The Doug Ryder Reports

Chapter 18: In Which The Dirty Dozen (Plus Two) Take On Moose Mountain And Win (But Not Before Getting Muddy And Suffering A Couple of Casualties to Pride and Bikes)

This week we took on the Moose Mountain ride in which we climbed up Moose Mountain, crossed over along the power line to Old Murphy Dome Road, and then back down to the ski lodge for this the penultimate Doug ride of the 2001 Doug ride season. We had a bike casualty (more about that in a bit) and Tom fell over in the parking area while trying out his new clipless pedals. He was little worse for the wear, suffering a little wounded pride.

The ride started at the usual Doug ride time (a little after 7:30) and with fourteen of us in all. We gathered up at the gravel pit at 2 Mile Murphy Dome Road and rode over to the ski lodge (about a mile and a half). From there, we took a lazy, wending trail up to the top of the hill. Malcom led the way for a while, then I did, then Tom and Malcom, and such all the way on up to the top. The group managed to stay together pretty well all the way on up and we were just getting up to the top of the hill a little more than an hour into the ride.

Once we got up to the top, it was a quick 15 minutes or so along the power line over to Old Murphy Dome Road. I had a shoelace problem and so had to push up one of the hills along the way. We regathered up at the road going to the old missile site. Then it was a fast bomb down that road to Old Murphy Dome Road. From there, we breezed down OMDR over to the rabbit-hole trail. I was feeling quite confident on my clunky Specialized and was able to keep up with the hammerheads on the way down through the ruts, bumps, and (several) puddles along the way.

I had intended to take off from the rest of the group once we got to the downhill trail and did just that, telling everyone I would "meet you back at the cars" as I climbed that last little hill before the subdivision section of OMDR. I passed by the car of one of the riders who had parked up at the end of the subdivision and ridden down to the gravel pit (he wanted to get an early start home) and was thinking that he’d catch up to me on the road. He didn’t, for reasons which I will explain shortly. It took me about six or seven minutes to get there, another fifteen minutes of flat-out sprinting to get over to Spinach Creek Road and then about ten minutes to bomb down Spinach Creek Road.

I had a fun descent and got back to the cars at around a quarter to 10 or so, approximately thirty minutes after leaving the rest of the group. Malcom showed up a few minutes later. He said he’d seen me blasting down Spinach Creek just as he was getting out to the road from the rabbit trail.

Other riders trickled in over the next few minutes and they said that David James had suffered a serious injury to his bike (his derailleur ate a stick and got bent) and that was what held everyone up. A few minutes after that, the guy who’d left his car up at Old Murphy Dome Road drove by with his and Dave’s bikes on top. Evidently they’d fixed it enough to get up the half-mile to where the guy’s car was parked and the guy gave Dave a ride home (Dave and I rode over from his house).

Finally, the last of the riders got in around ten or so. Burnside and the rest gave me some grief for skipping the rabbit trail, but I told them I wanted to do that cool descent down Spinach Creek Road. Anyway, aside from Dave’s bike, the ride was a blast. Total time: around 2.5 hours. Total distance: around 14 miles by the rabbit trail, 19 by the Spinach Creek descent. Worst hill: up Moose Mountain. Best descent: Old Murphy Dome Road and/or Spinach Creek Road. Percentage of time spent pushing/porting the bikes: less than 1 (around a few puddles, and up one little hill). Percentage of time spent having fun: greater than 99.

That’s my report for this week. See ya next week!

Liam Wescott

a/k/a The Doug Ryder

FCC Historian