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Definitely a cool place on a trials bike. I will say this about riding CP. I always had a goal set when I started. Which is not typical for me, because I pride myself on not having goals. I would get certain features in my head that I convinced myself I would attempt on that particular ride. All I would think about the entire ride was that specific feature, and not really pay attention to what I was riding. By the time I would get to whatever feature I was obsessed with that day, I would basically be so gassed that I wouldn't bother trying, but then I would think back on the ride and realize that since I wasn't paying attention to what I was doing, I had just cleared 3 other features I had never even considered trying. Long live Emma

cheap bastard here got a pack of PBR Extra. 6.5%, 6-pack of legit pint cans costs $6.50. it's drinkable and cheap. what more could you want?

That's a great pic. Lots of ways that can go bad.

My goals are fluid.

What about resolutions? I refuse to set myself up for failure.

Yes, my current goal is to never set a goal again.

The last time I was there, the bike had a motor...of the gas variety.

2 sub hour laps...SMH....I was always happy with sub day laps. haven't had a date with Emma for quite a few years now. I probably have no business out there anyway.

100% on that last point. I put 2.8 DHR and 2.6DHF on my hard tail and it feels like pedaling through mud. thanks for the help. I finally got this tire seated and after the pain in the ass I just went through I will definitely be switching on the next run.

Can't argue with that but it hasn't been an issue for me... so far.

Another fan of the trail boss but for the front. I have it paired with a worn Ikon on the rear. If the Ikon was fresh, I'd probably swap them.

Even though they suck to remove from the rim, I’ve really like my WTB’s. Vigilante 2.5 Light/Fast Tanwall on the front and Trailboss 2.4 Light/Fast Tanwall on the rear was a great chunky tire combo with the trail boss providing some improved rolling resistance while still grabbing well. Treadlife though was not super great on it though. I now have the same Vigilante up front but a WTB Ranger 2.4 Light/Fast Tanwall on the back. It’s a much faster tire but so far has done an excellent job on BCGB back trails. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Hipster. Did you bring it home on your fixie? 😉

I can only imagine how Suck the traffic has become in A-town since we left ... I really wouldn't mind finding some scenic road paths around Raleigh, for my Issac, but for now at least there's a lot of paved greenway that can be linked up. Not as good as singletrack but a great alternative if the trails are closed, even "those" trails.

Stop being such a crybaby, you still have one left...

Yep, all of this proves my point. Difficulty is what you make it. If you want more challenges start doing things differently.

Probably somewhere that shouldn't be promoted.

I've watched all of them, well done show.

Thanks for the warning!

Blackburn big switch, picked it up recently and really like it. Seems to be well thought out and stows in a wallet that goes well in shorts pocket. Big Switch

IMHO, maxxis EXO and EXO plus are pretty durable for here. From most aggressive rear down: DHR2 dissector aggressor rekon ikon Lot of people swear by the aggressor as a good rear tire for CTX. If i could run wider than 2.3 i'd be all over a DHF/Rekon combo. Had DHF/Griffin and recently swapped to hans D & rock razor with an insert. Night and day for rolling resistance. My other bike has 2.6 DHF & DHR with insert and feels like the parking brake is on🤣

"ah, those were the days" Brutal with all the wet, but taught me how much you only really needed to watch out for the black clay. well, that and so many dang morning rides with Daisy out at CP. I think one year I went insane and did over 200 morning laps. someone should dig up an old finisher list from one of the CP-TT events ... I remember there being a few - just a few - 30 minute laps recorded. Nuts.

FWIW, I've 46t largest cog on both my mtb, one is a 10spd using a Sunrace HG type cassette and 32t ring with 165mm cranks (hardtail) and the other is my main mtb that has 11spd e13 xD type cassette and 30t ring with 165mm cranks (RIP9); NC (east of the mountains) doesn't have the long climbs either and next spring i'll see how well it works for me in Pisgah but for the short steeps I do have it's fine. I also changed Maria's old Switchblade from 3x9 to 1x10 using the same SunRace+SRAM GX/X01 setup and it works fab for her. I just can't see the value in spending the $ for 12 speed of any type at this point, I find the SRAM GX rear-d with X01 or X11 shifter work just peachy for me, i'm sure there's nicer in some ways but this stuff is durable and cost effective. To me drivetrain tech has advanced a fair amount, of course the vendors are shipping it more on the newer styles, but using reasonable quality level components to build and not letting it get all crapped-out in muck is a better way to have a well running drivetrain than spending a kilobuck. Not that it matters here, but my 10spd Campy Veloce drivetrain from 2006 that is on my road bike still runs perfect. At the rate I use that bike though it'll probably only get replaced when the whole bike is replaced. Still, good quality + maintenance does pay off.

Being humbled by being outpaced by riders a decade or two leaves a mark for sure. Had a 70+ y/o hiker pass me on a fire road in NM when i first started.........brutal. Probably three years or so since @Chiefand my wife and I hit CP so who knows what direction we did or how hard it was then vs now. Seemed like a lot of it was unrideable and was totally blown out by the trials motos. Wife wanted nothing to do with emma after that. Would be open to revisiting but it's way, way, way down on the list. Sometimes this is just about impossible to qualify/quantify. What's difficult to some, is cake to others. Wife gets lost in the whole trail difficulty designations all the time. She convinced herself that black diamonds are too hard and she wants to only ride blues. We've been on some blues in AZ that were clearly blacks and some blacks that were somewhere between green/blue. Erosion and maintenance also has a lot to do with this too. In the end, I just stopped telling her what they were. I really like where builders are currently going with signage. If i see mandatory gaps/drops I know that we aren't going on it. If it's black just "because" i have no issue dragging my wife on it. It's just so subjective to the capabilities of the end user. I can run a double black that has steeps/tech/drops, but i'll end up in an ambulance on double black jump lines. With the exception of cat, (which is not open access) most of the stuff here is the same. Cat really pushes not only skillset/bravery but also fitness for the climb back up. I'd put that at the top of my list of local white whales.

Also, the more I think about it, speed around CP is not necessarily the biggest indicator of a challenge. In cool weather, back in my prime, I could do 3 laps at a time. Of course those would be 1 hour+ laps, more like 4 hours for the whole thing. THAT is a bigger challenge in my mind. There was a year, a long time ago, where it rained every goddamn week. I think it was an El Nino year (Spanish for "the Nino.") In the old mojo days, Bear, TrailSurfer and a few others of us had a standing CP Sunday ride that was probably almost every week because of the rain. Once we even rode in the rain because it started the first mile in and we really wanted to ride - you could do it back in those days. Typically there were two laps so we probably did 50-100 CP laps that year alone. Oh, and another great endurance challenge is ride to the ride. From my house in Central Austin I would ride to CP, do a lap and come home. That got me a good ~20 miles and tons of climbing. I really miss that place but with all of the solo riding I have to do in these covid days, the wife is not happy about me going out there.

Most of my sub-hour runs were ~2015 vintage so I was probably on the border between 40 and 50. https://www.strava.com/activities/786276063 That one was 52 minutes, I think it was my best. Gave up on trying to beat those numbers, the problem with trying to do the sub-hour CP is that you are really hammering constantly. It takes the fun out of it. Now that I have a few under my belt I am more likely to do a 1:15-1:30 and enjoy myself, maybe session a few things, maybe stop and take a break. #OldManProblems

Loving Alice in Borderland.

So who recognizes this spot or this rider?