Brooks: I'm going to start recording here. We're going to give it a clap.
Brooks: Do you want us to all do that? No, just me.
Brooks: Okay. Are you everybody ready?
Brooks: Yeah. All right. Hello and welcome to the Mountain Biking Podcast.
Brooks: This is your host, Brooks Lawson, aka the Mountain Biking Realtor.
Brooks: And you can find all things Brooks at brookslawson.com Today is April 1st,
Brooks: it's April Fool's Day How many times did you guys get got today?
Dale: Zero so far My.
Greg: Kids got me twice this morning They said the dogs had an accident in the house,
Greg: maybe search around the house for it And they got me at the end and said,
Greg: no, you're faking it Seven year olds,
Greg: So.
Brooks: We're going to do a quick guest intro trail this is going to be the satin podcast
Brooks: we're talking about the south austin trail network and here we have if you know
Brooks: anything about south austin trail work you know these people already but i'm
Brooks: gonna go ahead and let them introduce themselves we'll start with you over here uh.
Greg: My name is greg clip i uh i lead the uh the group one on uh the tuesday crank
Greg: and drink rides uh i've been riding
Greg: the the satin trail network for i mean probably 10 years at this point.
Carl: Um i am uh carl zapfi.
Brooks: There goes my camera,
Brooks: Nailed it. Thanks, Greg.
Greg: Dynamic.
Carl: I'm a dynamic speaker. I knock over phones.
Brooks: Good job. So I want to just get straight to it because of the brass tacks.
Greg: What about Dale?
Brooks: I'll edit that out. Sorry.
Dale: Hi, I'm Dale.
Brooks: Dale, go ahead. Sorry.
Greg: He's just Dale, guys.
Dale: Yeah, I'm just Dale.
Greg: That's all it is.
Brooks: Just Dale. Okay, well, we're going to have a follow-up. we're
Brooks: gonna have a follow-up episode with dale he's gonna talk a lot more but he's
Brooks: you know part of the satin crew so he's just here with us to talk about satin
Brooks: we're talking some other things later um so let's get straight to the brass
Brooks: tacks uh greg why is your profile picture on strava a parrot uh.
Greg: At this point it's a legacy image from the original graffiti that was underneath
Greg: mopac bridge uh i took a photo of it and then a few weeks after i took that
Greg: photo it got covered up And I was like,
Greg: well, that's going to be the perfect image to represent me in Strava.
Greg: And anyone that's been around the trails long enough knows that particular image from underneath Mopac.
Dale: Do you know the artist?
Greg: I do not. I have no idea.
Dale: Dribb on social media, Instagram.
Greg: Okay, all right.
Dale: Give him a shout out there.
Brooks: Dribb, how do you spell that?
Dale: D-R-I-B. Yeah, or excuse me, his street name is Dribb. His Instagram name is That Bird.
Greg: Is he responsible for a lot of the octopuses as well?
Dale: No, actually, the octopus is his buddy as well. That's Taco.
Dale: Okay. So you can find him, Taco. Or no, he's the main fish on Instagram.
Dale: So yeah, our satin street artists.
Carl: Street artists are under bridge artists or whatever.
Greg: I think that's one of the joys of the trail network is the artwork throughout the entire system.
Greg: And finding all those little tidbits that are left behind.
Greg: And someone posts a particular image and I try to seek it out on my ride the next time I'm out.
Brooks: Yeah, there's a lot of it too. um so do you want to do kind of a longer introduction
Brooks: like greg tell us how you got into mountain biking how you started mountain
Brooks: biking in south austin like how old did you start with other kind of biking or i.
Greg: Uh believe it or not despite my lack of any technical skills right now i used
Greg: to work at a shop up in chicago uh late 90s uh started in 1998 all the way through
Greg: 2006, a shop called Deerfield Cyclery.
Greg: I worked there.
Greg: There wasn't much of a cross-country scene, but it was more of a urban free ride.
Greg: So I had a nice little hardtail, was doing drops off of loading docks, going downstairs.
Greg: And back then, it was hard-pressed to find people wearing a helmet.
Greg: So I think about the stuff that I used to do as a kid.
Greg: I'm like, I would not have allowed allowed myself to do that if I,
Greg: if I had tried it nowadays, but, uh, I took a break from mountain biking,
Greg: um, in the mid two thousands, late two thousands came down to Austin when I met my lovely wife.
Greg: Uh, we were up in Rhode Island, um, moved here in 2009.
Greg: Um, and when I got here, I had my bike shipped down from Chicago.
Greg: Uh, and at that point it was a, a, it was a 1999 S works hard hardtail with the linear pull brakes.
Greg: I had 100 millimeters of front travel on it, which, you know,
Greg: back in 1999, I was like, you know, that's like a free ride bike.
Greg: And I started to ride the Barton Creek Greenbelt around here.
Greg: This is before I knew about satin and broke the frame within the,
Greg: I think the third ride and just realized I was under-biked for what Austin had in store.
Greg: So I got a new hardtail, a Giant Ecstasy, ATX bikes was the ones that Introduced me to that bike,
Greg: Um, and that's when they started pointing out the, uh, the, the trail network
Greg: behind the shop there, started riding it.
Greg: Um, it was before Strava. So I just kind of explored and every time I'd go out
Greg: on the bike, I'd go a little bit further on the trail and notice that,
Greg: you know, a cut through and, and explore that the next ride.
Greg: Um, but then the trails are really just what was behind ATX bikes,
Greg: uh, behind the Velo Way there.
Greg: Um, then a buddy of mine introduced me to Strava on, you know,
Greg: I know it's a, you know, A lot of people dork on this stuff,
Greg: but Strava is what allowed me to find the trails that were beyond the main network
Greg: and doing the flyby feature.
Greg: I could see where other riders were riding, and I tried to locate those trails the next time I was out.
Greg: And for years, I just rode by myself. I was not a group rider.
Greg: I didn't know any other people that rode.
Greg: So just solo out there on Strava, trying to follow that stuff,
Greg: putting up top times for myself and just trying to compete against myself.
Greg: Um, and that's where I met Carl. Uh, I started some, you know,
Greg: messaging you on, on Strava about, you know, trail maintenance that you were
Greg: doing and new trails that were, were being discovered and, you know,
Greg: kind of exploring that and,
Greg: uh, you know, doing trail, you know, reports.
Greg: And after a few years of that, uh, you know, a buddy of mine,
Greg: uh, said, you know, here's a, you know, there's a bunch of guys behind ATX bikes
Greg: on Tuesdays, you know, doing these group rides. You know, would you would you come out?
Greg: I'm not really going to do that.
Greg: But then there was a visitor from out of town that came in. No one that I knew,
Greg: but he did the Strava flyby the same way I was discovering trails.
Greg: He discovered me on one of the flybys and he messaged me on Strava and says,
Greg: you know, hey, I'm from the East Coast.
Greg: I see you do a bunch of trails around here. here. You know, would you,
Greg: you know, take me out and show me, you know, what satin has to offer?
Greg: And, you know, I did a few rides with him. It was the first time I've ever ridden
Greg: with another person here in Austin.
Greg: Um, and then he had to get going because, you know, Hey, I want to ride Tuesday before I have to leave.
Greg: Are you available? And I was like, no, I, I gotta work. But I was like,
Greg: I've never ridden with these guys, but I know they meet up behind the shop at Tuesdays at six o'.
Greg: And so he went to the crank and drink ride by himself and messaged me that night
Greg: and said, if you haven't been out to the, you know, that group ride, you are missing out.
Greg: Those are a bunch of crazy mofos.
Greg: The group, you know, the attitude is positive. The competition is strong.
Greg: I was like, all right, fine. So the next week I went out with him,
Greg: did the first crank and drink ride. ride. And Carl, I met you face to face for
Greg: the first time after, you know, messaging out Strava.
Greg: Oh, so you're Greg Clip. Yeah. You put me in charge of leading a group the very
Greg: first time I was out there.
Dale: Sounds about right.
Greg: I think you had me sweep.
Carl: Imagine that.
Greg: I think you had me sweep group one and you talked me up and I was so nervous
Greg: because I had never done a group ride.
Carl: Yeah, but I'd known your speeds and stuff. I could see what you were capable
Carl: of. So I knew where you fit.
Greg: It kind of you know yeah uh strava.
Carl: Is good for you know a lot of things you.
Dale: Were a legend.
Greg: Yeah a lot a lot of people knew me
Greg: before i knew them showing up then um but i ended up sweeping group one um and
Greg: i think i had maybe just two or three people that that tagged along with me
Greg: um i think chris felts was probably one of them um and everyone gave me positive
Greg: feedback and And then I think whoever was leading that group,
Greg: group one, the next week, they didn't show up.
Greg: Uh, and I ended up leading it.
Greg: Uh, and it's just, it whooped my butt.
Greg: Um, but it was a, it was a push that I was unable to do, you know, myself.
Greg: And it was a type of an exertion that, you know, it, well, you know,
Greg: you got people breathing down, you know, your neck and you're constantly aware
Greg: of the riders behind you.
Greg: And you keep trying to go faster and faster and faster.
Greg: And it just became addicting at that point and now I'm obsessed with not only
Greg: leading groups but working with you guys on route ideas and things that will.
Greg: Not only allow, you know, newer riders to, to participate, um,
Greg: you know, the, the shorter routes,
Greg: but having longer variations of those short routes on the same ride.
Greg: So the, the more competitive riders can also do the same, you know,
Greg: the, the, the same route plan,
Greg: but also extended at the end of it and get everyone back to the shop at the
Greg: same time for, you know, a social gathering and hanging out and,
Greg: you know, talk about the war stories of,
Greg: you know, who did what what during the ride and uh you know poking fun uh at
Greg: each other and you know showing scars yeah so i mean i was and i think there
Greg: was a it's a little bit of a tangent brooks i'm sorry uh that's okay i think
Greg: that's what you wanted though yeah.
Brooks: Well i got it no i got another quick tangent um let's just settle this right
Brooks: here and now uh is it satin or satan.
Carl: Uh don't get me started.
Greg: It's it's satin but i love it when people think of uh you know they look at
Greg: it just quickly and then see and see Satan, and I said, well,
Greg: you know, it's kind of an aggressive, you know, hardcore.
Carl: Pronunciation is in the mind of the reader or sayer, you know,
Carl: so why are you saying Satan when you're looking at the definition of the smooth
Carl: cloth in the dictionary is S-A-T apostrophe N.
Carl: That is satin. That's how the dictionary pronounces satin.
Dale: Nobody who has written satin would say it's smooth.
Greg: That is true yep when.
Carl: We were talking about um smooth crew i thought oh i missed a
Carl: uh great opportunity instead of calling it smooth crew call it the satin angels
Carl: you know the satin trail angels and then that really confused people of satin
Carl: trail angels you give us a longer satin that was one of the reasons for the
Carl: satin social just to be able to get satin out there in the um,
Carl: media land to so everyone would say okay satin that's how you say it satin.
Brooks: There you go.
Dale: On the record i've since yielded i've since yielded and i agree satin but uh
Dale: yeah in the beginning it was satin.
Greg: I'm curious where did you first see that you know that phrase used satin you
Greg: know for the south austin trail network was it did you did you start that or was that.
Brooks: Just coined the phrase carl.
Carl: There was a um,
Carl: bulletin board called uh bike mojo
Carl: which is now gone it
Carl: was uh taken over by korean bots or something and it was a great great thing
Carl: and so a long while ago since i wanted to discuss this system or network of
Carl: trails in uh south austin go what are we going to call it so i I started a thread that said,
Carl: and I thought of the acronyms and everything before I started the thread.
Carl: I go, here's, we're going to talk about the South Austin Trail Network.
Carl: And this is, and the rest is history.
Brooks: Well, that's a good segue, Carl, because you're known as sort of the godfather of satin.
Brooks: So tell us about yourself. Tell about your history with satin,
Brooks: your history in Austin. How long have you been here? How long have you been
Brooks: riding? All that fun stuff.
Carl: Oh, well, it started in 1973.
Carl: And when a bunch of my friends, we took a road trip on bikes from Norman,
Carl: Oklahoma to Sulphur, Oklahoma to this guy's ranch.
Carl: And that was a big thing. It was on the front page of the Norman transcript.
Carl: And so it was a deal. So I've been a roadie for a long time.
Carl: And when I graduated high school, I went with a friend to Europe.
Carl: And we stayed over there for two and a half months riding around and put on
Carl: about 2,000 miles seeing Europe on a bike.
Carl: And when I came to Austin in 1983 to open my restaurant,
Carl: I was still a roadie and I rode, you know, and I'd ride down Mopac and,
Carl: you know, crazy, stupid places on a 360.
Carl: And then on the news about the third time
Carl: a guy got killed on
Carl: 360 doing what he was supposed to the one hey
Carl: look at me the situation is he was just on you know doing what they were supposed
Carl: to be doing and then distracted driver killing him um i go i'm not gonna do
Carl: this anymore i'm not gonna be a i'm not gonna be a roadie it just scared me
Carl: you know and i knew i'd seen some trails and I'd seen some guys on bikes.
Carl: And so I bought a, uh, a track card, uh.
Carl: Uh, rigid, uh, Trek rigid, a 26 inch course and, uh, started hitting the trails
Carl: and, and, uh, soon of course I saw these trails and I go, why does that trail
Carl: not connect to that trail?
Carl: And the rest of that is history, of course. So, yeah, so that was a long time ago.
Greg: Was that a, was that the green belt or.
Carl: Was there actually? No, you know, even to this day, I don't appreciate the green green belt that much.
Carl: Cause I tell people I like to ride my bike, not carry my bike.
Carl: And, uh, and in the green belt, I mean, it doesn't matter.
Carl: I mean, it doesn't matter how, well, I'm not going to say that.
Carl: Cause I, some of our group is crazy and good, you know, but a lot of people
Carl: walk a lot in the green belt to get from here to there, you know?
Carl: So it's not, it's never been my favorite, but, uh, yeah, no,
Carl: just all around the house and stuff.
Carl: I've lived in the same house now for 30 years so uh you
Carl: know and that's another great thing about satin that everyone's house is two
Carl: blocks three blocks four blocks whatever from a trailhead you know to get onto
Carl: the satin and it's amazing how many of us are this close to the to the thing
Carl: so yeah so that's uh that's that's my deal well.
Brooks: Dale do you want to go next uh what's your history i know how long you've been
Brooks: in austin how long you've been mountain biking how'd you get into it.
Dale: Yeah sure um so yeah Yeah, I was born and raised in Austin.
Dale: Been here all my life. And I think I got into mountain bike riding when I worked
Dale: at United Heritage Credit Union right there at the corner of Slaughter and Mopac.
Dale: It's right next to the Walgreens there. And the owner of ATX Bikes,
Dale: different owner at the time.
Carl: Across the street when it was across the street.
Dale: Yeah, where the Bird's Barbershop is now. And so this was circa 2010.
Dale: And so, uh, the owner from ATX would come across the street to deposit,
Dale: uh, business checks and he would, he would be on his bike and,
Dale: uh, and I'd sometimes see him right in from behind the credit union on his bike too.
Dale: And, um, you know, I was probably close to 195 pounds at this point.
Dale: Like it was the heaviest I ever was in my life after being a scrawny guy,
Dale: pretty much all my life. Yeah.
Dale: I had, I do have pictures, um, to prove, right, right. Right. Yeah.
Dale: Um, but I just figured I need to start doing something physical and I hate running with a passion.
Dale: And, um, so I saw him on this bike and I thought, well, that looks fun,
Dale: you know? And so I started looking into mountain bikes and I bought a Trek,
Dale: uh, 3,700 with disc brakes from, uh, bicycle sports shop at the time it was still open.
Carl: And, uh, We need to support the local guy there across the street.
Dale: Hell yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. No kidding. Um, Hey, I did buy some accessories
Dale: from him, but, uh, But yeah, I wound up buying the Trek from Bicycle Sports
Dale: Shop and I spent about probably a year riding, I think, mostly Walnut Creek.
Dale: Some buddies took me up there and showed me Walnut Creek and it was pretty much all for fun.
Dale: And then I kind of fell out of it. And then fast forward to 2019 and the pandemic,
Dale: well, 2020, I guess, pandemic starts up and they send us all home.
Dale: So we're working from home and I'm kind of going stir crazy.
Dale: I enjoy working from home, but I'm going stir crazy. So I start running, right?
Dale: Trying to do something physical, even though I hate it. And I quickly remember
Dale: after like three days of running that I hate running and I'm laying laying on
Dale: the floor of my bedroom, like passed out, dying, trying to catch my breath,
Dale: wondering what am I doing?
Dale: Um, and I'm looking up and my bike's hanging from the ceiling.
Dale: I'm like, shit, that's right. I have a bike.
Dale: Um, and so I just kind of looked into what I needed to do to get it fixed up
Dale: and started riding again.
Dale: And so I headed out to circle C metro park. I remember some of the trails out there.
Dale: And for the first time I thought, well, I'm going to go underneath the bridge
Dale: here under Mopac, you know, cause I saw a bridge and I saw the trail.
Dale: I was like, well, I never crossed over let's see if there's some more trail
Dale: and that's kind of when I started realizing wow so there's a
Dale: whole bunch of other stuff and got on uh trail forks
Dale: and strava and started trying to figure out where everything goes and um
Dale: and then realized like trail forks was all misnamed and misrouted and everything
Dale: was weird and um so I started changing names on there and I referred to I think
Dale: the onion park trail right as three kings and the first time I met at Carl was
Dale: Carl posting something about like,
Dale: why is this trail called this or something like that? That's not what it's called. It's called this.
Dale: And, and so that kind of started my relationship with Carl and cleaning up South
Dale: Austin Trail Network on trail forks and all that.
Dale: Um, so I guess.
Carl: You've done an excellent job. It's, it's perfect.
Dale: Well, thank you.
Carl: Trail Forks is perfect.
Dale: Even, even to this day though, believe it or not, I mean, we have 140 miles of trail.
Dale: I don't know how many like individual trails there are, but there's a lot.
Dale: And so even like yesterday we had somebody pointing out that one of them was
Dale: mislabeled. And, uh, and so
Dale: we're fixing it even to this day and we'll probably continue for a while.
Dale: But so that was my first kind of experience with South Austin Trail Network. work.
Dale: And then the second was when we went to Bentonville with Brooks in 2020.
Dale: And I experienced that for the first time. And I was like, wow,
Dale: this is amazing. And then came back to Satin and I was like, oh, we need features.
Brooks: And I've heard this story so many times. I went to Bentonville and I came back
Brooks: and I was like, we need this here now.
Dale: Yeah. It's a broken record story, but yeah, that's eventually what happened
Dale: is just, you know, you see other people and what they have and you start navel
Dale: gazing. You're like, wow, that's really nice.
Dale: And, uh, and so I just wanted something like that in South Austin.
Dale: And so talked to Carl, kind of figured out a spot where we could start doing some digging.
Dale: And lo and behold, now we have tunnel vision and East Bank stuff and all of that.
Dale: But shout out also, as long as I'm on that point, I'm not the first person to
Dale: dig out there. That was Alex Weir and Andre Kashkin.
Dale: And so they're kind of the guys, you've got that whole spot going with the natural
Dale: drop, that step up, a couple of little doubles along the fence line.
Dale: And then I came in added the berms the step down and the three tabletops and
Dale: had a lot of help along the way but yeah how.
Carl: How did everyone find that spot.
Dale: Well I,
Dale: uh i guess exploring mostly um.
Carl: What trail were they on while they well east bank.
Dale: So east bank um.
Carl: Where did that come from well.
Brooks: Yeah you want to tell the story carl.
Carl: I think i think i think.
Dale: Carl's trying to say something here um but yeah that that segues into like maybe
Dale: one of the best trails we have in south uh south austin trail network east bank.
Carl: Yeah it really is uh well tell us the.
Dale: History about that actually because i'm kind of curious is well.
Carl: I discovered that trail after um the school bought the piece of property where the,
Carl: peacocks are where you hear the peacocks are so what's now the school over there
Carl: used to be a farm and so that side of the creek the north side of slaughter
Carl: creek there was owned by someone and And you shouldn't discover trails on Farmer
Carl: Jones's property, I say all the time.
Carl: I go, that's too invasive and you're asking for trouble. You know,
Carl: just don't do that. That's wrong.
Carl: And so, but then as soon as the school took ownership of that, East Bank. East Bank.
Carl: Which is the east side of Slaughter Creek Bank. So East Bank.
Brooks: Top three favorite trails dale for.
Carl: What on set for what though for for what purpose because people on your favorite
Carl: purposes you know people on facebook all the time hey i want to write trails
Carl: and what's a good trail and then i.
Brooks: Mean your personal favorite.
Carl: Oh okay so.
Dale: Let's see uh top three i would have to say well chip chop would have been one um that's rest in peace.
Carl: So so.
Dale: Rest Best in peace, Chip Chop. I would have to say, I think North Bank is very
Dale: flowy. Bunny Gravel has a lot of potential.
Dale: And then East Bank.
Brooks: What about you, Carl? What are your favorites?
Brooks: Too many it's like choosing your favorite band.
Carl: Well i i'm east bank is very scenic and very,
Carl: different from a lot of even austin stuff you know and so it's and it's different
Carl: from a lot of the satin so i like it a whole lot um there's too many and when
Carl: i'm out riding a lot of times i go this is a good trail you know a lot.
Brooks: Of times carl's gonna pass.
Carl: Yeah i i gotta pass greg.
Greg: Oh i i I preach this trail, and I know it's a controversial subject for some,
Greg: but disco disco behind that trail.
Greg: I love that trail to death. I remember the first time I did it without dabbing,
Greg: and it was just a personal accomplishment.
Greg: And I feel like for any rider out there that has trouble with it,
Greg: once you get through without dabbing once, you've kind of figured it out.
Greg: It does feel good. And you can do it every time after that.
Greg: But it's a challenging trail. It's a skill check trail.
Greg: Um, it's got, you know, some, some, some techie rock gardens,
Greg: you know, there's flow in there.
Greg: If you get the speed up, uh, you know, a lot of people don't see the flow,
Greg: but you know, a lot of those features are really easy.
Greg: If you get the speed up, um, disco, uh, a newer trail right now,
Greg: a lot of people like, um, Meridian Highline or, uh, you know,
Greg: as Carl likes to call it, pineapple upside down cake.
Carl: I do not like that name. He's teasing me a lot because that's a stupid name
Carl: and people come up with stupid names and people that don't have anything to
Carl: do with the trail come up with the names and that's totally wrong.
Carl: And that guy in there worked hard on that and we communicated with him.
Carl: What would you like to call it?
Dale: Whoever named it that, shame on you.
Greg: Meridian Highline, though, for anyone that's been out there to check it out,
Greg: it runs parallel to the Bear Lake Jeep track out in Meridian.
Greg: Meridian connecting to avania uh and
Greg: one of my reasons i like it is not only is it a challenging
Greg: trail um but it serves a purpose
Greg: and it provides an alternative way of coming and going out of meridian there
Greg: uh before you're kind of just stuck with the jeep track and you know as as carl
Greg: you know knows when we plan the routes that the last thing you want to do is
Greg: double back on on a segment that you've already taken to go out there repeat
Greg: trail yes you don't want to repeat Pete Trail,
Greg: and we don't want to cause too much issue with the golf course out there,
Greg: so I prefer anything that would keep us away from that.
Greg: So Highline, Disco, and...
Greg: I mean, Dale, I would, I would agree with, did you say North bank?
Dale: Yeah. I think North bank as well.
Greg: North bank is like the OG trail.
Carl: And my wife calls it, we, we called it the fun trail for a long time. That's the fun trail.
Greg: Yeah.
Carl: Cause she liked it, you know, and, and, but we like it too. You know, that's.
Greg: Well, it's, it's, it's, it's nice. Cause it's got the, the, the,
Greg: the, the G outs that you can dip in and out of, if you want to add a little
Greg: spice to it, but it's, it's, it's a fast trail. It's got great flow and it's open to all riders.
Greg: You know, my wife rides it with me. She can do that trail.
Greg: My kids can do it. I mean, they have a little challenge with,
Greg: you know, some of that, that, that, that rocky part. Yeah.
Greg: But, you know, that's one of the OG trails and, you know, no matter what happens
Greg: that, you know, that'll be one of my top, you know, top trails out here.
Dale: It's amazing how different it is from like, you know, you got aesthetic,
Dale: you got Javier's, you got South Bank, Dixie, every single one of those trails.
Dale: Very, very rocky. And then you have North Bank, just this perfect,
Dale: pristine, smooth flow trail with one little rock garden.
Greg: I don't know how it stayed that way. I mean, all of the trails just from erosion and just from use.
Greg: I mean, North Bank is one of the highest used trails around here.
Greg: And, you know, look at Maxwell's Slaughter Creek.
Greg: You know, five, six years ago, it was fast, flat, and flowy.
Brooks: Hill of life.
Greg: Yeah. Yeah.
Brooks: Let's talk about erosion.
Greg: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And, you know, you look at those trails now and,
Greg: you know, they're still great trails. I love them, but they're completely different
Greg: from where they used to be.
Greg: And I feel like North Bank is just kind of that trail that never changes.
Carl: I get a lot of pleasure out of looking how trails mature from inception and 10, 15 years later.
Carl: I think that it must, it's like bottom land, like bottom farmland,
Carl: that it just keeps depositing dirt on it as opposed to.
Dale: That's exactly it, man.
Carl: Washing it away. Yeah, we're lucky to. Yeah, you think you're in the great northwest
Carl: forest or something when you're going through there because it's dirt.
Carl: What's this? What's this underneath our tire? Can we segue from here? Greg said something.
Brooks: We can talk about whatever you want, Carl.
Carl: Oh, great. Great. Because Greg said something that was important about trail
Carl: sanitizing and altering trail because you had great joy from conquering Disco Disco.
Carl: And if someone had removed a bunch of rocks or something.
Dale: And they have.
Carl: Well, yeah, that that trail wasn't meant to be.
Carl: I sanitize trails a lot. I'll go out with a hammer because that trail was not
Carl: designed, not necessarily that one, but trails were not designed to have annoying rocks.
Carl: And it's a, it's a, it's a balance. I'll say that it's a balance that,
Carl: you know, something that will just tear your tire.
Carl: That's, there's no skill in, hey, look, my tire didn't rip on that jagged rock
Carl: that has now come up from the tread going down that much, you know.
Dale: Yeah, can I piggyback on that actually? Actually, you know, there's another
Dale: example and this actually gets brought up a lot.
Dale: And so I kind of want to address it because it's a bugbear of mine.
Dale: And regarding like Walnut Creek, for example, is a good case.
Dale: BMX loop, you know, from time to time we'll throw dirt on roots or something
Dale: like that or cover up something that's getting eroded and somebody will complain
Dale: that like we covered up their favorite route and the names in the trail, right?
Dale: So it's BMX loop and it's intended to be a smooth fluid trail and that's the
Dale: way it was intended to be. And so when trails start getting eroded and somebody
Dale: goes and puts more dirt on there, they're not sanitizing it,
Dale: they're restoring it. So, yeah.
Brooks: Exactly. He who builds the trail decides the way it's supposed to be. Correct.
Carl: Well, no, I'll even, there's an argument against that because after a while,
Carl: like, okay, that's not designed, that's not how the original trail builder might have designed it.
Carl: But it's become such an iconic thing that don't change it.
Carl: You know, so, and yes, I, of course, I agree with that sentiment of,
Carl: you know, that the trail better, whoever that is, should have pretty good say about what it is to be.
Carl: But, yeah, after a while, the public domain becomes a more trumping cause, you know.
Carl: Yeah, once it becomes the community thing and not so material thing. Yeah, mm-hmm.
Greg: I don't know if it's, you know, some of the stuff that gets me though,
Greg: it's not so much sanitizing.
Greg: I understand like the need to, you know, knock down some rocks,
Greg: but, you know, and some trails where someone does a cheater path or something
Greg: around a techie feature where the feature itself is part of that trail.
Greg: Um, and then once that, that, that cheater path gets cut, it just naturally
Greg: starts being broken in and then it becomes a mainstay of that trail.
Greg: And that's hard for me sometimes just because I want to see people try to challenge
Greg: themselves and do the original lines.
Greg: Lines but you know sometimes those original lines disappear um and they just become.
Greg: This this this new cut through that people you know
Greg: had put in there and i know there's a few spots on disco um not
Greg: so much before but there used to be that really techie um was it was it was
Greg: the rock garden right at the the far west part of it um and used to have to
Greg: barrel straight up through the rock garden and you know used to challenge a
Greg: lot of people and then something And then something like a cheater line broke
Greg: in on the right-hand side.
Greg: So you can always cug the far right side of that line.
Greg: And, you know, every once in a while I'm riding out there, I'm like,
Greg: you know, I want to throw some, you know, some sticks down or something and
Greg: try to discourage people from taking that new line that's formed and try to
Greg: get them back on the OG line.
Greg: But, you know, there's also the part where that's just kind of the natural evolution
Greg: of the trail. And as things erode and become, you know, too difficult,
Greg: I mean, I guess I got to just reframe from, from having that reaction and just
Greg: allow that to naturally just kind of evolve.
Carl: My, my philosophy on that is, is, um, there's only so much land out there,
Carl: just like a golf course. I use a golf course as a, uh.
Carl: Example, at a golf course, they have four different sets of T's because they
Carl: know that there's only so much land that they can build this golf course on,
Carl: but they want to accommodate a wide range of skill levels.
Carl: And so I am adamantly opposed to altering a feature, but I'm okay with an alternate line.
Carl: I mean, I mean, like a whole separate line,
Carl: like you were defending the thing on Disco Disco and I just discovered a alternate
Carl: line on that one rocky thing that's that was not that rocky when it was built. I'm pretty sure.
Carl: So the alternate line is slower and it's not going to enable a Strava KOM guy,
Carl: you know, that's trying to.
Carl: Uh, so that's not a concern, uh, but it's safer and doable.
Carl: And, and I, even like when you said, oh, you, you, you're telling me,
Carl: oh, Carl, all you have to do is go up this line.
Carl: I go, oh, I did it that night before, you know, when we on a crank a drink,
Carl: when we did that, yeah, you just power through it and, you know,
Carl: it's really easy, but sometimes I don't want to do it.
Carl: You know, sometimes I go, you know, sometimes it's at the end of the ride and
Carl: I'm tired and I don't want to, uh, put myself at risk. And so,
Carl: uh, alternate line to me is, is a fine thing, you know, and I,
Carl: uh, EMBA says the same thing.
Carl: They, they're okay with, uh, alternate lines, you know, because they know there's
Carl: more than, not everybody. body.
Carl: Our perception of mountain biking skills are very skewed because our group,
Carl: a lot of them are pretty skilled.
Carl: I mean, there's state champions.
Carl: But then there's those new people that say, oh, well, this is not fun because
Carl: they took us all over this stuff. And so,
Carl: You know, I, I build it for you and I build it for, uh, oh, you know, these jumper guys.
Carl: And, uh, but I also have to accommodate my wife who is not the strongest rider,
Carl: but she enjoys getting out there, you know? So, and she, and she goes,
Carl: oh, North Bank's so hard. I go, what are you talking about?
Carl: Well, you know, there's that rock garden. I go, that's 20 feet.
Carl: That's 20 feet. walk your bike 20 feet and and
Carl: enjoy the other nine tenths of a mile and
Carl: she i've finally convinced her that okay yeah but so always walk if you can't
Carl: do something you know don't alternate don't don't you know don't smack down
Carl: that line because i think a lot of us enjoy going through that rock garden and
Carl: seeing how fast we can do it right the on north bank the one rock garden yeah
Carl: Yeah, below the little jump thing.
Brooks: Well, let's talk about Crank and Drink. So for those of you who don't know,
Brooks: Crank and Drink is a weekly ride.
Brooks: It happens on Tuesday nights, 6 o'clock, behind ATX Bikes.
Brooks: Talk to me about where did it come from? Whose idea was it? How did that come to be?
Carl: There's a lot of fuzzy history. Why is it fuzzy? Well, because,
Carl: because I'm old. Shut up.
Carl: Uh, and it was a long time ago. Um, yeah, so we used to do some stuff out of Dick Nichols.
Carl: We'd start out Dick Nichols and then we'd have a beer afterwards.
Carl: And, uh, and then maybe that stopped for a little bit. And then,
Carl: uh, Hey, how about behind this bike store?
Carl: And, uh, because they'd moved to the new, you know, ATX bikes moved from across
Carl: from Dale's old workplace to where they are now.
Carl: And so I started going. But the reason I promoted it was because the satin was a –,
Carl: underutilized resource. I thought, you know, there wasn't, and still is when
Carl: the, you know, you think about going to Walnut on a Saturday afternoon,
Carl: are you going to run into anybody?
Carl: I mean, not literally run into, but could you run into somebody? Yeah.
Carl: Pretty easy. Cause there's a lot of use there.
Carl: Well, you spread out our users over 140 miles and you never see anybody.
Carl: I go, this was a beautiful Saturday morning and I just rode 30 miles. And to be fair.
Dale: This was also pre-pandemic right so.
Carl: Things things definitely changed oh yeah long this was a long time ago how.
Brooks: Long ago was it.
Carl: Well the name the name uh going back to that same bike mojo uh,
Carl: 12 12 years ago we started talking about it and i started a thread and i go
Carl: we're gonna do a um I'm riding a vibe South and somebody says, oh, you can't use that.
Carl: That's a trademark. That's a trademark name.
Carl: You can't say riding in vibes. So I thought, oh, what else can we call it? So crank a drink.
Carl: So that was. Yeah, maybe.
Carl: 12 years ago, probably that had an official name and we'd been doing it for a while before that.
Carl: And the reason we, the, the reason behind crank it. Oh, again,
Carl: the reason that I promoted it for so heavily for a while was to educate people
Carl: to the satin and we'd have people show up and go, God, I live next to Dick Nichols.
Carl: I mean, literally I live, not me, but someone would say, I live next to Dick Nichols.
Carl: And I never knew this stuff was back here. Like you going underneath Mopac,
Carl: you know, that, that aha moment, you know, they, They, and people just don't know.
Carl: And it's right there. And it's, it's a unique, um, system,
Carl: I think, you know, I mean, where else is there 140 miles of urban trail that really,
Carl: when you're on it, you think you're in a state park or you driven 50 miles to
Carl: pay $10 to get in, to ride these, this kind of trail. I don't know.
Greg: So how did it work back in the day? I mean, I'm relatively new to the,
Greg: the, the crank and train. I started probably 2021, I think, right when kind
Greg: of the lockdown restrictions started to lift back up.
Greg: But, I mean, did you all even have a ride plan? Did you just show up and say,
Greg: let's head east or head south?
Carl: We had a ride plan. Yeah, we'd have a ride.
Dale: Again, fuzzy history. I can fill in my first crank and drink experience for you.
Carl: All right.
Dale: There was no ride plan. Well, maybe there was, but it existed in Carl's head
Dale: and there was a vinyl banner that was about like,
Dale: what, four or five feet long that you had the map of satin and,
Dale: and Carl would stand there with his pointer and he would point on the map where
Dale: we were going to be going.
Carl: That was from a satin social. That map was made for a satin social.
Carl: Yeah. So that was good. Yeah. So, yeah.
Carl: And then it got bigger and then we would maybe have some trail conflict and
Carl: maybe then it got more organized, you know?
Carl: Maybe more organized and and when did how did you how did i convince you to
Carl: start doing it and you do you do that's a better job than a better job than
Carl: i do and it's so much fun to read your uh.
Greg: I i i think what i just started i started you know emailing you and uh i start this.
Carl: Is wrong carl.
Greg: Oh no i you know i said you know carl i
Greg: got some you know great ideas for you know a route for next week if
Greg: you don't have anything you know set up and i used to you know
Greg: put them put them together on strava and i'd
Greg: send you the link on strava and you're like oh this looks really good you
Greg: know and after a few of those i think you said like you know just go ahead
Greg: and post it you know post it send it out and i started sending
Greg: it out and you know the the biggest issue i
Greg: had at that point and you probably had it when you're doing the original
Greg: you know pre-ride discussions for crank and
Greg: drink was you know you get up there and you
Greg: start rattling off every single segment name
Greg: that we were going to go through um and i
Greg: used to do this off the top of my head just you know what what that route
Greg: would look like and after 10 minutes of just talking i'd be like all right we're
Greg: ready to ride and just i'm looking out over a sea of 30 blank faces like what
Greg: what the what the heck did he just talk about um and then you know it was always
Greg: challenging for me to give that talk and after realizing you know no one learned anything from it,
Greg: other than me flexing my knowledge of the trail names,
Greg: I think it became what it is today,
Greg: where we post a ride summary.
Greg: The ride leaders that have volunteered use that summary as kind of a guide while
Greg: they're looking at the map.
Greg: But there's no pre-ride discussion of what we're doing.
Greg: It's just saying, hey, these are the groups. Get behind your ride leader.
Greg: The ride leader knows what we're doing, and we're going out there.
Greg: And I think that's a, it's an easier way of, of definitely.
Dale: And P.S. It's a drop ride. Good luck.
Carl: Yeah. Yeah. It's a no drop ride. If you can keep up, that's, that's our job.
Carl: Uh, and it's great to get it out, like on Thursday that you've,
Carl: you started, that was a good thing so that everyone can pre-ride it,
Carl: or at least the ride leaders and everything.
Carl: It's interesting too, that, that, uh, I appreciated Greg because there's only
Carl: so many people and Kat is the same way.
Carl: She, she thinks trails and she, some people can say,
Carl: okay, when we're saying those 15 trails in a row they're mentally going okay
Carl: yeah you turn at the tree you know and you go under the bridge and as you're
Carl: following along not everybody does that and some people say i don't even know
Carl: the trails now and they've been you know i could name some names but i'm not going to but.
Brooks: No there's definitely
Brooks: i mean there's so many trails back there and yeah i lead rides at walnut and
Brooks: that took me like 150 rides probably till i could actually know all the trail
Brooks: i still don't know all the names but i know where they are and where to go um
Brooks: and satin has just like 10 times more trails so yeah i'm just i don't have that
Brooks: i'm not like i don't have the map in my head like some people do yeah.
Greg: A lot of people ask because i don't use navigation and i mean either i just
Greg: know how do you remember that like you were talking about where if you're just
Greg: going through the names you're kind of visualizing the the whole route and i
Greg: know downhill riders that's how they They visualize their downhill course.
Greg: They're basically, you know, at the top of the slope and they're visualizing
Greg: every turn throughout the entire course.
Greg: And that's the same approach I take to the crank and drake group rides is I
Greg: visualize the map that was prepared and kind of, you know, walk myself through it.
Greg: And, you know, while I'm leading a group, I'm still thinking about it.
Greg: I'm like, all right, I'm on this segment. What's the next turn? What's the next turn?
Greg: And, you know, I'm not daydreaming. And I'm constantly thinking about what's
Greg: the, what's, what's the next feature that's coming up, what's the next turn
Greg: and keep everything together.
Carl: And so, Brooke, when you, when you go home, I tell people to learn these trails,
Carl: you know, just do the crank and drank. And then when you go home.
Carl: Look at your Strava route and kind of follow along and go, Oh, that's a disco disco.
Carl: Oh yeah. I remember that tree that we turned on to, you know,
Carl: uh, turned around onto forbidden fence line or whatever,
Carl: you know, and just kind of that's, I encourage people to, that's how you learn
Carl: the thing is that you go home and you just kind of re play it and say,
Carl: Oh yeah. Okay. That's what we were on.
Dale: Oh, so that, and allowing yourself time to get lost to like,
Dale: I'm a, I'm a big advocate for trail signage.
Dale: You've, you've helped to put signs up. I put signs up.
Dale: You've both put signs up. Like, I think, I think, um, we need a lot more signage.
Dale: There's a lot of people who are against that. Um, and they're like,
Dale: Oh, I'll need a sign to know where I'm going.
Dale: And, um, you know, appreciate the beauty of getting lost and everything.
Dale: And, um, you know, I'm of the mentality that the signs don't prevent you that
Dale: like, um, if there are signs there, that doesn't stop you from,
Dale: you can ignore them basically, but, but people need them. But regardless,
Dale: regardless, let me get off of signs here.
Dale: The point is just, I think the way I learned satin was by just letting myself get lost essentially.
Dale: And just giving myself the time to say, I don't know where the ride's going
Dale: to go. I'm going to give myself like three hours and enough water here.
Dale: I'm just going to start writing.
Dale: And once I don't know where I am, I'll, I'll look at the map then,
Dale: you know, if I am like, now I need to go home.
Dale: Where am I, you know, find your way back and then try to find my way back.
Dale: And I think, yeah, I think if you just, I think if you just just kind of not
Dale: focus on navigation and just go out there and explore it, you're a lot more
Dale: likely to learn the network because you're going to be relying on context clues
Dale: and you're going to be looking at more things.
Dale: Um, and so I think that's a good way to, um, get used to satin and also just,
Dale: uh, remembering that like slaughter Creek kind of cuts through like most of
Dale: it and using the Creek is like a natural guide,
Dale: you know, I'm which side of the Creek am I on? Have I crossed it or have I not crossed it?
Dale: And, um, and how far am I in like relation to Mopac or something like that?
Brooks: Well, same thing with like driving navigation. If you put on GPS to get where
Brooks: you're going and you get there, you have no idea where you are.
Dale: Right, right. Yep.
Carl: That's excellent.
Brooks: Um, so I guess I want to talk about ride etiquette and social etiquette regarding,
Brooks: uh, riders, hikers, dogs, et cetera.
Greg: That's a touchy subject.
Dale: Oh yeah.
Carl: Well, let's talk about etiquette, uh, group ride etiquette first,
Carl: since we're talking about satin and crank and drink.
Carl: And I have a list that I used to put up about stuff.
Carl: And some of the important things are, well, I'll say one being the last group
Carl: having and I'm trying to remind you all to tell me to tell the group this,
Carl: that the sweep of each group needs to tell people that are coming opposite us.
Carl: Us, there's more coming, you know, there's more coming because I can't tell
Carl: you how many times, uh, I've encountered almost, you know, a guy and did they
Carl: tell you that I was back here, you know, that we were still coming and they go, no.
Carl: And, and, and one time, of course the guy was lying,
Carl: you know, cause the sweep right in front of me said, I told him,
Carl: you know, and so can't always trust what the guys, but, but that's a real easy
Carl: thing to say is more coming,
Carl: you know, more coming don't you know keep your head up because they're
Carl: coming so that's that's an important one and
Carl: if you drop off a ride tell them
Carl: tell the your group that you're dropping so we don't wait for you at the next
Carl: uh thing now some of those groups don't wait for anybody anyway you know i do
Carl: know i know but uh yeah so uh yeah that and then the marco polo marco polo,
Carl: It's interesting.
Greg: There's the dynamics within the group itself.
Greg: There's the group-by-group dynamics and how those groups interact with each other.
Greg: And then how the overall ride interacts with other trail users.
Greg: And I think there's three layers that a lot of people don't realize.
Greg: Everyone's trying to balance and harmonize.
Carl: How much do the ride leaders get paid?
Greg: Nothing.
Carl: Oh, really? Really? No. Okay. Are they just out there to have fun too?
Greg: Every once in a while, I get a thank you.
Carl: Oh, every now and then.
Dale: So they shouldn't, they say you wouldn't be too concerned with unsolicited feedback then.
Carl: Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah.
Greg: But, you know, leading a group, you know, I try to set a pace.
Greg: I'm not trying to go out there and do PRs. And some people, you know,
Greg: they want to push it on a certain segment and they'll ride up, you know, right on me.
Greg: And I mean, that's fine. If you want to ride up on me and pass me,
Greg: just to say, you know, I want to hit this segment, you know, go ahead, pass.
Greg: But, you know, my job is to, you know, as I see it, is to maintain a solid pace
Greg: for the duration of the entire route as opposed to, you know,
Greg: one particular segment.
Greg: So if some people want to get after it, like, you know, one of my pet peeves
Greg: is when someone's right on my heels and it just...
Greg: It concerns me because I know if I, if I, well,
Greg: it's, it's, yeah, it's, it's, you know, it puts a lot of pressure on me to make
Greg: sure every line choice I, I, I make is clean because if I don't have a clean
Greg: line choice, I'm going to have someone who's going to crash into me and it stresses me out.
Greg: Uh, I mean, it, it causes me to, you know, to ride really fast,
Greg: but I, you know, I don't want to get done with 18 miles and, and collapse.
Greg: And, you know, I feel like there's a dynamic where riders got to realize that
Greg: there's a spacing, you know, concern that they need to address while in a group ride.
Greg: Well, you know, don't fall too far back, but, you know, also don't ride on the
Greg: tire of the person in front of you.
Greg: And if you start losing the group, you know, don't be competitive.
Greg: Allow the people from behind you to pass you to keep that group together.
Greg: And ultimately, if you start slipping down the group, that's what the sweep
Greg: is for. And the sweep will either help you get back with the group or advise
Greg: you that, you know, hey, just drop off and get picked up by the next group.
Greg: But, you know, a lot of these people, it's either that they don't think about
Greg: it or being very competitive.
Greg: And it's almost an attack on them if they allow someone to pass them.
Carl: You mean on their ego?
Greg: Yeah, I don't know. I think it makes for a better ride experience if everyone
Greg: leaves their egos behind and just realizes there's a group dynamic we're trying to maintain.
Greg: And if people appreciate that, it makes it for the overall ride experience is
Greg: much better for the entire group.
Greg: And if one group is doing well, it kind of trickles down to other groups, I think.
Greg: Um you know unfortunately carl i think you you're
Greg: in social group you're you're left picking up some of the fragments of
Greg: you know people that trickle out of group one two and three and you
Greg: know you're picking them up and i'm kind of curious you
Greg: know this is a drop ride um you
Greg: know so the the ride leaders have an obligation to to kind of you know maintain
Greg: the group but it's not their job or it's not that you know the idea of the right
Greg: to keep everyone together um do you feel pressure when when you're riding social
Greg: to not allow anyone to drop out of that because there's no group behind you?
Carl: No, because that's another huge benefit to the satin.
Carl: You feel like you're out in the wilderness, but you're 300 feet from the 7-Eleven.
Carl: You can always find a street and say, oh, this is where I am, and find your way home.
Carl: So that's not a – I just – for the social, I want those because they're usually
Carl: new people and I want them to have a good experience, you know,
Carl: and not everyone does that comes out because...
Carl: They've, uh, we've had the complaint before. I thought this was the slow group
Carl: and I go, well, it's the slowest group, but it's not necessarily the slow group.
Carl: And so people, you know, it's not for beginners. It's, it's definitely not for beginners because.
Dale: I don't think any group ride really, unless it says like specifically,
Dale: this is a training ride or something like that. I don't think anybody should
Dale: think that a group ride is for beginners.
Dale: Yeah. I think you should have like some minimal competency before you go and ride with other people.
Carl: That's what I said. I encourage people to download Strava so that they can say
Carl: if you can maintain eight miles per hour on a 10 mile ride out here on these
Carl: trails, you know, on the trails, then you can you can hang with the last group.
Greg: Well, that would just get you to hang, though.
Carl: Well, sometimes. Yeah. Well, yeah, that's true.
Greg: I think overall speed of all the groups is just over the past year and a half has just increased.
Greg: You can look at Strava and just see that that increase.
Carl: It's just fun watching the progress.
Greg: Yeah, I think it's everyone's becoming a better rider. I've seen it. Dale, I'm curious.
Greg: You used to help out with some of the group leads, two and three.
Greg: And I know that wasn't your cup of tea. Was it just you just didn't want to
Greg: lead or was there something about the group dynamic that was irking you?
Dale: It's hard. It's work. Yeah, it's not really my cup of tea.
Dale: I mean, sometimes I can get into that leadership mode.
Dale: And I did do like in high school, I did ROTC and like this leadership camp and all that sort of thing.
Dale: So I do kind of consider myself a leader in some sense, but I don't want to
Dale: volunteer my time and then hear a bunch of flack from people about the pace,
Dale: this, that, and the other.
Dale: And I empathize with what you were talking about. When someone's right on your
Dale: tail, you feel like you need to ride perfect or you're going to,
Dale: you know, screw the person up behind you.
Dale: And when you're leading a ride, it's not just the person behind you.
Dale: It's like the entire group behind you.
Dale: And so um i don't know i
Dale: kind of got into this spot where i felt like i could never do anything right and
Dale: there was this one ride in particular where i was both at the same time too
Dale: fast and too slow and i was like wow freaking freaking quantum ride leading
Dale: pace right and so take your pick and uh and i just kind of moved on from it
Dale: um but i mean that's no offense to anybody like that we ride with i love everybody
Dale: there but i think when you're in that that mentality and you're giving it and
Dale: you're just physically exerting,
Dale: sometimes you don't think about the comments that you make and the way they'll
Dale: be interpreted by others.
Dale: And sometimes when you're giving it, you don't interpret comments that people
Dale: make in like the best way you could, you know, like that's obviously offensive
Dale: to me right now while I'm giving it.
Dale: But later on, you tell me that and I might not even care.
Dale: And so, yeah, there's just, I think ride leaders need some respect.
Dale: And so that's always something worth keeping in mind. um but i also just kind
Dale: of enjoy um writing behind greg stevens sometimes you know just being just being
Dale: able to zone out and keep a pace and well try to keep the pace at least yeah.
Carl: Following is fun. It's it.
Greg: I, I, I think group three or, you know, for, for anyone that hasn't done the,
Greg: the, the crank and drink, there's, you know, a race pace group with,
Greg: you know, it's just, just blistering fast.
Greg: And then, and then group one, two athletes.
Carl: Yeah.
Greg: Group one, two, you know, three and then in social and, and,
Greg: and group three in particular,
Greg: because it was, you know, kind of in the middle of the pack, I think is a very,
Greg: it's, it's an interesting group because
Greg: you got a lot of people that would be that should
Greg: be riding social but aren't because they're they're trying
Greg: to push themselves um and then you
Greg: get a lot of people that should probably be in in group two
Greg: and and aren't because they they they want to go for a more relaxed ride but
Greg: you know for me in particular if if i'm out riding and i'm i and i'm relaxed
Greg: i actually end up riding faster because i'm not i'm not thinking about the the
Greg: ride itself i'm just enjoying what I'm doing.
Greg: So you get this weird, you know, tug of war in group three, where there's a
Greg: lot of people that should be riding in a faster group. And there's some people
Greg: that should be riding a slower group.
Greg: And, and, and, and Dale, you've, you've experienced it.
Greg: And I think other people that have volunteered to lead, you know,
Greg: group three for crank and drink are experiencing it as well.
Greg: And, you know, tomorrow we've, we've got a, we've actually split group three
Greg: and it's going to be, you know, group three and group four.
Greg: And I'm going to try to emphasize that, that, you know, people in group three,
Greg: this is going to be like a group two pace with, you know, a few breaks.
Greg: And then, you know, group four is going to be more towards social and see if
Greg: we can break that up and kind of eliminate some of that conflict and make it
Greg: an overall better ride experience for everyone that's in those groups.
Dale: Can I give a shout out real quick? So to your point, I had never actually thought
Dale: about that, that it does kind of become a catch-all group.
Dale: And so that's probably where some of the difficulty comes to.
Dale: So shout out to Tate and Ryan for being the two group three ride leaders consistently.
Dale: They do a great job. Yeah. And those are the biggest groups too, I think.
Carl: Yeah. A lot of times.
Greg: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
Carl: Or a lot of times, one, I go, is there going to be anybody left? And I see one drive off.
Carl: There's a whole bunch that try that. But the beauty of crank and drank is the
Carl: way it's designed that you can try and push yourself.
Carl: But again, that goes to ride etiquette. But if you say, I'm losing the guy in
Carl: front of me, that's wrong.
Carl: You know, if you can't see the guy in front of you, you need to let this guy
Carl: go by and then the next guy go by.
Carl: And then if you end up in the next group behind you, that's okay because here
Carl: they come, you know, and we're all going to do the same thing.
Carl: We're all going to get back to be drinking beer behind the shop, you know.
Carl: So the way it's designed, there shouldn't be pressure on really anybody, you know, except,
Carl: group one ride leader well.
Greg: I think so you know group one in in particular is anyone who goes off with the
Greg: race pace knows what they're.
Carl: Getting yeah exactly.
Greg: So that's just that's just a free for all i don't have to worry about that but
Greg: with group one you know last week you know we rolled out and you know my my
Greg: sweet spot for a group is you know about eight to ten riders.
Carl: That's the best for.
Greg: Preferably what we try and do preferably about eight um because if you get more
Greg: than that you get get these weird, you know, slinky effects while you're going
Greg: through features and people don't properly space, people are going to have to
Greg: stop and it throws the rhythm off.
Greg: But we rolled out of the park on it. It looked like there was 20 people in group one.
Greg: And, you know, when I, when I noticed that I will purposely not stop and just
Greg: push it for the first quarter of the ride.
Greg: Cause I, I know that part, some of those people in that,
Greg: in that group shouldn't be in group one, but they're trying to push themselves
Greg: and i i i'm trying to get them to drop and i don't say that in a mean way i
Greg: i i know for them to enjoy their ride they'd be better off with group two so
Greg: i push really hard in the beginning try to fret i like that.
Carl: That's a good.
Greg: Because because i know if they if i'm pushing and they can't hold they'll drop
Greg: in the you know the group behind us and that's what the beauty of this ride
Greg: is you'll get picked up by the other groups yeah.
Dale: Greg does the the same thing in like the first 10 minutes of.
Greg: The ride.
Dale: I'm like oh please dear god just let me hang on for just 10 minutes you know
Dale: because i know he'll like calm down after a while yeah that first that first
Dale: few miles it's just like oh god i like i now i know why some of y'all do like
Dale: the warm-up ride before the ride because just starting off oh yeah.
Greg: The whole throttle.
Carl: Is hard warm-up ride yeah who does that is that is that on there no this is
Carl: what causes his uh trauma.
Brooks: Uh, who's in charge of the big ass ride?
Carl: Uh, Zach Sisson, um, who did a whole lot of finding of trail out on East.
Carl: It was his vision, the Boggy down and Boggy Diddy. That was his vision.
Carl: And, um, and, and I think that trail builders, once they finish a trail,
Carl: they are are proud of it and they want to educate to the public for two reasons
Carl: because they're proud of it but also to get enough wheels on it to keep it beat
Carl: in you know and so this is an educational thing and just a community building
Carl: thing like we do a whole bunch on the satin community you know we uh,
Carl: do the.
Dale: Satin social too.
Carl: Satin social yeah that sort of thing and so yeah so he's uh and he had talked
Carl: to the fast friends people the brewery there so um yeah i rode that today it's
Carl: it's in pretty good shape it's uh that's gonna be uh 4 20.
Carl: Yeah uh april 20th um at fast friends at at eight o'clock uh and we're gonna
Carl: do uh the big east loop is what we call it's about a 26 seven what did you it's on your thing oh.
Dale: No i think uh yeah definitely um i think it was about 25 miles.
Carl: Yeah a little bit more but uh yeah so it's gonna be fun yeah it's.
Brooks: Pretty long ride.
Carl: Yeah big ass ride i.
Greg: Think it's a unique you know you know especially for me i i i'm not really familiar
Greg: with those east trails out by 35.
Carl: Oh well then see that's the purpose of this.
Greg: You know i i I live in Southwest Austin, so, you know, the trails I know are
Greg: the ones I can get out and explore easily.
Greg: But, you know, to get out to 35, because I prefer not to drive,
Greg: you know, if I can ride there, I'll ride there.
Carl: You can ride there.
Greg: I mean, I'm already, you know, 12, 13 miles deep if I ride out east.
Greg: And, you know, there's not much room for exploring once I do that,
Greg: because I know I've got another, you know, 12, 13 miles to get back to the house.
Greg: So, you know, the Big Ass Ride just, you know, for me, it's an opportunity to just follow people.
Greg: Commit to it, too. And learn those trails and see those trails.
Greg: Because every time I go out there, I love them. I think they're challenging.
Greg: They're unique environments. The east side is nothing like the west side.
Greg: But, you know, I don't know those routes. And, you know, just to get out there
Greg: and have someone that, you know, show me those trails and give me the opportunity
Greg: to experience. I think it's a unique experience.
Greg: Uh event and hopefully a lot of people come out.
Carl: For it i think it'll be fun that when i do
Carl: that big east loop it's i feel like not that
Carl: it takes a long time but i i feel like i've been gone like two days or i've
Carl: gone to a different country or something it's just somehow it's a different
Carl: environment and it's just and you go through a whole bunch of different ecosystems
Carl: or some i don't know why it is but it's it's challenging but it's not challenging
Carl: like rocky and features and and that kind of stuff.
Carl: It's just very unique.
Carl: And so it's an opportunity to come out.
Carl: And I think Fast Friends is doing something. Maybe. I'm not sure.
Dale: I don't know. Zach said it's sponsored by Fast Friends. I don't know if they're doing anything.
Brooks: That's the brewery?
Carl: Yeah. Brand new brewery there on the side of I-35, just south of William Cannon.
Greg: I think a shout out to them. But also, I would like to see some of the businesses
Greg: in the Satin area take advantage of the, the, the proximity they have to the trail network and, and,
Greg: um, open their doors to make it more inviting for, for bikers.
Greg: Uh, I know Nomadic Outpost up there off of, uh, uh, Brody.
Greg: Uh, I would love to see some, uh, um, some bike racks that can accommodate,
Greg: uh, mountain bike tires.
Greg: You know, I love Nomadic. It's great spots, uh, great, you know,
Greg: proximity. And they, they added some bike racks and Carl, I think you talked to them.
Carl: I did.
Greg: But, uh, you know, the funny thing is they're, they're, they're,
Greg: they're, they're, they're not wide enough for a mountain bike tear.
Carl: Oh, really?
Carl: Well, my bike's leaning against the picnic table. I'm not letting them,
Carl: I'm not putting it away over there. Yeah, I know.
Brooks: I was going to say the same thing. Like my bike, if it's not at home in my house,
Brooks: it never leaves my sight.
Carl: Your grasp.
Brooks: It's an unfortunate, unfortunate side effect of living in the city. Any city really. Yeah.
Dale: Greg, you brought up an interesting point. Brooks, do we have some time?
Brooks: Yeah, go for it.
Dale: Violet Crown Trail. So I was just thinking about this the other day when I was
Dale: riding out there and exploring it.
Dale: So the Violet Crown Trail currently ends where Walgreens is there at Slaughter,
Dale: and it's planned to go all the way out to Buda.
Dale: And so they took our, what I named was my favorite trail, which was Chip Chop.
Dale: They took our Chip Chop away to build the VCT.
Dale: And initially, I think a lot of us were disappointed about that.
Dale: We're losing single track to 12.
Carl: Don't you admit that you've ridden it already.
Dale: 12 foot. You never. No, no, no, no. I just kind of looked at it from a God's
Dale: eye view upon my bicycle.
Dale: But yeah, so I don't know how I got onto it. It must not have been clearly marked or something.
Dale: But yeah, I took a turn and here I am on this 12 foot wide gravel trail.
Dale: But we originally lamented that.
Dale: But I was out there the other day and I was, you know, trying to exert myself
Dale: a bit on Genesis and a couple of the other Rocky trails. And I realized I still had to ride home.
Dale: And then I realized that the Violet Crown trail will be there.
Dale: And, and, and that's going to be something that cuts through like the majority of Satin.
Dale: And it's going to give us an opportunity to completely change the way we approach
Dale: Satin and our routing and, and riding in that we can like, we can give it far
Dale: away from home and try to improve,
Dale: get our PR on a difficult segment.
Dale: And then just ride some basic, easy trail back to ATX bikes.
Carl: I've done a lot of PR. I'm on the Violet Crown Trail Advisory Board,
Carl: and I've done a lot of PR in our community to say don't,
Carl: give them a hard time. This is going to be a good thing for us because,
Carl: and you didn't mention that you can ride it when it's wet.
Carl: So when it's rain, you will be able to gravel bike all over all the Violet Crown Trail and stuff.
Carl: And it's going to open up so much when we get through to Buda,
Carl: you know, when it, uh, there's on the 45, um, the new 45 that has the nice,
Carl: uh, paved, uh, hike and bike trail along it.
Carl: There's two cutouts. One of them's an educational one, But the other one is
Carl: the actual trailhead to the Violet Crown Trail when it goes south to Buda.
Carl: So when you do those two little things off of the trail, one of those is going
Carl: to be the Violet Crown Trail.
Carl: And when that opens, when that fence gets cut, booyah!
Dale: You know, you mentioned wet weather. And so, you know, trails when they're wet and everything.
Dale: And that will allow us probably to do a crank and drink after a rain in some
Dale: situations where it can be trail.
Dale: Because sometimes, you know, 80% of our route is good to go and basically what
Dale: we would call hero dirt and then 20% of it is garbage and we can't ride it.
Dale: And so if the VCT allows us to bypass that 20% and link up the 80,
Dale: then we have 100% trail route.
Carl: It'll be an out and back, you know, but still it'll be as much as we want to.
Carl: That's a huge, that's a great point.
Brooks: Yeah, and then it goes back to what you said in the very beginning,
Brooks: Carl, about, you know, wanting to ride on the road more. And I think it's okay to give away sections.
Brooks: Personally, I'm okay with giving away sections of the mountain bike trails to
Brooks: improve actual urban transit where people can actually go places and accomplish
Brooks: things and not just recreation.
Brooks: I'm totally on board with that personally.
Carl: I've ridden the new Violet Crown Trail to Home Depot to buy a screw just because,
Carl: well, hey, I can ride there faster than I can get in my car.
Greg: Well, it's safety corridors too. I mean, trying to connect to the Greenbelt
Greg: from the South Austin Trail Network,
Greg: you know, if you want to go do a Greenbelt ride, I mean, it's a heck of an effort
Greg: just to do that ride, let alone have to take, you know, trails all the way up there.
Greg: And now, like, to what, you know, Dale's point, you know, you can just hop on
Greg: the Vial of Crown, have a nice, easy, you know, to and from the Greenbelt and
Greg: have better access to those mountain bike trails.
Greg: But from a safety standpoint, just not having to ride Brody there.
Dale: So crank and drink Barton Creek Greenbelt win. Just kidding. Please don't.
Greg: I've got to rest. Please don't. well you know that you know to that point you
Greg: know with the it's it's it's difficult for some of the the the riders who want
Greg: to get out there and just do 15 miles because you're you're already what's that
Greg: from from atx it's already six or seven yeah they get up there and.
Carl: That's like mary moore same idea it's seven miles from the parking lot to get
Carl: to mary moore parking lot and so mary moore doesn't work for crank and drinks
Carl: unfortunately because that's a,
Carl: underutilized area for sure there well.
Greg: I think that's what's cool about you know satin though is if you wanted to you
Greg: can make it a day oh you know plan ahead have you know backpacks i've seen some
Greg: guys they they got a drop food ahead at certain waypoints well.
Dale: What did zach do recently in austin too they had over 100 mile rides like 114 in one day i think.
Carl: Yeah yeah well and and steven's gonna do his uh perimeter thing that's a 50
Carl: mile of the satin perimeter is 50 miles or so.
Greg: That's that's that's wild it's literally just the perimeter i mean it doesn't
Greg: even get into the meat upset and there's.
Carl: A lot inside yeah.
Greg: And i i didn't i think he it's not even taking
Greg: advantage of all the perimeter i think there's more to it so
Greg: it's kind of exciting to see how that's going to evolve you know i i think right
Greg: now the the pushes that those east side trails i think that's where the the
Greg: new uh you know the new ground you know for for satin where this out there,
Greg: I think it's going to open more opportunity.
Greg: But, you know, I joke with, not even joke, but I talk with my road bike buddies.
Greg: I'm like, y'all got to be on a mountain bike. I mean, road biking is too dangerous.
Greg: And I joke about it with my wife. And it's just, you know, if you're road biking,
Greg: your chance of death is much higher. Yeah. I mean, because if all you need is one.
Carl: You might break a collarbone mountain biking, but you're not going to die.
Greg: Yeah, sure. Your chances of crashing mountain biking are much higher.
Greg: But the chance of catastrophic injury, I think, is much lower.
Greg: And it makes it, I think people need to realize that, especially in this day
Greg: of age with so many distracted drivers out there and cars being bigger and being
Greg: faster. It's just, it's dangerous.
Carl: People are being dumber.
Dale: I'd drive to Crank and Drink, even though I live less than a mile away,
Dale: because I was hitting on my way home and coming out, like the dude coming out
Dale: of the HEB parking lot, you know, wasn't even paying attention,
Dale: ran right into me, you know.
Greg: Was that after mountain biking?
Dale: Yeah, that was after a Crank and Drink ride. So I was coming home from Crank
Dale: and Drink and I was just passing the HEB parking lot and he just.
Carl: It was 1.30 in the morning.
Dale: No, it wasn't. I mean, and it was
Dale: just kind of wild because it wasn't that late, but it wasn't very busy.
Dale: I had my lights on, everything, two lights on. I had my helmet light,
Dale: and the dude still managed to run into me.
Dale: And luckily, he stopped. He was very apologetic, and he paid for a new front
Dale: wheel because he bent my front wheel and everything.
Greg: I was about to ask, how was the bike?
Dale: Yeah, yeah, right, right, yeah. How was the bike? I was fine,
Dale: but I definitely gave him what for in the beginning Cause I was like,
Dale: dude, you screw up my bike and all that.
Dale: And, uh, he was like, I'm so sorry, but that's the reason why I drive to crank
Dale: and drink, even though it's way more convenient for me to just ride my bike.
Dale: It's because I could get killed in the less than mile ride to crank and drink.
Carl: I, you know, I drive so I can bring my ice chest.
Dale: Well, that's a good point too. Yes. Okay.
Dale: We need Greg's backpack ice chest.
Carl: Yeah, that's pretty good.
Greg: Yeah, I'm thinking about bringing it tomorrow.
Brooks: There was a guy who tragically passed away at Brushy Creek recently,
Brooks: but that's the only death I've ever heard of when mountain biking,
Brooks: as opposed to road bikes where it's unfortunately a very common thing that happens on a regular basis.
Dale: I can't tell you how many times I've crashed, had gnarly just OTBs flying straight
Dale: into, I've had concussions, but I'm still here, I'm still riding.
Brooks: Right. Right.
Dale: You know, so.
Brooks: I broke a collarbone too. Yeah. And got stitches in my hand.
Dale: Yeah.
Carl: I always laugh when mountain bikers start to talk. It's like the boat scene
Carl: in Jaws where they go, oh, that's nothing. I have the, you know.
Brooks: Everybody starts showing their scars.
Dale: Or, or non-flashbacks. That's roadies. For roadies, it's non-flashbacks.
Dale: For us, it's the showing the scars.
Brooks: You gotta, you gotta have good health insurance for sure.
Carl: Yeah.
Greg: Well, that's part of the fun with the social after, you know,
Greg: after we do those group rides is everyone's, you know, it's an opportunity for
Greg: people who have something in common to discuss that and their war stories from
Greg: that ride and what they've done before.
Greg: And, you know, everyone's got their jobs. I mean, there's so many riders that
Greg: I know in Crank and Drink that I don't know what they do for a living because
Greg: we don't talk about work.
Greg: We don't talk about the stuff that's, you know, that's the grind day to day.
Carl: We talk about the important stuff.
Greg: Yeah, mountain biking. And, you know, how are you doing? How was that ride?
Greg: What are your plans this weekend to go, you know, ride some more and where you've ridden.
Dale: Where you've been, your recent trails. Yeah.
Greg: And, you know, my wife, you know, are they, are they married?
Greg: I'm like, well, I don't know. I never asked.
Greg: Do they have kids? That's, I don't know. It's a good question.
Greg: I, I never asked. And then there's, there's a people that I've,
Greg: I've, I've met and talked to for years at Craig and Drink and it's.
Carl: It's so, but my wife can't, she can't understand it at all that,
Carl: you know, because when they talk, they, they know by the end of the day that
Carl: the The new person they just met, they know where they were married, how many kids they have,
Carl: and all that kind of stuff. And we don't care.
Greg: And it's weird to occasionally bump into those people outside the ride setting
Greg: and see them in civilian clothes, you know, so to speak.
Greg: And have that weird look like, I think you look familiar.
Greg: But, you know, when people are not in their bike helmet and their jerseys and
Greg: stuff. And, you know, there's so many people that I identify based on their bike.
Greg: And I see the bike, I'm like, oh, that's who that is. And then,
Greg: you know, I'll be at Torchy's and there'll be, you know, Vincent,
Greg: you know, when I first met Vincent, you know, he was there with his kids at
Greg: Torchy's and I'd never seen him outside of the MomBank setting.
Greg: And him and I on the opposite side of the patio and we keep kind of,
Greg: you know, exchanging these looks like, I think I know you.
Greg: And then the next Tuesday he was there and he, you know, were you at Torchy's the other day?
Brooks: I was like I was was.
Greg: That you I was like oh it's like you know I I didn't recognize you without the bike helmet.
Dale: Yeah you can recognize them from like half a mile away when you're on the bike
Dale: so seeing like across the soccer field like yeah yeah.
Brooks: No no totally and I think it's one of the things that's fairly unique about
Brooks: crank and drank because most of the social rides that I've been on social I
Brooks: put in quotes uh and you know it gets the end of the Ryan is like okay that
Brooks: was fun thanks see you later yeah I'm like okay bye I.
Carl: I went to walnut that you're exactly right I went to walnut for the AR just
Carl: cuz to say well what's this all about and that what what what where'd everybody go.
Brooks: We have.
Dale: A race to see who will be in the
Dale: final four every night it's a race of attrition and if you lose you win so.
Greg: Now that's, that's, that's fun though. The amount of people that stick around for that.
Greg: And I think it's, you know, it's, it's been growing and the,
Greg: the, the fight for the final four is, is, is, you know, like Dale said, is, is a badge of honor.
Greg: And, you know, I, I expect that to be a harder fight once the weather gets warmer
Greg: and, you know, you're not, you're not freezing.
Carl: And, uh, I laugh because sometimes the ride to my house, Strava rides,
Carl: and they start at 1 a.m. And I go, wait a minute, Crankin' Drinks on Tuesday,
Carl: not on Wednesday morning.
Carl: I've seen that two or three or four times. Tuesdays.
Greg: Yeah, I'd get words covered at the door if it was 1 a.m., yeah.
Brooks: Well, I got one thing left on my little list here of topics.
Brooks: And that's Greg's incident.
Brooks: Do you want to talk about that, Greg? I've heard secondhand accounts,
Brooks: but one of the things I like to do on this podcast is to get firsthand accounts
Brooks: of everything. Do you want to talk about that?
Greg: Yeah, I'll talk about it. I'm happy to do so. And it goes to Carl's point earlier
Greg: about, is it worth it to pre-ride before the group rides?
Carl: That's what I was alluding to. Who pre-rides? Who would do that?
Greg: And for anyone that doesn't know, No, it was the December 5th incident where,
Greg: you know, the, the, the gentleman went on a shooting spree through,
Greg: through, through Austin.
Greg: Uh, unfortunately, you know, a large number of lives were lost. Um, and I had.
Brooks: You went all the way from Round Rock to San Antonio, right?
Greg: Starting San Antonio all the way up to Round Rock. Um, you know,
Greg: I've kind of disassociated myself with the, the, the facts of it just from a
Greg: trauma standpoint. I've already, you know, dealt with enough.
Greg: Um, you know, there's a lot of people that have suffered as a result of this.
Greg: Um i don't want to diminish their pain and
Greg: you know i i'm hoping for swift justice in this particular matter
Greg: but you know from from a from a ride standpoint in the topic that we were talking
Greg: about uh it was it was one of the the very first times that i i'd gotten the
Greg: crank and drink early um because i brought the grill and it was a brand new
Greg: grill um so i didn't ride my bike i drove the the car.
Greg: And because I drove the car, I was off on my ETA of how much time I needed to
Greg: get there before the ride.
Greg: And I was like, well, you know, I got 15 minutes. I can do a quick loop through South Bank.
Greg: And I just went out by myself within, you know, the first quarter mile.
Greg: You know, as I entered the trail, you know, as a warm-up, I was pushing myself. And it.
Greg: What happened first was I thought someone threw a firecracker in front of me.
Greg: I just, I had visual memories of seeing sparks coming up in front of my bike.
Greg: I'm not sure what it was, but I think he shot, he was lying ambush style in
Greg: the woods off to the side of the trail.
Greg: And I don't know why he targeted me. I think maybe he just wanted the bike for
Greg: mobility reasons. I have no idea. you.
Greg: Um, but the first shot missed. And as I'm going by the trail,
Greg: I'm ever seen out of the corner of my eyes, someone rise up from the ground.
Greg: Um, and they started chasing after me with a weapon.
Greg: Um, and you know, I'm not a gun guy. I don't really don't know much about them.
Greg: I just, I, I, and it was dusk, so I really didn't get too good of a look,
Greg: but I just remember seeing a weapon in the air.
Greg: And, uh, the first thing that popped into my head, um, and everyone,
Greg: it blows everyone's mind when I talk about this is, is, is an alligator.
Greg: Um, cause the, the trail that I was on, it's, it's about a hundred miles of
Greg: just wide open, straight single track.
Greg: And, you know, even though this all happened within a matter of seconds,
Greg: I, I processed what felt like an entire book of thoughts in my head.
Greg: And the first thing I thought was if I ride this this trail straight,
Greg: he's going to shoot me. And.
Greg: I thought of an alligator and I don't know if this is true or not,
Greg: but they always say if an alligator is going to chase you, you run in a zigzag
Greg: because an alligator can't turn.
Greg: It rides and it runs in a straight line.
Greg: And that's what I started doing. I started riding as erratically as I could
Greg: on the trail and off to the right, off to the left, off to the right, off to the left.
Greg: And I was just, you know, riding back and forth as I just remember hearing gunshots going off.
Greg: And I didn't even process it. Um, I, I thought it, like I said,
Greg: I thought it was a, you know, maybe a flare or firework.
Greg: Um, and it just, I just remember just a, a, a, a flight instinct and just having
Greg: to get away as quickly as possible.
Greg: And, and I got hit once in the, in the left elbow.
Greg: Um, and it, it, it felt like everyone's like, you know, what would it feel like?
Greg: And it just felt like I hit my elbow really hard on a table.
Carl: Like, you know, he felt like he got hit with a rubber bullet.
Carl: Cause you said somebody was shooting rubber bullets at me when you came back.
Carl: And I know you don't remember everything that happened when you came back,
Carl: which is somebody shooting rubber bullets at me.
Carl: And, uh, and we look at you and we go, Greg, you got shot.
Carl: You got a hole in your elbow.
Carl: And, and you, and I.
Greg: I didn't even know that. And I think it was Robert, I think who,
Greg: who first pointed it out and he took some, you know, some photos of it and,
Greg: and it hadn't processed me to me that someone,
Greg: you know, know, I, I, I trail network that I was so familiar with that,
Greg: like felt so comfortable on even at night.
Greg: And it just, you know, there wasn't a safety issue.
Greg: So, you know, the first thing that popped in my head was, it can't be someone
Greg: that was trying to kill me.
Greg: I thought of maybe it was a, it was a, uh, you know, homeless,
Greg: you know, individual, maybe trying to defend their territory or something like
Greg: that. So that's why I thought of like a rubber bolt.
Carl: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Greg: I was like, he couldn't possibly have been trying to kill me.
Carl: Right. Right.
Greg: Yeah, then, you know, I rode all the way back to the shop with a,
Greg: you know, a bullet hole in my elbow and, you know, called 911 and,
Greg: you know, someone was, you know, firing rubber bullets at me.
Greg: And then, you know, you all said like, you know, you've been shot.
Greg: And that's when I looked down and saw the bullet hole and I just...
Greg: In shock i.
Carl: Ran into the store to get a uh bandage for you if you recall that i was the
Carl: one that put the bandage on i i did.
Greg: Well i i remember you you you took it
Greg: personally like someone was threatening the trail yeah i know
Greg: you grabbed the machete and you were
Greg: about to you're about to run into that trail and oh my
Greg: god i wasn't thinking about you carl i'm sorry you know
Greg: i i should probably have held you back hopefully someone else held you
Greg: back i did uh but yeah it
Greg: was just a and there's probably what 60 people
Greg: there you write for a group ride and they they all witnessed
Greg: it uh you know me coming back and you know it's it
Greg: was kind of an attack on you know
Greg: like i said you know something i found safe and
Greg: and and welcoming and someone had tried to violate that and it was personal
Greg: at that point it made me incredibly angry that someone would not only attack
Greg: me but But for everyone else that rides those trails to now have them think
Greg: about that and like, am I safe out on these trails?
Dale: That was the first thing that went through my head.
Greg: Yeah. And that's what made me angry.
Greg: It was just, no, these trails are safe. And I tell everyone the trails are as
Greg: safe as they've always been.
Greg: This was a random incident, had nothing to do with the people that are on the trails.
Greg: They didn't know you, that's for sure.
Carl: It wasn't personal for him.
Greg: Yeah. Um, and, and, and what was, what was not only my own recovery and processing
Greg: mentally, what, what, what had happened, but it was important that I get back
Greg: out there as quickly as possible.
Greg: And that's why the next Tuesday at crank and drink, I, I, I didn't ride.
Greg: Um, but I wanted to be there. So, well, yeah, cause I, you know, a bolt hole in my arm.
Greg: Uh, but I wanted to be there for the, the, the social activities afterwards,
Greg: because I want everyone to see me and see that I was still enthusiastic about
Greg: the group, the writing, that I was fine, that I didn't feel unsafe.
Greg: And I wanted them to see that. So they felt the same thing.
Carl: That was huge. It was a healing. It was a healing thing because everybody was traumatized.
Carl: You know, there's so many what ifs that were I mean, I still get creeps, right?
Carl: I mean, it's just it's just creepy. I just feel unease talking about it.
Carl: But that was so heroic, you know, to come and— It could happen anywhere.
Carl: Yeah, it could happen anywhere.
Greg: I just—it was important that people saw me, that I felt seen,
Greg: and that, you know, I got back out there as quickly as I could.
Dale: Are you comfortable with kind of like rehashing what you told me about—well,
Dale: you were talking to somebody about this, and they said that as mountain bikers,
Dale: we process things differently.
Dale: And I don't know if you remember that.
Greg: Yeah, so I ended up seeing a trauma counselor.
Brooks: That's good.
Greg: I...
Greg: I felt good, but I wanted to talk to someone about it and have them let me know
Greg: that how I was processing it was appropriate and I was doing it in a healthy way.
Greg: And my wife was having a really hard time with it. And I don't blame her.
Greg: She still does every once in a while.
Greg: But for me, I just breezed past it. It was a traumatic incident,
Greg: and I immediately put it behind me and tried to focus on just moving forward.
Greg: And I remember the counselor had told me that, and I don't have any studies
Greg: personally about this, but he said that people that are active in outdoor activities.
Greg: Extreme sports, action sports.
Brooks: Yeah.
Greg: Action sports have this, this, this, your, your,
Greg: your body is used to processing the now and being focused in the present and
Greg: what you are doing and not thinking about what could happen or what will happen.
Dale: Or what has happened.
Greg: Exactly. But it's just what you're doing there in that moment.
Greg: And that's where your mind is.
Greg: And if you're on a mountain bike and you have a crash, you know,
Greg: I'm not thinking about that crash for the rest of the ride.
Greg: You know, you got to push that behind you because it's going to make the rest
Greg: of your ride unsafe if you're constantly second guessing yourself.
Greg: And, you know, extreme athletes, they don't second guess themselves.
Greg: They, they, they, they, if there's a crash, they just put it behind them,
Greg: they process it and they move on to the, whatever they're doing now.
Greg: And you see those, you know, one of the documentaries I love was it a free solo. Is that it?
Dale: Oh yeah, with Alex Honnold?
Greg: Yeah. Where they're, they're, they're climbing, you know.
Dale: Need a bag of chalk just to watch that film. Yeah.
Greg: I mean, but their heart rate in that moment is as if they're sitting at a desk.
Greg: They're not focused on their route up to that point or where they're going to go.
Greg: They're focused in the now on what they're doing, that next handhold, and that's it.
Greg: And they're perfectly calm in that moment. And, you know, the counselor said,
Greg: you know, he thinks that I was processing it very well because I just I I spend
Greg: so much time doing these social rides out on the satin trail and and being,
Greg: you know, focused in that activity and in my body.
Greg: At least I like to think it just has a way of just processing that trauma and
Greg: putting it behind you and moving on.
Carl: Yeah, that was, that was interesting to me. I've told that story more than once
Carl: about that, that the, that the counselor came up with that, you know, that was cool.
Greg: I just.
Carl: Made us feel badass.
Greg: You know. Yeah. Everyone who rides on these, these group rides or the sand and
Greg: all you guys, you know, I consider you're all a bunch of badasses and,
Greg: you know, it's, it's, and that's part of the love that I have for them.
Greg: And, you know, it's unfortunate that it's unfortunate that that incident had
Greg: to occur and people had to experience it.
Greg: But, you know, everyone I've talked to is, is, is, has processed it and moved on, I think.
Greg: And, you know, you sure you think about every once in a while.
Greg: And, you know, if I'm coming on, uh, on South or Dixie, that is,
Greg: if I'm doing Dixie at night by myself.
Carl: It's like, oh man.
Greg: There better not be anyone else on this trail. Uh, but you know,
Greg: you just, I just pushed through it and it just, as time goes by,
Greg: I just feel better and better about it.
Greg: And, you know, one of the things for my wife to help her heal with it was to
Greg: take her out there and have her do the exact path.
Greg: Path she goes i she goes i want you to walk me through the exact path you took
Greg: from leaving the bike shop to going back to the bike shop she goes you know
Greg: because you keep talking about it and you keep explaining where you were in
Greg: the straightaway this hundred yards that you had to get through,
Greg: and and and part of her healing was just to to visualize that and see that where
Greg: i was where he was where i had to go and how i got back and um it still blows
Greg: my mind every time i ride through that i'm like i can't believe i did that.
Carl: I can understand that because when i crash somewhere every time i go past the
Carl: crash thing where i hurt my elbow on disco disco for instance i go that's where i hurt my you.
Greg: Know and.
Carl: I can only imagine i go well.
Greg: If you go there today there's there's there's there's police tape still up in the trees and don't.
Carl: Have your trophy.
Greg: The the the the set and bullet dodger runner-up trip,
Greg: shout out to jeff for that i think he was the one who came he.
Carl: Did he did uh.
Greg: But no the the the tapes up there in place and i still think about every time
Greg: i i go through there and you know and the group rides you know people that know
Greg: what happened they always ask for me to point it out and you know what direction
Greg: were you going you know how you do it but you know what's still the only The
Greg: only thing that I still can't process was the amount of thought that I processed
Greg: within that millisecond.
Greg: I mean, time literally slowed down and I,
Greg: It was probably one or two seconds.
Carl: You know, felt like you had the wherewithal to start.
Greg: Yeah. That was the first thing that popped. It was just alligator.
Carl: It just, just, you know.
Greg: Anyways, it's, it's, it's part of the lore of the, the satin trail network now.
Carl: It just grows. The legend grows.
Brooks: The legend of Greg clip.
Greg: Yeah. Yeah.
Carl: So when you walked around, when you walked with her, with your wife back to
Carl: the shop and it was like you know 200 yards to and did she say and this is where
Carl: 50 guys were just sitting drinking beer while this guy was still out there with
Carl: the gun did anybody put that together.
Greg: No yeah i still like to hear the the stories and gosh i think it was i think
Greg: it was andrew andrew looked at you and goes so so we still riding,
Greg: and i think that goes to the devotion of these riders
Greg: it's like okay well that happened are are
Greg: we still gonna ride and you know i i and i don't and i actually love it that
Greg: that some of the guys went out and and they did a north loop they just went
Greg: in the direction away from where all the yeah where everything was going on
Greg: and you know i think it's a testament to the the riders and And the love of
Greg: the trails down there that, you know, people are like,
Greg: well, I still want to get out and ride it.
Greg: He's down there. He's not going to bother me. Yeah. Well, yeah.
Carl: It shook me up. I just want to drink beer and...
Carl: And the other testament to the group was that nobody that night said,
Carl: and how's the bike? Nobody asked.
Greg: So, Brooks, you got another minute?
Brooks: Yeah, go on.
Greg: So that was the one thing that I thought of. It was the next morning.
Greg: I was like, oh, man, I didn't check the bike.
Carl: I was, you know.
Greg: I'll call it 911.
Dale: Your bike's in the garage like, I'm okay, it's okay.
Carl: No bullet holes.
Greg: And they're loading me in the ambulance. I remember, you know,
Greg: as they're loading me in the ambulance, uh, someone passed it off to Frank over
Greg: at ATX bikes and he took the bike in, but you know, that whole night I was thinking,
Greg: I was like, I never checked the bike.
Greg: Did the, did the bike get hit? Like, I sure hope the bike is okay.
Greg: And that was the, so the next morning I went to ATX bikes.
Greg: The first thing, like, you know, out of the hospital, I was at ATX when they
Greg: opened up and I saw Frank, he was there and it was before the news crews had gotten there and stuff.
Greg: Off and i asked him i was like you know did you check the bike and and and that
Greg: was the first thing he said he goes as soon as i took possession of your bike
Greg: yes i did a full evaluation of the bike as soon as i brought inside the shop
Greg: because i checked i checked the wheel i checked the frame.
Dale: Frank didn't want to be responsible for accusations of shooting your bike.
Carl: Hey this didn't have a bull whole.
Dale: Lot brought it in.
Greg: No mike the the bike was was not hit um But yeah, that was the first thing I
Greg: was thinking about the next week.
Carl: Oh man, what a...
Brooks: All right guys, well that's all the topics that I have. Is there anything that
Brooks: you guys want to add? Append?
Greg: Yes, if we got another minute real quick, we talked about the group dynamics.
Greg: And we never talked about other trail users.
Greg: And you know, I find it important to be as friendly and polite as possible to
Greg: other users of the trail and to not just say that these are mountain bike trails,
Greg: you shouldn't be hiking on it and stuff like that.
Greg: And I think it's an asset for the community to use these trails,
Greg: but for non-riders to also...
Greg: I want those people to appreciate...
Greg: The main use of the trail and that to, to, to, to not destroy it or interfere
Greg: it, you know, to the extent that you're taking it away from those riders.
Greg: And, you know, I, I, I'm as polite as possible to the, the, the,
Greg: the hikers. I stop, I let them pass.
Greg: But, you know, there's, there's, there's a, and Dale, you can chime in if you
Greg: want, but, you know, there's the electronic motorcycles that are out there and people.
Brooks: Don't get him started.
Dale: We'll save that for when I'm on here with you, Brooks.
Dale: But no, to your point, Greg, I think other trail users are assets to our community
Dale: as well. Trail runners and hikers.
Dale: I think a lot of people need to understand that hikers don't like by default
Dale: hate riders at all. Um, I've actually been pleasantly surprised,
Dale: uh, building jumps and stuff, um, over by East bank.
Dale: I'll have people walk by and, or hike by, and they'll be like,
Dale: thanks for the trail work.
Dale: And I'm clearly building dirt jumps and they're like, oh, it's so great.
Dale: Thank you for all the work you're doing. I'm like, okay, thanks. Bye.
Dale: And, uh, but, but then like, we'll be trimming and they'll say the same thing.
Dale: And so, you know, hikers appreciate what we do. And there's a lot,
Dale: there's some that are like jerks, but most of them appreciate it.
Dale: And trail runners especially.
Dale: And those are our assets. So, you know, if we ever need to like lobby for the
Dale: city to sanction sat or give us the autonomy to be able to take care of the network,
Dale: we might need more trail users than just riders on our side.
Dale: You know, and so it's important to be friendly with hikers and not just blow past them.
Dale: And remember that we do yield to them, you know, give them the opportunity to
Dale: go by. but nine out of 10 times, I find that hikers will yield to you,
Dale: you know, but at least make it clear that you're trying to yield to them to begin with. But.
Carl: Yeah, it always gives me great joy to see people using the trail,
Carl: you know, doesn't matter.
Carl: And when you say that when we have to lobby the city for something,
Carl: I always say that trail hiker can carry a sign that says save our trails at
Carl: the back of the city council meeting just as well as a mountain biker, you know.
Carl: So, yeah, the more that are advocates for the trails, the better. So that's always good.
Greg: Be nice out there.
Carl: Yeah, be nice.
Dale: Be excellent to each other, as Abraham Lincoln once said.
Greg: That's right.
Brooks: All right. Anybody want to give their content information, you know,
Brooks: Instagram or Strava or whatever, and then, Carl, you want to talk about muchachos?
Brooks: Is that something you want to open publicly?
Carl: Well, yeah. Yeah, we have a email list that we send out the things that Greg comes up with.
Carl: And people will say, put me on the list or I get requests to put on the list.
Carl: And if the best way to do that is to come to some crank and drains because we
Carl: want to say real people out there.
Dale: Yeah, it's a fan club. You have to come and actually be there.
Carl: Yeah, exactly. It's not just so I'm on the list. Be out there.
Carl: And I've seen you a couple of times. Oh, great. Well, come on.
Carl: What's your email? Send me it right now and say, put me on the damn list.
Brooks: Show up to Cranky Dragon, ask Carl to put you on the email list.
Carl: That's the technique. That's how it works.
Greg: Well, yeah, and do a ride before you ask to be put on the list.
Carl: Well, yeah, yeah, don't just show up in your tuxedo and say, put me on the list.
Greg: Yeah, yeah, do a ride, make sure you like it, and then, you know,
Greg: join the list, and then, you know, it's...
Greg: Contribute to the discussion i guess so to speak but you know i know it's kind
Greg: of just a one-way conversation on muchachos but you know berkshire again at
Greg: the uh you know how can people get a hold of us i think the easiest way to get
Greg: a hold of us is six o'clock behind atx bikes off.
Brooks: A slaughter ring beer.
Greg: As long as it's not actively raining we'll be there uh at least someone will
Greg: be there um but i'm not on social media strava is my only social media outlet so you know i and.
Dale: Email there There is a crank and drink Instagram handle that James,
Dale: James is working on now, you know, so if you, if you do follow crank and drink
Dale: on Instagram, uh, that's a good way to get the information.
Dale: Um, I also have the MTB ATX website that I maintain.
Dale: Um, I try to upload the route and Greg's route notes to that,
Dale: both in Strava and Trailforks, uh, format, uh, typically.
Dale: And then, uh, James will share that on Tuesdays as well.
Dale: So you can kind of preview the route and, uh, get all the
Dale: details if it's your first time coming out where to park uh
Dale: what to bring how it kind of works you name it mtb atx i'm can't brag enough
Dale: about that that's also where um the big ass ride uh so zach reached out and
Dale: asked to put the route information everything on there as well so if you need
Dale: information on the big ass route uh ride it is there as well and that's where
Dale: we'll put probably the satin social info yeah.
Carl: Or any information about anything
Carl: mountain bike related in austin that's a wealth of information on your,
Carl: website.
Greg: Carl, I'm curious, do we have any idea for Satin Social this year?
Greg: I know the Big S Ride is the focus right now on April 20th.
Carl: Yeah, there's a date. October 24th or something like that is the tentative date, if that's a Saturday.
Brooks: Before Halloween.
Carl: Yeah, a week before Halloween. Yeah, exactly. Saturday before,
Carl: yeah, I think it's a 24th.
Greg: I think it was as important it's before the time change too.
Carl: Yeah yeah oh what.
Dale: Is the satin social.
Carl: Uh satin social yeah it's
Carl: a fun thing it's a fun thing it's another
Carl: it's another community involvement deal just
Carl: to show off the um the whole
Carl: network and it's a fun social deal after
Carl: it there's four 17 mile routes and
Carl: you chew off you bite off how much
Carl: you think you can chew and we have had four or
Carl: five or six people now i guess through the different
Carl: iterations uh be able to do all of it so it turns into a 67 mile ride which
Carl: is less than half of what the satin is now but still and and i i still okay
Carl: with not changing the routes just so there's a legacy of uh doing the west and
Carl: the north and And I mean, yes,
Carl: the trail system has changed since the Satin Social has started,
Carl: but still, I kind of lean that way. What do you think?
Dale: We're going to add 17 laps. We're going to add a route that's 17 laps of tunnel vision this year.
Greg: The cool down. A testament to Carl's routing of Satin Social,
Greg: it's 67 miles with no overlap whatsoever.
Greg: So ever so each each of those 17 miles
Greg: is a distinct unique route uh that has no conflict with the other three out
Greg: there so i think that's a it's an impressive testament to the number of trails
Greg: out there and carl's ability to to design them in such a way that you can do
Greg: such a long ride and and every minute of that ride is new yeah.
Brooks: Well i think we could sit here and talk talking about bikes and events and trails
Brooks: all night. Yes, let's do.
Brooks: Thank you, Dale, Carl, and Greg for being here with me.
Brooks: This has been the Austin Mountain Biking Podcast. I'm your host,
Brooks: Brooks Lawson, aka The Mountain Biking Realtor, and you can find all things
Brooks: Brooks at brookslawson.com.
Brooks: Thank you. Have a good night.
Greg: Thanks, Brooks.
Dale: Thank you. Thank you.