Flow State, 2021. A bike festival in Ascutney, Vermont. I’ve been given yet another totally free weekend and I decided instead of staying home, I was going to drive up on a Friday & ride, stay 1 night, then ride on Saturday and drive home. A quick hitter to say the least.
Bonus being that I knew some people going up so I figured I would run into them.
I took all my work calls on the road today and it was of no consequence/detriment to my work day. All good so far as that goes. When I got into Vermont, the clouds over the mountains looked kind of evil. I would later learn that it poured the night before.
Maybe an hour before I got there I stopped for gas, which had a market across the lot. I got a sandwich and these amazing fresh strawberries. As of this writing these berries are gone.
Hit the lot at 12 and got myself ready to ride, taking my time because again, I had all day. I had told Dave VW that I was going to be there around noon and he said he would find me. So I headed up to reg from there to get the lay of the land and assumed he would find me in due time.
After I got my reg stuff & t-shirt I was listening to the trail guy explain the loops to some woman I was standing next to. Another woman walks up behind us both and says, “I know you!”
She taps the other woman and says, “We know him.”
She says, “That’s Norm. I don’t know how I know you but I know you. You’re Norm.”
Turns out they have both done our races before. Small world.
Shortly after that I ran into Dave VW and Johnny G. Jeff was also there but he was being a Reeb spokesman or something and he apparently flatted on the early ride so he needed to fix his tire.
I went out with Dave & Johnny for a bit and we did the standard Wind Up, then the harder Gracies stuff and the red trail off that which was definitely tricky with the roots & rocks greasy from the night before. We dropped down to the falls and took the required pictures.
Dave had to peel off to go help Jeff with his ride, so Johnny and I went off to ride by ourselves. I’d never ridden with Johnny and it was a bit of a treat in some ways, because he is a legit skilled rider. I had never spent time around him before and he is a super nice guy in real life. It’s funny how we base our assessments of people by their online persona. Fair or not, this is what we have to go on more often than not.
We made our way over to the new “flow” trails which ended up being the same trails we found last year when we were here with Joy & Steve. I look at that post and remember for a brief time I listed out the trails we rode. But I soon realized that this wasn’t something I was going to maintain so I stopped doing it.
We played around on Spaghetti & Meatballs a bit and it seems to me those trails have been left for dead. We made our way up Cloud Climber to Nimbus back to the falls and over to the Gracie stuff to find the best way down. While over there we met up with Jeff & his group.
We talked a bit then Johnny and I went back to the cars where I debated calling it a day. I took a short break then tossed 2 cans of seltzer in my pack and climbed up the left side of the hill. On the way I found some gems up there. In addition to this there were a few crude doubles & step-downs.
At the top where Norcross (the new trail) starts, I stopped and sat down to take a break and have a seltzer. It was a gorgeous day to be outside sitting in the grass.
Took 1 last break before I got to the bottom to have my last seltzer. Wrapped up my ride shortly after that.
The Strava link can be found here. In all we did 15 hard-fought miles in 2:40.
After I rolled out the end of the ride I went to the car for a recovery drink, then to dress down into non-disgusting clothes. I walked back to the festival area to check out what they had to offer. For the most part the vendors were all gone but I did talk to a NEBMA rep who was super friendly.
I went to look for some food and came across dumplings first, which were good.
Then I found pierogies, which were better. They were setting up for a wheelie competition but it never got off the ground before I left.
From there I just went to the car and drove to the Airbnb where I cleaned up, ate some snacks, talked to D, and caught up on all the things I skipped today in order to ride my bike.
Traveling Normandy 