Whoosh

Yesterday I went out for the Wakefield ride and JoeP was the only one there. I guess the cold has scared most of the people off to the comfort of their home in front of the fireplace. No big deal, Wakefield's too small anyways. Less people equals less traffic jams.

Billy pulled in five minutes after I got there so now we had a threesome. Saddled up soon after, and we were off. The trails were still a little damp and muddy in many spots, and it kinda sucked. Joe was going at his usual spritely pace which I dug, but Billy was having issues with his bike so we kept dropping him. Either he didn't like the pace we were doing or just didn't feel good, so he split off when we went to the bowl.

I led on that side, and after a few staccato starts, I got into a rhythm. I tried to push harder as we wound our way up and down the hillside because I had a feeling I was going too slow for Joe. Not surprisingly, he was right behind me the whole time. I kept taking the correct turns at a fast pace, so we didn't duplicate any trails. Also, the leaves are starting to give way to the trail as the traffic pushes them aside so it's become more difficult to get lost.

For a few minutes in the ducking and diving between the trees I achieved that highest state of mountain biking: flow. You've got all the pedal strokes timed right, you float over the trail, and everything whooshes in front of you and disappears in your periphery: flow. If you aren't getting flow on your rides, you need to push harder, dive deeper, and jump higher. It's why I've been addicted to mountain biking for the last thirteen years. I'm a flow junkie and I'm not giving it up any time soon.