For the first time since our ill-fated attempt to ride Skeggs at night, Bonzai, Romulus, and I hooked up to show the Skeggs Point (El Corte Madera) hills who's boss. Romulus is the resident Skeggs expert on the team, and he recently discovered some new sections of trail that he couldn't wait to show us.

We met at the main Skeggs lot at 7:30 AM -- that's right, 7:30; it may be painful for me, but it's worth it to get to ride with these two -- and then proceeded south about another two miles to another set of Skeggs gates. We've never been through these southern gates, so the energy was high. Adding to that state, we held a safety meeting to review routes, rendezvous points, and trail notes.

Our first section of trail was Steam Donkey and it was almost our last. With the energy of fresh legs, we charged down the trail only to quickly find that this was no beginner's section of trail. It was overgrown, rutted, and steep -- a bad combination for the very first part of a ride. I felt like I barely made it through. I couldn't keep up with Bonzai, who was leading the charge, and felt like I was about to crash every time I touched the brakes. Now, brakes should not have been an issue, because I picked up Blue Sugar from Rich last night and was armed with a fully functioning speed-reduction system. I got better as the ride went on, but I forgot that I needed some time to re-adjust to Blue. Turns out the unsteadiness was not limited to me; both Bonzai and Romulus admitted that the Steam Donkey had gotten their attention real quick!

At some point in this first blur of trail, I dumped it into a thorn bush yet again. Instead of falling all the way into it though, this time, I reached out and grabbed a tall stalk of the plant, a stalk furry with tiny thorns, to break my fall. I don't know if I had an allergic reaction such as with stinging nettle or whether I have a million tiny, colorless thorns in my hand, but my ring and pinky fingers on my right hand were on fire for the rest of the ride. It was like a combination of a burning sensation, like hydrogen peroxide on an infected wound, and the pins-and-needles sensation you get when your hand falls asleep. As of press time, the fingers are still burning.

Speaking of on fire, Bonzai was having a career downhill day. He is really learning alot from Romulus and is getting pretty damn smooth and fast on the descents. Of course, Romulus is still Downhill King of the Johnnies, but Bonzai is a quick study. Romulus deftly led us through the labyrinth of Skeggs trails like he's been riding them his entire life. Despite confusing discrepancies between the map and the trail signs, Romulus effortlessly navigated the spidery trail complex. I've ridden Skeggs probably 10-15 times and I still don't know where the hell I'm going in there. Romulus did have one little mishap, going high-side over the bike on the downhill side of the trail as he tried to negotiate a little bend in the trail that included a massive rut and some ill-placed rocks. His experience playing football paid off as he rolled nicely out of his five-foot fall and emerged relatively unscathed. Knowing how to fall is as important as any other mountain bike skill, maybe even more so. I also had a decent day, ripping some nice hill climbs as I tried to get used to doing hills on a soft tail again. My seatpost is slipping again, so I need to get that fixed, but other than that, I felt pretty good on the hills.

Blue didn't get on my good side today because the very first time I tried to shift to the small ring -- chainsuck. About five miles later I got chainsuck again. After fixing it very quickly (maybe five minutes total time elasped for both fixes), I resolved to work on the inner throw of the front derailler when I got home (didn't happen, but I'll get to it tomorrow). The double chainsuck did not prove to be all that time-consuming, but it did change the way I rode the rest of the ride. Usually, I like to push the smallest gears possible going up the hills in order to keep max RPMs. But after the second chainsuck, I got real leery about going to the small ring, so I did a lot of stuff in the middle ring that I wouldn't normally do. I was able to do most of the stuff, but it kind of took me out of rhythm a bit.

This was only a 20-mile ride, but it is critical to note that 20 miles at Skeggs is the equivalent of about 35 miles anywhere else.

Bonzai excised an embedded tick from his midsection at one point and we saw a few plump banana slugs, but other than that, the animalia was sleeping in this morning. Beautiful, clear, warm day. Skeggs can get pretty hot, but the temperature was perfect the entire time we were there. We saw some other bikers there, but considering the weather, the place was pretty empty. It pays to get there early.