12.1.13 First day of SNOWBOARDING SEASON

It has been a long 10 months that i haven't been able to snowboard but luckily it has been that long since i had actually injured myself the last day of the season. I needed the rest to heal my leg and the first day back it feels great. I spent the day with one of my friends at Liberty Mountain Resort which is only about 55 minutes away from where I live so it is a timely commute. We left our houses at 8:30 am and got there at about 9:30 am ready to snowboard to our hearts content. I had actually expected the terrain to be very slushy and not packed considering it was supposed to be a warm day and the sun was out. It was however a GREAT day out. We spent the bulk of the early morning on getting re acclimated to snowboarding since we haven't done so in a while and most of the day really just riding the lifts.

We started out on Sneaky Pete and Nova for some time because my friend had just got his new gear this year and wanted to test it out.We then headed over to a slightly harder trail called Dipsy Doodle and spent some good times there blasting through the first parts of the trail. After a while that got tiring because of the straight away that they have mid way through the trail where it is almost flat and you spend the bulk of your time straining your back leg to keep yourself from catching a bump or sliding. So instead a few runs after we still took Dipsy Doodle but we transitioned into a shortcut toward Whitneys way which is a Blue trail. We had some fun throughout the high speeds you catch riding these trails. My friend ended up not being able to go many runs because his bindings were slightly loosened so he took a break while i went for my final run. I went through Upper Heavenly and went through Whiteneys Way which was a blast. In the end however i realized my boots were not fitting me well since whenever i try to make turns my heel would move and slowly slide out. So i need to get that fixed ASAP so i can go through the rest of the season comfortably. If you guys haven't ridden before or want to try Liberty their website is http://www.libertymountainresort.com/ and they offer lessons with rentals and a lift ticket for some lifts for only 39 dollars until Christmas rolls around. This offer is also good at the two other ski resorts affiliated with Liberty called WhiteTail and Roundtop. Try to get on the slopes and HAVE FUN

Lucky Day NEW NEW BIKE RACK

I was seemingly just browsing craigslist a couple of days ago and found a new bike rack that fits a small niche of cars that was mine exactly. It was a Nissan Xterra 2000-2004 interior bike rack that fit my 2004 Xterra exactly and works like a dream. I was getting tired of having to work about my bikes when i go to eat after biking and i was still concerned about my bike moving or getting damaged as i put it on my bike rack. There was no security on my bikes as i left it on my car and i felt the bikes were really hampering my trunk and seemed like it would damage the trunk sooner or later. So i decided i would just look at Craigslist for the heck of it and lo and behold i came across a gem in which a dude was selling exactly what i was looking at for a price that seemed to be a scam. He was selling it for only 25 dollars and it seemed a little too good to be true but i ended up just going. What the heck why not? It ended up being a pleasant interaction and the dude sold it to me for only $20 and i was excited to use my rack. I haven't been able to use my interior bike rack since the cold weather and the rain that's been coming through but i hope i can get to use it sometime soon. Here is a picture of the rack and an example.

NEW SNOWBOARD RACK

I looked online for some time now and finally found a snowboard rack that i would like that would fit great for my car. I found the Yakima Big Powderhound online for a very decent price from a seller on eBay and ended up having to piece together a couple of the other accessories/attachments. All in all i think i spent around 70 dollars for everything from just the rack, the mounts, and the locks. This rack was built to hold up to 4 snowboard and 6 pair of skis and it seems like a great fit for me and my friends. This solves the problem of having to put the equipment inside and leaving no space for additional people. So now i can fully keep 5 people in my car while having my gear securely fastened to the roof of my car. Here's a picture of the snowboard rack itself:

The snowboard rack was actually in very good condition and worked flawlessly once i tried it on. They are available online with everything together for about $125 and is a great deal considering the time i spent peiceing my set together and it was an used snowboard rack for $40. Heres a link to the whole set:Yakima Big Powderhound

Another Addition to my Gear for the 2014 Winter Season

After last seasons snowboarding i felt i needed a little something to feel a bit safer after taking a pretty bad fall at the end of the season last year. I ended up getting a helmet this season and hope to put it to good use this year riding some blue terrain and maybe some park this year. I think i want to master being able to control myself and keeping high speeds up as i ride. I am way too safe and reserved as i snowboard when i feel sketchy about some things i just stop or try to stop and just fall and slide. I try not to take too much of a risk because you really do catch a lot of speed while boarding and sometimes it becomes unstable. I shopped around a great deal but ended up finding a great helmet for my season and it was a decent price. I decided to buy the RED HiFi helmet and the aesthetics so far seem great but i hope to take it out for the season. Well heres to my new addition and hope for a great season. Heres a link to the helmet: Red HiFi Helmet

Snowboard Gear for the Season

I used most of this last season and it has been doing me well. I haven't had to replace anything and i haven't been dissatisfied at all from anything. This includes my whole set up and i got everything new at a very comparable price. Links to my boarding set up are below. I cant wait for the season to come up and i hope you guys could also get the chance to go out to a ski resort even for just one day and at least once in your life.

K2 Brigade

K2 Indy Bindings

K2 Haymaker

Seneca Trail Near my House

It has been well over a year since I've biked on this trail but i have however run on this trail for a while now. Riding here was a whole new terrain because it wasn't built exactly for mountain biking but more for a hiking or running trail. This trail was built with lots of ups and downs and it really made a different impact unlike Schaeffer Farms where it is built more explicitly as a mountain biking trail. It wasn't as fun because getting up these hills were verrrryyy long so i ended up walking a lot of the up hills. The downhills although were very fun and made it still enjoyable. These trails went through the forest behind houses near my neighborhood and was less crowded so it made the riding a lot more peaceful

New Side of Mountain Biking

I decided to try and take the mountain bike trail today going the opposite way and taking new sections of the the trail. When you change it up that little it changes the whole trail and make everything new to you. It makes the terrain unknown and lets you explore the trail in a whole new way. This time i found an area like the expert trail yet it was hidden on the side on the trail. Even though i had biked for a few months i still had not explored the full area of the trails. And so i went through a different side where I've never been and came across something quite cool. I have a picture i took below.

It was just something cool that even though i have ridden through multiple sections of the trails but i stil have not discovered the plethora of different trails.It was a great change and i know there were sections of the trail where the corn that had once been all over was cut there were still sections where it is still green around even though it was starting to get very cold. Overall it was a great day out just exploring new areas.