Rays and First Snow Ride with the Fatty

I had a trip to Detroit early this week, I consulted a map and found that Rays Indoor Mountain Bike Park - Cleveland was a 2.5 hour drive from my hotel. I found by staying over an extra night I saved $100 on the flight, which was what the hotel costs - score. We finished the customer meeting around 12:30 and I drove over to Cleveland. I rented a Ford Focus - as a very quick note, that is a pretty nice car, I wouldn't mind owning one (unlike almost every other compact car I've ever rented).

Finding Rays was a bit of a challenge, its buried in the middle of a turn of the century (guessing) industrial park. There are signs for the businesses in the park at the entrance my phone took me to, but Rays is not listed. I poked my way through the park and found Rays (even the doorway is barely marked - though the hanging bike kind of gives you a hint).

Rays is incredible, I wish we had something like that nearby. I spent about 3 hours cranking around inside. Its a huge warehouse space that is full of biking goodness, jumps, berms, skinnies, tabletops, transitions, all kinds of great stuff.

I don't have many skills beyond mountain biking, so a lot of the BMX type stuff was out of the question. I had a blast on the sections I rode though. Their pumptrack is stupidly perfect, you get going so fast and you can carry that speed through the perfectly formed corners. Just an amazing time, I definitely have to get back.

I did have one spectacular crash on a wall ride. At speed those thing are so cool, you lean in and it just carries you around the corner. There was a jump set up and after getting comfortable carrying speed coming through the corner, I decided to try the jump that lands you in the wall ride. Unfortunately I misjudged exactly what was going to happen, I landed upright and stalled on the wall. I went down to the low side (of course, without getting a foot out. Ouch, hard crash, broke my helmet and got a few bruises. No permanent damage.

Last night I got the fat bike out for a solo cruise at Crandalls in the snow - we have about 2" of snow on the ground. It was a really fun ride.

The bike has traction all over the place, of course I didn't have my other bike with me to compare, but I only had to walk one or two small sections. That bike was a very good investment, I'm loving it.