Rain Out and belated Memorial Day Riding Report

Memorial Day weekend turned into a fantastic riding weekend. The forecasted rain did not arrive on Saturday and Sunday allowing plenty of singletrack riding. While I had planned on traveling to French  Lick on Saturday, reports from the ground suggested lots of mud.  I didn’t want to travel to BCSP due to the high traffic on the trails from the holiday weekend.

Instead I went to Versailles State Park in south eastern Indiana. Versailles has 13 miles of fantastic trail but only a fraction of the use that BCSP gets.

 

The bustling Versailles State Park trailhead. All two of us enjoyed the trails.

I saw only one other mountain biker on the entire trail, plus three BMX’ers with no helmets. I also saw several campers in jeans and windbreakers (and no helmets) out for a spin and about to get into some of the more serious singletrack. I tactfully suggested they be careful and wear helmets before trying those trails.

Versailles is also a DINO race later in the year and I wanted to ride the course which runs opposite of 24 Hours of DINO route. I’m glad I did as there were a few places in the trail that I’ll keep in mind for the race. The trail itself was a bit muddy in spots, but generally very nice and the ride was a blast.  I put particular emphasis on pushing any descent that I came to since I tend to be a bit too conservative on downhills.

I ran across these interesting…things near a picnic table on the Grandview Loop:

I’m guessing some sort of mushroom or fungi. Each one was the size of a dinner plate and about five or six inches high.

And of course, the obligatory single track photo:

 

And the remains of the best post ride snack ever:

 

 

I was expecting rain Sunday but the morning dawned cool and partly cloudy but with no rain in sight, so  I took the singlespeed over to Fort Ben for a few laps. The Fort had been a mud pit last time I was there, but trail work targeting the muddy spots and warm weather had mostly resolved this. Overall a nice day, although I saw very few bikers. Heck, I even saw more birders than mountain bikers. Of course, the Indianapolis 500 was that morning so people may have had someplace else to be.
 

Monday morning a heavy rainstorm came through turning the red light on all local trails. Instead, I went for an early ride over to Crown Hill to beat the Memorial Day crowds. The cemetery was beautiful and the weather was perfect for an easy spin. However, I ran into many signs like these:

 

I ride through Crown Hill quite often, but rarely do I see more than one or two cyclists in the cemetery. I chased down an employee in a golf cart and asked why the signs had been posted.  He said that they had been having problems with large group rides and impromptu racing recently (although I suspect they were assuming a group ride was a race). He specifically noted a 20+ group ride earlier in the week which interfered with a funeral procession. He said I was fine since I was riding by myself.

However, another employee in a huge Mercedes (manager?) stopped and said that he had kicked out a group of four cyclists yesterday for riding too fast and cited liability issues related to potential injuries. He also emphasized that Crown Hill was private property. No need for further explanation of that statement. Memorial Day is a busy day at the Crown so I can understand concern for that day, although it sounds like there might be a crackdown on group rides (small ones included) even outside the holiday. Plus the guy driving the German tank seemed to be keen on lecturing me about the problems with cycling and kept talking over me whenever I tried to say something. I got the feeling he was looking for an excuse to kick me out so I wrapped up my ride and got out of there. I actually went back to Crown Hill on Wednesday for a ride, and although the signs were still there, I s no employees patrolling and only three cars from a distance.  Hopefully Monday was a one time experience.

And now the rain out portion of the post. As of this afternoon, the Brown County DINO race for this Sunday has been rained out. Besides being a great race venue, I was anxious to get this season going after the two previous races were also rained out so I am in a bit of a pissed off mood. Is it drought time yet? Anyway, now the race season will begin in French Lick in two weeks. I will be there come hell or high water. Seriously. Even with high water they will still have that race.