{"id":36,"date":"2008-03-02T20:58:48","date_gmt":"2008-03-03T04:58:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mountainbikebill.com\/blog\/?p=36"},"modified":"2013-02-18T21:33:23","modified_gmt":"2013-02-19T05:33:23","slug":"pushing-my-luck","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mountainbikebill.com\/blog\/?p=36","title":{"rendered":"Pushing My Luck"},"content":{"rendered":"

I have been fighting off the early signs of a cold so I opted to do something non-epic to for my weekend ride.\u00a0\u00a0 I had driven by the Ronald Casper Wilderness Park dozens of time on my way out to the San Juan Trail<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0I had heard that it was an okay ride but all fireroads for mountain biking.\u00a0\u00a0 I figured I would be stopping often to take pictures so a bit of minor chest congestion should not be too big of a deal.\u00a0 The chest congestion ended up not being much a factor at all.\u00a0 But something else would be.<\/p>\n

\"Windmill\"<\/p>\n

\u00a0I started\u00a0off from the Old Corral\/Windmill area and took the Bell Canyon trail.\u00a0 I had barely gotten on the bike when I spotted a group of deer.\u00a0\u00a0They certainly\u00a0knew I was there so I kneeled down and looked away from them and acted like I was looking for something on the ground.\u00a0\u00a0 Feigning that I was\u00a0uninterested in them was\u00a0enough to calm them enough that they cautiously\u00a0 moved along the edge of\u00a0the meadow gettting closer to me.\u00a0 I spent a good 10 minutes here before they moved along.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Deer\"\u00a0<\/p>\n

After this things\u00a0went along pretty nicely.\u00a0\u00a0With all of the rain we have been having there was green everywhere.\u00a0\u00a0 I eventually made my way to the Oso Trail and\u00a0started climbing a ridge.\u00a0\u00a0This trail turned steep in quite a few sections, but it was\u00a0cool as\u00a0views of Santiago, Los Pinos and Surgarloaf peaks were often\u00a0seen in the distance.\u00a0 I was a little over\u00a0half a mile from\u00a0reaching Badger Pass when I heard a loud bang and immediately felt the rear tire go flat.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I thought “No Big Deal, I know\u00a0how to boot a sidewall tear”.\u00a0\u00a0 It did not take long to find the tear and it was not good.\u00a0\u00a0 I had about a\u00a0two\u00a0inch split in the tire\u00a0just above the bead.\u00a0\u00a0 Not a good\u00a0place at all.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0After taking inventory of all my stuff, I was also a bit bummed.\u00a0\u00a0 About a month or so ago, I had used up all my duct tape\u00a0helping someone get a busted\u00a0chainstay patched up enought to limp home and had fogotten to replenish my tape.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Badger<\/p>\n

I ended up using a really\u00a0big patch on the inside of the tire with strips of first aid tape to help spread the load out.\u00a0 I also still\u00a0had a tireliner\u00a0still in the tire from a dersert ride that I shifted around to the side.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Once I inflated the\u00a0tire it was obvious\u00a0the patch was pretty marginal.\u00a0 I\u00a0deflated the\u00a0tire and added two\u00a0small patches on the\u00a0outside as well as some more first aid tape to the outside of the tire.\u00a0 This ended up working better as when I inflated the tire (with much less air than I normally use) there was much less bulging.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I\u00a0had little confidence that this patch was going to\u00a0hold and\u00a0had already\u00a0committed to about a four mile hike back to my truck.\u00a0\u00a0 Looking at the map I figure\u00a0it would be only be marginally longer to take Badger Pass down to the San Juan Creek Trail and then back to my truck vice going back the way I came.\u00a0\u00a0 I could at least see some new stuff on my way back.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Flowers\"<\/p>\n

So I gingerly made my way down Badger Pass as I\u00a0wanted to flex that sidewall as little as possible.\u00a0 Badger Pass ended up being really pretty with all of the growth.\u00a0\u00a0I knew it was a fireroad but in places it\u00a0was\u00a0vitrually a hard to follow singletrack.\u00a0 The poppys and lupines where really going off through as well.\u00a0 It was quite a treat.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Flowers\"<\/p>\n

\u00a0Once I had made my way down to the San Juan Creek Trail, I was amazed to see how well the patch was holding up.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The San Juan Creek Trail (aka\u00a0fireroad) was pretty non-eventual\u00a0as well as mostly fairly crappy as it\u00a0was very close to highway 74.\u00a0\u00a0 Once back\u00a0near the park entance and\u00a0back on the pavement I rolled back towards my truck.\u00a0\u00a0 The rear tire was\u00a0slowing loosing some air so I stopped and carefully\u00a0put some more back in.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I felt really lucky at the point having averted a sizable hike.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I stopped at the junction of the East Ridge Trail as I really wanted to check out as much of the park as I could at this\u00a0was on the list.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Since I had already mentally committed for a\u00a0hike today, I\u00a0figured what the heck,\u00a0there are a couple of trails that I can hike back on if the\u00a0tire blows and only have\u00a0a few miles to deal with.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So up\u00a0the East Ridge I went and worked\u00a0over to the Sunrise trail.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0At the bottom of Sunrise I had to put\u00a0some more air in the tire and bulging and increased some.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0Hmmmm, I only have about a mile back to the truck from here.\u00a0\u00a0 I really wanted to\u00a0check out the Starr Rise trail up to the\u00a0West Ridge Trail.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0I decided to push my luck some\u00a0more and went up the Starr Rise trail.\u00a0\u00a0I was loosing air a little quicker\u00a0now and I need to pump up again when I reach the West Ridge.\u00a0\u00a0 I\u00a0thought heading north would be risking too much,\u00a0but I was will to push my luck\u00a0again\u00a0and headed south the West Ridge trail.<\/p>\n

\"trail\"<\/p>\n

There were some more nice views to be seen from the West Ridge and I took it out to the end of the park.\u00a0\u00a0 The bulging was getting bad now.\u00a0 I had seen pretty much everything I wanted to so it was time to head back.\u00a0\u00a0 I pumped up again when I got back to the Bell Canyon trail and it looked like it was going to go at any second.\u00a0\u00a0 I worked by way back to towards the truck and sure enough it popped.\u00a0\u00a0 The cool thing was that I was exactly half a mile from my truck.\u00a0\u00a0 It was still really pretty out and I felt really great about the timing of the flat.\u00a0\u00a0 I had planned on a four mile hike and ended up only doing half a mile.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I got in a total of 17 miles of riding out at Caspers with 13 of it being on a booted, patched, and taped tire.\u00a0 I feel quite lucky!<\/p>\n

More Stuff Like This<\/h3><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t Peacock Flats Loop + Video<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t Snooping around in the Laguna Mountains<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t GoPro HD3 Shakedown Ride<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t
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<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t Toro Peak Access<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/a>\n\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n<\/div>