  According to a member of the Wesley Chapel Cemetery Board which owns and maintains the building and grounds, it may be too expensive to save it.   While we may never again be greeted by music through the windows on the next stop at the top of Shababerle, the 400 souls buried there always will. 

The Gapped Planks of Stonelick Covered Bridge

Where’d you ride?  Oh, we went out Roundbottom to the covered bridge route.  To Cincinnati area cyclists that route is as commonplace as a trip to see the Reds at Great American Ballpark.  Damaged a while back by what was initially thought to be  my teammate's face plant, but turned out to be an overweight truck, the 140 foot long Stonelick Covered Bridge has been closed.  For months cyclists and walkers have been ducking under the barricades on either side to get across Stonelick Creek while officials and residents struggled to find an agreeable solution between preserving the historic integrity yet allowing the 134 year old structure to handle 2012 traffic.  According to this March 18^th article, the bridge will be reinforced but maintain its historic look.  While I always enjoyed walking across to spend more time on the bridge and save a trip to the dentist, as a positive note for cyclists, the wheel-eating gapped flooring will replaced as part of the project. 

Goodbye Town Line Sprint, Hello #Strava

I taste what you call “Strava Glory.”  It’s sort of a sweet & salty mix of GU Energy gels and sweat combined with the odor of burning 350 dollar bills.  The Best Bike Blog EVER is now on Strava, sits on top of a Leaderboard and has a crown to prove it.  Better check your segments to see if you got knocked down a rung.  Ba bam!  Judo chop!

The problem is, I’m sort of having trouble squeezing my big head into my tiny .jpeg crown.  Still, I make no apologies for spending the equivalent of a week’s worth of family groceries on a GPS enabled cycling computer.  My Polar passed away and I enjoy a team discount.  So while you were out racing for real on Sunday, we went segment hunting in Northern Kentucky with my new Garmin Edge 500.

After the ride, unlike most people I know on Strava.com, I was able to toss my kit in the wash, take a shower, make a recovery shake and eat lunch before downloading my first ride file.  I know better.  While standing naked with their I-phone between their legs, sadly those who are addicted will find out there is not an App to cure jock itch and saddle sores.

Prior to our Sunday morning adventure, I virtually scouted segments of our planned ride.  In a way Strava turns the sport of cycling into a video game.  That sort of bothers me.  It brings cycling one step closer to Farmville.  You scoff at the ridiculousness of people paying real money for virtual world real estate, but yesterday I wondered what it would’ve taken for my teammate to sit up 10 meters from the top and let me have the segment?  Damn.  I drilled it with all I had.

There are no rules on Strava.  Segments aren’t asterisked with “drafted behind bus” or motor-paced by Vespa.  Sunday we returned favors, a lead-out for a lead-out.  That’s fair game I think.  Lead-outs are part of cycling.  But the next time we crest Amsterdam Road, I wonder how I’ll play it.  And it irks me that I’m even thinking of this.  Will I defend it?  Or, will I offer up some Strava currency to save my crown, an inner tube or air cartridge, a Coca-Cola or Snickers at the convenience store, a buck slid in the right hand jersey pocket.

The great thing about winning good ol' wooden town line sprints is enjoying the moment of glory among your peers.  As I log in and check the leaderboard on this 80 degree March day, I’m worried Strava is stretching the moment too far.  

Bet On This: The 1st Cat 5 Race

The Cat 5 and 4/5 races are selling out in the Ohio Spring Road Series Races (OSRS).  According to snobish uppity bookmakers at the new Cincinnati casino, here are the odds of seeing the following in upcoming races:

Seat Bag 5/125

Seat Bag That Sounds like It’s Full of Spare Bolts and Broken Glass 2/125

Unshaven Legs that look like the Lower Branches and Peeling Bark on a Pine Tree 10/125

Unshaven Pine Tree Legs with Chain Ring Tattoo 5/125

Threadbare Shorts 4/125

Threadbare Shorts with a Cork-Screw Butt Hair 4/125

Threadbare Shorts with a Cork-Screw Butt Hair and Half Moon of Salty Butt Crust 2/125

Hydration Pack 1/125

150oz Hydration Pack 1/125

Sweet Castelli Bib Shorts 5/125

Sweet Castelli Bib Shorts with Shoulder Straps Worn Over Old T-Shirt 1/125

Tail Light 4/125

Tail Light Blinking in a Seizure Inducing Pattern 1/125

Discovery Team Jersey 1/125

Time Trial Bike 1/125

Discovery Team Jersey on a Time Trial Bike 1/125

I Phone mounted on handlebars 3/125

I Phone mounted on handlebars with riser stem 2/125

I Phone mounted on handlebars with riser stem and 1 inch of spacers 1/125

I Phone mounted on handle bars with riser stem, 1 inch of spacers, on an otherwise rad custom Serotta 1/125

#Fall: It's Not All About Cyclocross

It's About Looking Up!

It's About Grabbing A Little More Brake.

It's About Sharing The Experience With Someone Close.

It's About The Snack Break.

It's About Stepping off the Trail for a better peek at Versailles SP Fall Colors.

Autonearbyu Syndrome: How To Lose Schababerle

Schababerle, the 2nd race in the Ohio Valley Spring Road Series is this weekend.  Here's a summary of survival for those making the trip to this spring classic climb in Northern Kentucky.


Autonearbyu Syndrome:

The incessant urge to quit every time your sniveling broken body passes your car at the intersection of California Cross and Rt. 10.

Toasters:

The crowd of people along the last pitch of the climb who have done this race enough to never do it again and have resorted to heckling your sorry ass as you deliver the mail.

El Perro De Tres Patas

The legendary three legged dog of Schababerle lives along the descent back to California Cross.  Unlike Ghost Dog who lives on Rt. 8 between Mentor and Silver Grove, at least you’ll see El Tres coming.  The issue is, at this point, you’ve finally caught your breath from the climb and closing gaps in the crosswind and all you want to do is chill in the pack.  It’s the perfect spot for El Tres to get a jump on eating you.  Think of it like this.  Ghost Dog comes out of nowhere, from behind another team’s unseen lead out train like Robbie McEwen.  El Tres attacks are as conspicuous as a bag of leaves in a windstorm, much like Cadel Evans.  You’ll see and hear him well before he gets you.  However, because you’re just getting your eyesight back from being over your lactate threshold for the last 20 minutes, you’re easy pickin’s.  El Tres doesn’t come out ever year.  Judging from the fact that he barely raises his head sometimes, it’s been rumored that El Tres has been high on doggy Ritalin from time to time.  El Tres will never die.  If he does there’s no shortage of three-leggers in Kentucky to take his place.

God-schooled-ya:

Realizing that Godzulla, the diabolical founder of this race with the tattoo arm warmers in the mis-matched Xavier kit who attacked from the gun on Rt. 10 just to mess with you, finished in front of you.  (See Fat Boy 10 Attack)

The Fat Boy 10 Attack

From the start at Flintlocks, with 5 or 6 times up the beast in your future, you’d think it’d be a rather mellow ride up Schababerle at least the first time, at least until the toaster, at least until the first pitch.  Nuh-uh.


If you’re unfamiliar with the toaster, Schababerle is actually a nice scenic climb with two slight stretches of quad relieving lulls on the way up.  The toaster is the last pitch to the tippy top.  When you get there it will feel like riding down and into a BMX style half pipe. Then you’ll realize it’s bigger than anything you’ve seen on the X-Games.  Frantically you’ll dump it into your lowest gear.  If you don’t drop your chain shifting from your 53-17 to your 39-27 at the wrong moment, you’ll soon find yourself looking at your cassette thinking that you brought the wheel with the 12-23.  


That said, no doubt, a slightly grizzly looking dude in an unfamiliar kit will attack well before the base of the climb on Rt. 10.  You’ll write him off as a big boy trying to get a jump on the climb and let him go.  He will be followed by three or four others thinking that his effort to get his caboose on the climb before everyone else is a good idea.  However, 5 guys up the road in different kits tends to make the alarm bells go off, especially knowing that the right turn into Schababerle and the first left on the climb will stretch the pack into a long 2-3 rider wide line.  No matter how you cut it, you’ll be following multiple attacks and be on the edge of crying for mama between bouts of the pukes before your Garmin even registers a change in elevation. 

Hell Hole:

The port-a-poddy along the backstop by the Flintlocks softball field that’s been there all winter and just beginning to thaw.  Guy tip: remove your sunglasses from your helmet before peeing.  Girl tip: invest in a Bumper Dumper.

“Sin” Ders

If you bought brand new road tires for the season, take them off your bike now.  Obviously you’ve never ridden in Mentor, KY in March.  You see, they don’t use salt on the roads here in winter.  Calcium chloride and beat juice are for pussy-towns like Cincinnati.  There’s a giant coal power plant just down the river.  When the coal is burned, cinders are the result.  It’s burnt up coal, what is referred to as coal ash.  Questionably biodegradable, it’s a wonderful thing.  It doesn’t really melt ice or snow.  Instead, being much like teeny tiny shards of black glass, they spread it on the roads.  It embeds itself into the tires of cars, essentially turning them into studded tires.  Brilliant!  It works exactly the same way with bike tires.  Only, your tires are .7 mm thick.  Suddenly those brand new Conti GP 4000 S’s have a hundred cuts on them.  Inside each cut is a microscopic black piece of glass.  If you don’t pull them all out after the race you’ll get flats for weeks.  My best advice: put your crappy-old out-of-fashion light blue Michelin tires on.  The best thing you can do is avoid the "black sand" and every time you hear a rider say “gravel” imagine them saying “glass.”  Throw your tires away after the race.

Indiana:

The state of residence for the winner of your race whose jersey you’ve never seen in your life.

A KY Ride Nut For Winter: Kincaid-Claysville-Kincaid

Down here, they get the Sunday paper on Tuesday, one of my buddies joked.  “Claysville Kentucky hello.”  Personally, I pictured Larry King greeting the next caller from Tobacco  Basket, USA not realizing earlier the caller just finished hanging Tobacco to dry in the barn and now settled in for a little T-V.  I rode there yesterday.  Tobacco harvesting season is in full swing in Kentucky.  While some fields were still full of the giant yellowing leaves, others lie bare adjacent to a big black barn packed from floor to ceiling with hanging drying leaves.  While I’m not a fan of smoking, I am a fan of tobacco farming.  With the small black barns and plants with leaves as big as your face, it’s romantic in a way.  I don’t know if it’s true or not, but someone once told me the tobacco barns are black to draw more sunlit heat to the leaves.  While I didn’t smell any yesterday, in just the right conditions late in the summer you can smell the tobacco aroma from the fields and get a tish of a buzz.  Harry, my teammate and longtime Tobacco Basket resident, wrestled unwrapping a Clif Bar outside the Claysville General Store.  “It’s a dying breed,” he said in his soft drawl referring to the store’s genuine dusty boot-carved wooden floorboards which were perfectly unlevel.  Even having to hike around a warshed out bridge (pictured), it was a perfect end of summer ride.

“You know what’s wrong with this ride?”  All together now in staccato, "Not…A…Goddamned…Thing!”  I hate to say it, but the waning daylight doesn’t lie.  It was officially the last ride of the summer.  This blog post is my way of storing a ride nut away for winter.  I’m trying to remember the little details:  Grimes Road- pure Kentucky chip and seal no wider than a bridge of a dozen computer screens, tobacco hanging in little black barns so close to the side of the road you could practically reach inside and rip off a plug, the remarkably friendly farm dogs that just wanted to run with us for a while and drought baked dry creek beds revealing the flat stone underneath.  I like to think of the topography of Kentucky as God’s second draft.  Like he took a map of a flat tree lined beautiful forest, crumpled it up, uncrumpled it, and said, “There…that’s better.”  Then there was that kid on the Huffy.

My friend Tony, who scouted this route south of Kincaid Lake State Park near Falmouth, said the kid, now a young man, was involved in an ATV accident.  As they’d say in rural Kentucky, he’s a little slow.  In a voice that I’ll recall as heartbreaking, he slurred in a drawl, “y’all wanna race?”  My buddy replied, “Naw man, we’re just out for a ride.”  We turned past a house littered with aging old bikes in the front yard.  One of them, a rusted singlespeed with a Schwinn-like curving top tube and an orange panel decal caught our eye, but we didn’t stop and headed down another single lane road toward Claysville.

I don’t know how many hills we climbed, but everyone paid off with a panoramic vista of a creek carved valley.  The ride was a lumpy loop of what seemed like 90% single lane roads which sort of paralleled the Licking River Valley from Kincaid Lake State Park to Claysville touching Pendleton, Harrison and Bracken counties.  Tony brought up his recent trip to North Carolina and Virginia.  While the mountains are nice with their brutally long climbs, heavenly high views and hair raising descents, he reasoned that this was better.  Just off a recent trip to Park City, Utah I knew what he meant.  They payoffs are more frequent in Kentucky, and the price isn’t as high.  In the mountains you might climb up over one or two or three ridges in a long ride, here I literally lost count of the ridgelines, vistas and how many times I said wow.

Before we had left I mentioned the ride to a few friends on FB.  One replied asking, “how far and how fast?”  I had no idea.  Looking back, I seemingly clipped into the ride blind.  Maybe that made it even more enjoyable.  I didn’t care how fast or slow we rode, how much my legs hurt, how long it’d really take, how many miles, or how many climbs there’d be.  I really didn’t know where we were.  Sure I was somewhere around Falmouth, but I didn’t know where the next turn, or climb or sketchy chip and seal descent would be.  I really didn’t care.  I put my trust in two of my Kentucky buddies and like a movie, the ride just played out before my eyes.

Running a Corn Maze with a Jackhammer

I have serious going-postal thoughts that Cincinnati gets a big rain storm and a whole twisted network of mountain bike trails washes down the hillside into the Ohio River with a resounding splash.  KA-SPLOOOSH!  Buh-bye Tower Park. 

Oh my god it felt so good to say that I should have a cigarette and I don’t even smoke.  Certainly I can’t be the only one to feel this way.  Normally, I’m a very positive person and blogger.  Putting things down is not a trait I respect in people.   But, somebody had to say the baby is ugly.  Father, I confess, every time I see someone post on Facebook or talk about “hitting the tower” I can’t help but think I how much I hate riding Tower Park in Ft Thomas Kentucky.  Off with its head.  Time for a mountain bike Mulligan.

Before you berate me in the comments, hear my defense.  I feel like I’m a respected mountain biker and trail advocate in Cincinnati.  I have scars on my shins from trail tools.  At the same time, I’m pretty colorful and exaggerated.  Certainly I can’t be for real for having impure trail thoughts.  I admit it is a bit selfish.  Afterall, others obviously LOVE LOVE LOVE riding at Tower Park.  However, as a mountain bike trail, to me the only redeeming qualities of Tower Park are that it’s the closest trail to downtown Cincinnati and you get an incredible feeling of accomplishment and elation when you can clean the trail without dabbing.  

No doubt, if you can successfully eek your bike around the awkward, ugh, rocky, oof, rooty, twisted, steepness you can call yourself an expert rider.  I’ve felt that.  It’s wonderful.  I’ve cleaned the “otter slide” climb.  When the gods are smiling, I can get my triple-trailer of a 29er around the tight switchbacks up and down.  Tower’s rocks and roots and awkwardness, countless times, has given me the skill and confidence to take on larger mountain bike challenges like trails in Whistler B.C. (pictured Whistler's Rainbow Sproat Trail), Pisgah, West Virginia and the Mohican MTB 100.  When I first moved to Cincinnati, it was the first trail I rode.  It was where I first met the teammates and cycling friends I have today.  However, I seriously never have fun riding there.   To me, it’s nothing more than the mountain bike equivalent of boot camp.

The trail has all the flow of an 85 year old man standing in front of a urinal.  Go fast.  Stop.  Track stand.  Turn.  Dig for a grunter.  Chatter down the other side.  Hit the brakes.  Turn right.  No left.  Then right.  You’d have more fun running blindfolded through a corn maze with a jackhammer.  Secondly, aside from the switchbacks down to the river, you never feel like you’re going anywhere.  There are no real destination points.  Being on the Ohio River, you’d think there’d be a cool vista, a unique tree, a pretty creek, an odd shaped rock or something that tells you that you’ve gone from point A to point B.  Truth is, if you take your eyes off the trail for a second, you’ll be part of the landscaping. 

There are great trail organization in the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky area called CORA (Cincinnati Off Road Alliance) and KYMBA (Kentucky Mountain Bike Association.)  I’m a CORA member and have put in plenty of sweat equity on a number of local trails including Tower.  I’ve spent hours and hours with goofy hand tools carving new trails in Covington’s Devou Park, Cincinnati’s Mitchell Memorial, East Fork State Park and Caesars Creek.  I sent $50 to IMBA this year.  Great organizations and I'm all about putting my time in, certainly I'm at least deserving of an opinion.

Like an NA on the report card, Tower Park needs attention, not just a quick fix to a section or two but some IMBA-type love, a redesign, cosmetic surgery.  Bring out the views.  Highlight the flora and landscape.  Take me from the Tower to the vista, across the ridgeline and through the valley.  I want to loosen my grip on the bars and have a second to discover the tree with the odd knob or the giant boulder with the crazy moss, before the next tough section.  The trails in Whistler are crazy sick twisted tough too, but they also reward with a view, a waterfall, a section to relax the knuckles for a moment to appreciate the ride.  I want to enjoy the challenge Tower Park offers.  

I’m not pointing fingers.  There’s no blame.  Tower Park is still just the backyard neighborhood trail it’s always been.  It can be better.  While I’m no trail designer or grassroots organizer, I am a voice.  Like an ugly baby, it’s still a blessing to have challenging mountain bike trails within 15 minutes of downtown Cincinnati.  Let this be my first step toward making Tower a fuller mountain biking experience.  

To lean more about trail advocacy projects, visit these links and give generously:

Cincinnati Off Road Alliance (CORA), part of Ohio Mountain Bike Association (OMBA)

Kentucky Mountain Bike Association (KYMBA)

International Mountain Bike Association (IMBA)

Warning: Bike Jersey May Cause Hallucinations

Like I was a speedy splash of color, perplexed and off balance, she cringed, hunched and looked cockeyed upward at me. An Annie eyed guy, who I assumed was her boyfriend, held her by her upper arm to keep her from falling as she tried to make sense of the streaming colors of my approaching team kit. Both skinny, pale faced and red-eyed, they freaked out on my team kit, she more than him. What made it odder was that they didn’t say a word and instead contorted their bodies toward the railing to allow my trailing colors to pass. That happened 100 yards after I was caught off guard by Raccoon Man.

With an red-collared pet adolescent Raccoon clinging to his upper back, in a cool with the world voice he said, “no problem brother,” as I gave him a heads up that I was approaching. I silently worried that the Raccoon would freak out and jump on me or over the railing into the river. “Thanks man,” I said and looked at my clock. Yep. Sure enough. It was just past 8 p.m. again on the western pedestrian walkway of Cincinnati’s Roebling Suspension Bridge.

The bridge, a model for New York’s Brooklyn Bridge that locals call “the pretty bridge,” seems to lure a cast of castaways late in the evening, about the same time I wrap up my northern Kentucky rides and cross the bridge to head home before dark. As far as I can tell, the traffic of characters seems to travel southward into Covington, Kentucky this time of day. Judging that below the bridge on the Cincinnati side of the Ohio River is a makeshift homeless camp, I’m guessing that maybe a shelter or a soup kitchen opens on the Covington side of the bridge around 8:30 p.m. Maybe these folks are heading in for the night or to grab a free bite. As I digested my encounter while rolling past Great American Ballpark, home of the Reds, I couldn’t help but think that she could be on the cusp of needing medical attention. I looked around thinking I might see a police officer. I didn’t see one. So I, like the hallucinating couple and Raccoon Man, went about my business of getting to where I was going.

Wou Hou Devou - Devou Park Mountain Bike Trail Building

His chat turned to complaint.  Finally, the poor kid who wore sneakers to the Cincinnati Off Road Alliance (CORA) trail building day Saturday at Devou Park said he had to rest.  In a pair of big hikers I plodded on, initially to deliver empty buckets to the U-Give Cincinnati volunteers picking up garbage.  I soon realized I had passed the last trail group around section nine.  “Well, might as well see where this trail tops out,” I thought.  I put my bucket down to pick up on the way back and kept up a stiff pace.  A half hour and sections 10 through 19 passed quickly. 

From the trail head at the ball fields at the bottom of Sleepy Hollow Road, It was an hour round trip to the vista.  My hike of what will become the first mountain bike trails in Covington, KY’s Devou Park made me think more of Bent Creek in Asheville, NC or Brown County in Nashville, IN than local trails like Tower Park, Harbin Park or Mitchell Memorial. The trail is located on the west side of Sleepy Hollow Road.  While the amount of available land in Devou won’t match that of Bent Creek or Brown County, the topography certainly does.  I lost count of the switchbacks that crisscross the beginning of the climb.  Unlike most area trails, the switchbacks at Devou don’t end at the top.  That made me smile.  About 2/3’s up the first hill, the trail wraps around the south side and into a pretty valley with flowering

 trees.  Eventually there will be some Bent Creek-esque deep bench cuts in this steep valley.  After crossing a bridge-worthy creek which dropped nearly 6-7 feet from the trail markers above, a handful of switchbacks take you to the first real vista of the west side Cincinnati skyline.  Looking at my watch, then at the green trail flags wrapping around the bend, I shook my head in disbelief.  Just like the kid in sneakers, I had to turn back. 

This is going to be big.  Cincinnati is about to have its first trail system with a sustained mountain bike climb that will top out at what?  Nearly a mile and a half I guess.  I’m a strong hiker.  It took me a half hour to reach the top on foot.  On a bike, I’d hedge a guess that expert riders will be looking at a 12-15 minute climb and novices may be knocking on that half hour door.  There’s nothing within 20 miles of Cincinnati with a climb of more than a few minutes.  This is just to get to the top.  The trail keeps going around the 2^nd hill and on and on.  This is just the warm-up.  There’s enough land here for 15-18 miles of trail.  There are plenty of trail days ahead, plenty of time to learn that a Pulaski is a tool and Pulaski is a historic Chicago figure.  We’ll see you at the next Devou Park trail day. 

 POST SCRIPT-TRAILSIDE TREASURES:

While picking up trash, debris and relics along the path of the new trail at Devou Park, I came across this unusual apparatus.  At first I thought it might be a spur of sorts for horseback riding, but upon further inspection it appears to be some sort of tool that would hang from a chain or maybe some sort of candle sconce.  Any ideas?  Leave a comment below.