Intro

Mountain biking is a drug.  A horrible, wonderful, time-sucking, beautiful drug I discovered five years ago.  And for that, I have to thank an old man and the rediscovery of a junker bike from 1995.

Fresh out of college, I found a great job in a different town.  It was only 30 miles away from the city I knew all my life, but distance is immaterial when moving away from nearly everyone you know.  That, and my friends were too cheap to make the drive to hang out, and I was sick of driving to them.  I don't make friends easily and didn't know many people outside of work.  I was getting bored with all of the free time on my hands.  I tried to just work more, but I couldn't stand forcing myself to stay in the office longer than necessary without extra pay.  I needed something to occupy my time, but had no idea what to do.

One day, I was out on a sales call with a co-worker when we drove by a bike store.  He commented about stopping in there some time to check out their bikes, and told me he wanted to try mountain biking.  Considering Kansas has the complete opposite of mountains, I was interested in why he wanted to try this.  He told me what little he knew, in that it was more of off-road biking, and less of the insanity of flying down hill at 70 mph many people imagine.  In the conversation I brought up the fact I had a '95 Specialized Sportrock.  To my surprise, that was a perfect beginner bike in his mind.  That got me to thinking...

After a few more conversations with him, another employee, and the local bike shop (thank you Sunflower Bike), I found a good, easy trail not five minutes from my work.  So, I struggled with taking off the front wheel and loading the bike up in the car, and at 5 PM that day, I ran to the car and jetted over to the trail.  After struggling to get the wheel back on, and certain it would fall off and bring me to a sudden end, I was heading on the trail.  It started off smooth enough, but I shortly hit the first descent, if you could call it that.  It was a 15 ft. off camber decline with a small rock and turn at the bottom.  I stopped, examined, held my breath, and went for it.  I then promptly went over the bars in slow motion from sitting too high and  too far forward.  I was hooked!  I got back up, made sure no one was laughing at me, and that was it.

After that season, I determined my old bike was not in the proper condition for riding offroad anymore.  Things were loose and falling off, the front wheel was bent, and maintenance was quickly exceeding the $60 the bike was worth.  So, I decided I needed a new bike.  With a bit of shopping around (and a little pleading with my now wife), I picked out a rather sweet bike.  Then, we had the wonderful surprise of learning about our first son.  I managed to get through the next season, but in early September, I woke up one morning to the wonderful birthday present of our bikes (my wife got one as part of the pleading) stolen from our balcony.  A second story balcony of an apartment complex with no access except from our apartment.  Apparently, someone figured out the bikes were worth something and scaled the wall to the balcony, then hauled them over the side and back down.  We never found them...

I was left with no bike for two years, all the while torturing myself by looking at ones in the stores, looking online, and thinking about riding.  My one hobby was gone, and due to funds, or a lack thereof, I couldn't do anything about it.  I thought about giving up.  You know, taking it as a sign that I should stop.  But, I kept at it.  Eventually, I picked up a nice frame and fork.  It was a Canfield Yelli Screamy and a Fox F120.  Sadly, I did the math, and it would take me two years to complete a decent build.  I decided to cut my losses by selling the frame and fork this past summer, then using the proceeds and some other saved up cash to get a sweet deal on a Turner RFX.  It's a beast of a bike and a bit over-engineered for most trails here, but it's a bike, and a fun one at that!  The rest is the future, soon to be the present, soon to be history.

So, why the title "Chainring Bites"?  Well, there's a little story to go with that as well, and the scars on my leg to prove it.  I was riding on a fast, flowy trail one day a few years ago, and was really making a go at it.  I was on pace to make the 10 mile loop in sub 40 minutes, a personal best for me and a respectable time for a relative noob.  The trail had other plans, though.  On what had been a mostly dry trail after a light rain a couple of days prior, there was a large patch of mud in the middle of the trail.  On a sweeping, fast turn.  A sweeping, fast, turn will little visibility of the dirt.  I was railing through the corner, just having a blast and flying, when I see the mud about 10 ft. in front of me.  I hit the brakes to slow down, but it was too late and I caught the mud with my wheel turned.  My bike slid, then hit the other side of the mud and decided to catch traction and zoom off in the other direction.  My body had other plans.  The bike won the fight, and I came down with my calf, right onto the chainrings, resulting in a few nice gashes up my right calf, and I had to pedal the remaining 3 miles back to the car with a sore leg and blood running down into my shoe.  I went home and cleaned up, but not before my wife noticed.  I can't recall what she said, but I fairly certain it was along the lines of "idiot" with some eye rolling and head shaking.  Yet, she loves me enough to still let me ride!  Anyway, I call that my "chainring bite".