Group A+, and Group M

Hey just wanted to let you all know that it is now upon us to spend some time off-the-road in the next few weeks. As you all may know, or have heard, a couple of us "Heavy Hitters" are primarily Mountain Biking guru's. Since it is getting later in the summer months "ALREADY", we have to begin to prepare those muscles, that we dont really excersize while road riding, for the beating we will subject ourselves to on the trails of upcoming events. The one that a few of us will be hitting will be the 6-Hours of power in Ellicottville, New York. This is a tag team relay event (or solo, if you so desire) in which two persons riding of an on for Six Hours straight, on the slopes and trails of Holiday Valley Ski-Resort.

I want to introduce to all the "Group-M" which will be a Mountain Biking group that will be meeting on Sunday Mornings at various places every weekend. Now I do want to say that I cannot guarantee the pace or place of every ride. The pace, even when we would like to keep it slow, doesn't always remain constant. Since those of us who ride together off road have such a passion for speed and dirt, we all tend to force the pace and usually someone will be suffering. If you would like to join us you are more than welcome to do so. Just remember that our pace can get brutal at times, and we all love to blaze the trail. I will do what I can to converse with John about posting our mountain bike rides for sundays on the web so that if you are interested you may join, or even get a ride.

My next topic will be the "Group-A+". I was told two weeks ago that "we need to have a group that rides faster." I did not say much about it at the time, but thought about it over the last two weeks. Maybe we should change things to "A, B, & C and the M of course", in essence giving us the Fast A, Intermediate B, and the Cruising C, with the adventurous M's of course. I will have to talk with "Big John" on that. However, I want to introduce this week the A+ on thursday to start. I will take out whomever would like to go out with the idea in mind of working a little harder than normal to test our limits and increase our potential. What I am talking of is getting a couple of people together that would like to increase their potential so that on competition day they may be a little further than the guy standing next to them on the line. We can do some hill repeats, sprints, intervals, tempo riding, etc. I just want to make clear that whatever we do this will not be an easy ride. So if that is not your goal on that day, dont do it! Trust me on this though, whatever we do as the A+ group, you will benefit from it, I promise.

I would like to also back up PB (now gonna call her Peanut Butter) on her post. I cannot say enough for what everyone has collectively become a part of. There have been many occassions in the past twenty years of my life as a cyclist that people have tried to start some type of riding group in the area. None have stayed. I would really love to see this group of people become a long and lasting thing for many moons to come. You have no idea how awesome it is to see people getting together to ride continuously. I mean I have spent thousands and thousands of miles on the road and hundreds of miles off road, and have done so many of them alone. When you have people to ride with things always seem to be that much more motivating to you. I know that sometimes you dont always get what you want out of riding with a group, but those would be the days that you should be alone. When you don't really feel so much like going out there and sweating it out, or it is too cold........all us freaks that will.........should be the motivation to help you do so. Not to mention, people that ride, no matter the personality, will always have something to talk about. You can never be in a group of people that ride and not find something to speak about. You will always feel at home with them, and always be capable of having a common ground.

Looking forward to riding the 100 this weekend with as many of you as possible. Hopefully I wont feel to frisky and decide to jump on any fast wheels and dissappear again. Also looking forward to getting a pretty good plus ride in on thursday and a nice day on tuesday. Try to encourage all you know to attend the rides this week and next week so that we may encourage all to attend the up coming Tour Festivities in July starting from the Bike Shop in Hermitage.

See You all soon....

Harmsway