Another White rim in the Hopper

The Western State College cross country team raced nationals in Joplin, MS this past weekend so it felt appropiate that we thought of Coach Vandenbushe and Jen Michel while we were riding. It was Jen's first nationals as the new coach and with much respect and anticiaption we sent good thoughts their way while we where pedalling.
Our white rim group met at 6am at the Mineral bottom rd trailhead. Now whatever is going on with our indian summer, we took with wide open arms. It was fantastic to start in a 38f degree morning sans all the clothes that normally require later shedding and lugging around for the rest of the day.
Dropping in the canyon to mineral bottom Brian and Seth where nearly taken out by a flying mountain goat launching from 50 ft above them, It hit the road amid a flurry of loose rocks, bobbled, crashed and re launched off the other side.
The mountain goat followed right after we'd seen a herd of wild horses. Pretty cool.

There where no questions about the bright pink feathers malted along the road. (they couldn't be natural?). In the afternoon we met with a park ranger who nearly fined Lisa for shedding. But when he saw the occasion he let her off lightly. By lunch time we where joined by the Ricky G group of riders who had camped at the bottom of schafers climb and gotton it out of the way first thing. Life really doesn't get any better than an afternoon still of riding with 20 of your friends, in the desert, when the views are amazing in every direction.

To finish the ride we needed to ride up the canyon wall on Schafers climb. Jeff Irwin hammered Schafers Climb in his big ring. Brian cleaned it on Garrisons 2 to 1, 69er Single speed. I hiked 95 % and would have sold my 29er singlespeed for cheap cheap cheap at the time. Laura A rode much faster than I walked this year. Seth W rode his longest ever on a MTB as did Spenser P. Steve R made it 6 in a row. Jay just made it look easy. We got in by sunset. It was a fairly decent day!