Don't feel like Satan, but I am to them.

Neil Young - Rockin' in the Free World

And now for something sort of different. Last night my friend Mike and I decided to get out and do a mountain bike ride in Joaquin Miller Park. Actually, it was more than just a ride because we are both on the city's bike patrol. I have this personality that likes to tell people how to do things "the correct way", but if I indulge my personality's habits at home, I often learn what it's like to be an unwelcome guest sleeping on the couch.

Besides, what better way to get to tell people what to do than become a volunteer/quasi-know-it-all/I'm gonna tell on you for the Oakland cops? And I get to be riding my bike while carrying a police radio and channeling Barney Fife. We also get to wear red jerseys with "Oakland Bike Patrol" on the front and a police-like shield on the arm! Don't mess with us, beotches. We're mountain bikers!

(Side note: How mainstream and popular are the Simpsons? When Googling to check the spelling of Deputy Fife's name, I typed BAR and Barney Gumble popped up as first on the suggested searches. Sheesh.)

Joaquin Miller Park (hereafter referred to as JMP) is located in the Oakland hills above Hwy 13. According to Wiki, "Its 500 acres are heavily wooded with redwoods, oaks and pines, and include miles of hiking, biking and horseback riding trails." True, true, but let's note that these are miles of legal singletrack in the east bay that don't exist anywhere else nearby. Oakland means temperate conditions and year-round riding, and the city values us as a user group. Eat that bike haters!

Mike on the trail in Dimond Canyon. Looks like someone is doing some vegetation repair here. Keep in mind that this is a City of Oakland park. There is graffiti on the road supports, and you occasionally come across a vagrant. No big deal, the trail is awesome. Mike's got a baby due in the next few weeks, so this may be the last riding he does for a little while. Good luck with that, Mike.




Mike dropping a set of stairs with a right-hander half way through. Must I always mention that the video makes this stuff look pretty tame? Sure looks tougher at the top staring over the handlebars...


Smudge drops the rocky face of Big Trees Trail. It was getting dark under the trees, so I had to lighten the shot a bit with Photoshop. The angle of the decent was not, however, altered. It's a two-stager that lets you grab a little bit of brake if needed in the middle of the steeper sections (as sort of shown in the next video.)




This one also looks much worse in person than on video. The lack of lighting kills the rockiness of the face, and full suspension makes it easy. In reality, all you have to do is line yourself up straight, keep your speed under control with a little bit of brake-feathering, and don't hit any trees after the ample run-out. I rode this drop once upon a time on my cyclocross bike while commuting home from a previous job back in the day (and didn't crash.) Now that was a feat that proved to me that speed really is your friend. Or maybe luck. I'm still not sure which.

On the way home from JMP I grabbed a pizza for the family unit and imbibed an oatmeal stout wrapping up the day. Can I say this enough times? This is Oakland.

Stats: Just under 15 miles, 2.5 hours of riding, top speed of 35mph (ripping down Redwood Road on pavement, of course.) Funny how big, fat knobbies keep your terminal speed low enough to skip the big ring in almost all instances and just run a rock-ring instead.