Porcupine Rim, Take 1

Porcupine Rim's got something for everyone: technical climbing, fun scrambling, little hucks, big hucks, tough downhills, easy downhills, singletrack, sand, action photo ops, panoramic photo ops, precipitous drops, and the occasional quad-bruising root to fall on and fuck up your next few days of riding vacation that you've been daydreaming about for months.

Monday. First major ride of the week. The continental breakfast at the hotel leaves something to be desired, though Mota seemed to be pleased eating half a dozen donuts. The hotel provides THE worst coffee in town, since they seem to be the only ones making it from a can, while everyone else serves fresh, locally roasted coffee to order.

On to the ride ...

It's difficult to imagine riding to the trailhead from town and completing the loop. Even shuttling this ride is exhausting, so I have to put my shuttlers-are-wimps elitism on hold. It's definitely deserving of its reputation as one of the classic rides of the area. By "area", I mean Earth.


Kev and I each took a while to get all the cylinders firing, with our new, strange bikes and our respective broken ribs. Not to mention that it's rough having to warm up on a climb. So it was ironic when we all looked up to find the source of the "THUD --- GRRrrooooaannnnn" about 2/3 of the way up to the peak. Mike had crashed. Mike Morton, the shit-talker of shit-talkers, the bane of Pat's riding reputation and the principle perpetuator of all stories Pat-endo, had gone over his bars. None of us was ready to give him shit, though, because he had actually hurt himself, falling on a root that might have actually contributed to his trip over the bars. Such a fall so early in the first ride was not a good mood to set for a week of riding.
Nonetheless, he soldiered on and finished the ride, and then cursed me and Pat for taking too long to return to the foot of the trail with the car and pain remedies: a bucket of iced beer, a bag of ice, and a bottle of ibuprofen.

Pat, on the other hand, seemed to be unfazed. If anything he actually seemed charged up, like it was retribution or something. He stole Mike's Mojo and rode the hell out of it that day. It was a drastic change from his cramping up and nearly dying on the San Juan trail the week before. He made several passes at each photo op huck spot, going bigger each time. These performances even warrant redundant picture postings.



Last thing: we saw the biggest idiot on a bike in all of North America (at least, of those not already elected to office). Some dude, presumably a retarded local, passed us on the single track section with the huge exposure riding without a helmet. Keep an eye out for him in the Darwin awards, or in Congress. He looks like one of those kooks in the 70's ski movies with a bushy moustache and a sunburned scalp and the big blue blocker sunglasses, but he's on an red, unmarked full suspension ride.