Bug Springs

#followcamfriday sampling one of Tucson's finest DH tracks with the squad. 

Tucson is definitely making an impression on me. There is just something special about the realness and rawness of this town and the surrounding trails. This place is growing on me. I could live here for a few months out of the year, no question. It is WAY too hot in the summer, but riding in a short sleeved jersey in February certainly has its charm. 

I think I like the riding here so much because it is hard. The ground is abrasive, the rocks will slice your skin, and the cactus.... Don't even get me going on the cactus. There is a bunch of it, living inside my body as I type these words. Maybe I am just bored of riding manicured, feel good trails. I honestly couldn't be bothered. Lemmon is hard. This place breaks bikes, bodies and your spirit. I need more of that in my life. Suffering builds strong character and makes tequila taste better at the end of the day. Any time of day, for that matter. 

The ride is only as good as the company you keep. Feeding off of your friends energy and stoke is as real as it gets. Cut that shit with a knife, get it down your throat. The energy I can harness from my friends is surreal. Always surround yourself with good people. Always. Randy, Kyle and Jonny are keeping the levels up. Squad of legends, smashing down the hill, laughing the entire way. Nothing better. 

All I actually care about when I am riding is finding natural trail gaps. Sometimes they are only a few feet, sometimes they are twenty. Sometimes they are over sharp shit, often they are for no other reason than to make the person behind me laugh. When I hear that laugh, I pull up harder off of the next one. And so the game goes. Always pull up. Fucking always. Always make your friends laugh. 

Randy Sooter is such a legend. Randy is the only person I have ridden with in the last 6 years that doesn't use Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Youtube, or any of the other white-noise distractions that we are all so addicted to. I love this about Randy. He is too busy living in the present to give any fucks about social media and it's negative impact on our society. Legend. 

Technology isn't all bad. If you would have told me 5 years ago that I would have an autonomous drone chasing me while I ride my bike with an electronic drivetrain, I would have laughed in your face. And here we are. What a time to be alive. The Skydio 2 drone really has been a game changer from a filming perspective. The technology that allows this thing to chase us, keep us in frame, and not crash 47 times is mind numbing. The footage coming out of this thing truly does justice to the amazing landscapes that I am fortunate to find myself enjoying on the daily. 

I was thinking of buying a small piece of land adjacent to Lemmon. You know, one big enough to park my van on, and with enough space for a few more. Maybe a garage and a yurt. Maybe some jumps and a swimming pool for Pete. You can get 10 plus acres here for what a 1/3 acre lot costs where I live. Might be time to cash in some of that Dogecoin. Pete will thank me.