East Coast Weekend

Baltimore ("Charm City", according to the sides of its buses) has me in its clutches as I groggily sit here typing.  5 hours of driving (starting hours after I had intended--does that ever happen to you?) got me to SLC for a brief reunion with Mary and Nils, with whom I left Rue the Wunderdog, and then 4 hours of rear-end-numbing flight time landed me on the Eastern seaboard for the second time in a calendar year.  Having spent my whole life west of the Mississippi, spending a weekend this close to the Atlantic is a novel experience.

Steve and Kristi at the harbor.  Didn't have the motivation to go explore the National Aquarium in the background.  Probably should've done that.

How is it that I'm in Charm City in March?  Cuz-in-law Robin is celebrating her wedding this weekend!  Big, fun family affair.  Erica is a matron-of-honor (she quickly corrected me when I referred to her as a "maid") which means I'm spending the weekend hanging out with brother-in-law Steve and his girlfriend, Kristi.  So far, so good--nice stroll around the harbor under a warm sun, afternoon sauna and nap...  And the party hasn't even started.

But in addition to Robin's wedding, big news in my cycling world: the new Pivot LES frame arrived!  Thanks to the crew at Fitzy's I had just enough time to build it up before driving out of town on Thursday.

Scott set me up in one of the stands and gave me free run of the tools at the shop--what a guy.  Then he and Lloyd walked me through the parts I didn't know how to do and left me to my own devices for the rest.

Beautiful in black--this rocket has been my wet dream for the last 6 months.  Now with American Classic Singlespeed wheels, cockpit by Loaded Precision Products, XT brakes (Ice, Ice, Baby...), a smattering of parts from Crank Brothers.  Mmm, good.

And the new XX-1 cranks?  Unbelievable.  Works of art.

  

After torquing the last bolt, it weighed-in at 20.4lbs. with pedals, bottle cage, Friendly Hello-bell, and air in the tires.  All in the hopes of helping me get across the finish line a little bit faster.  The only thing it's missing is an 18-tooth Kick-Ass Cog from Endless Bikes.  On the way, didn't quite arrive in the mail before my departure.  Bummer.

Regardless, it all got built just in time to take it to the desert for a few days on dirt before the True Grit 100.  I know, I know--who races 100 miles in March?  It's a week away, and I haven't ridden a mountain bike since November.  I've done one ride over 2 hours in the last 4 months, and the only two rides I've done outside were at irrationally-slow speeds on a fatbike.  Yes, I'm fully relying on the skiing I've been doing to produce some sort of endurance fitness, hopefully enough to get me across the finish line in competitive shape.

Now I just have to wait 3 more days before we get to the desert and I can ride the new dream-machine.

Back to the weekend's happy nuptials...