Flying Dog

Absolutely incredible ride today! We arrived late last night into Salt Lake and by the time we got our bags and headed out to be picked up it was 12:45........To add to the matter there was traffic we had to avoid on the way south in the middle of the night? Due to the delay we got to my inlaws at about 2am and asleep at a sucky 3am which was 6am for you east coast folks. Buzzer went off a long time later at 6am, yes that was a whole 3 hours of sleep, LuAnn had a 8:00 hair appointment in Bountiful so I scheduled to be dropped off at my good friend Brent's house. We arrived about 7:30 and checked out my rental bike which was actually surprisingly good and was a GT sensor 4.0. Yes it was a GT and I was looking it over and seemed like it would do the trick. Little did I know how well it would perform. We got locked and loaded and were off on our drive up to Park City to ride Flying Dog trail. This is a trail I have ridden a few times and decided it would be a great first ride.....I made an excellent choice. We arrived to the trailhead which must have been a cool 50 something degrees that felt amazing. We hit the trail and got to pedaling on some very fond memories I have made on the Glenwild trail. The mission today was to ride the loop counter clockwise which has never been done by me or Brent. So up the switchbacks we went as the sun rose slowly into my face, the switchbacks were a welcome warmup, switching back and forth at a comfortable climb rate, the lungs and legs were feeling great! Crested the top of the hill and shot down into fields of grass lining the tight knit single track, it was absolute heaven, I had a smile on my face that didn't leave for probably ten minutes. I mean this stuff was good, just good old smooth twisty single track winding through the meadow at a fast rate. It did last for awhile as we casually made our way to the cobblestone junction were we made our right and began to actually have to pedal up a slight incline again. The trail was so smooth I could not get over it, it made racking up the miles a breeze and I could not help but bang my head against the handlebars in disbelief that I no longer get to experience these great trails like I use to. But the show must go on and we slowly climbed out of cobblestone and onto flying dog which began to ascend the hill in front of us. Switching back and forth enough times to make you dizzy but it did so to allow for a very comfortable climbing rate that was not affecting my east coaster lungs. I was ripping uphill with ease, wether it was the 3 hour sleep or just pure adrenaline I didn't care, I was cranking away and no end in sight. After awhile up climbing the alpine forests and plant began to show they're faces letting me know the summit was coming soon. Which it did after about 30 minutes of straight climbing without a hint of break or downhill. I rested at the top and waited for Brent to make his way up and I took in the sights. Looked my bike over and was very pleased in it's performance. It was light, had good tube angle, suspension felt great, climbed great, braked good, was very very very happy dude. Waited at the top for something I have been waiting to do for the last year, RIP downhill! You can do this in CT for a very short time but it is nowhere near the same! I dropped into a 1700FT drop and enjoyed every second of it. Blasting through the alpines catching air on roller, riding wheelies on the smooth steep sections, slapping corners with my sidewalls it was incredible and was long overdue! Down down down and down we went, eventually after 20 minutes it leveled off and I had to make a very easy small effort to pedal uphill for a short while before I was level riding the hillside and then dropping into jeremy ranch to enjoy yet another downhill. To the car and I was on cloud 9. Words cannot explain how much I had missed that sensation and while I am sad that I no longer experience that on a daily basis I am incredibly thankful I had the opportunity to ride this morning. We then headed down mountain in hopes to set off on another ride but I decided it was more important to keep my wife happy and spend the rest of the day with her. Now for tomorrow morning ride where will it take me, I am on limited time unfortunately but I will still be on trail :)

Flying dog

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