Two jerseys, arm warmers, a pullover, a windbreaker, two pairs of socks, two pairs of bicycling shorts, thermal underwear bottoms, tights, two sleeves cut from a old T-shirt on the head, my cycling gloves, and ski gloves. "Man, I hope I'm wearing enough today," I thought, as I stood beside Mike Teeter's truck waiting for him to get ready. I was shivering as I checked my bike over, and feeling my feet already go numb as the metal cleats in the bottoms sapped the heat away. I knew I should have bought those neoprene shoe covers, but the new Race Face crankset on my bike told me why I hadn't.
Pulling out of the paved parking lot beside the Black Mountain trailhead, we started up Route 276. Ice covered the road, in some places as thick as three inches. Keep the bike straight, I thought, no sudden movements. I'm just happy I'm not riding my road bike today as the wind bite into my face and through the mesh holes in my mountain bike shoes. At least the trees will keep the wind off me once we're on the trails. The news said it was in the low twenties this morning with a wind chill of five degrees.
Coming up on Route 477, we saw ice covering the entrance. We started doing light taps on the brakes to keep from laying the bikes down as we made the turn with a wide arch. Route 477 looked as if it had been paved with snow. So many cars had been down it already that they had literally packed the snow into a paved sheet of snow and ice. Already the rear end of my bike was starting to get twitchy as I readjusted my bum to sit farther back over the rear wheel. About a mile in, in what appeared to be an illusion to my snow blasted eyes, we saw a fellow mountain biker, and waved our greetings as we passed.
Once we reached the horse stables we took a right onto Clawhammer Road and our first moderate climb. There were a few hiker's tracks and two sets of mountain bike tracks blazing a trail for us to follow in the sea of whiteness. We tried to ride in these for a while, and quickly discovered we fared much better by cutting our own trail though virgin snow. This was better than the bottoms of the tracks left by the mysterious hikers and bikers, since their tracks were frozen into clumps and ruts that tried to throw us about. At Maxwell Cove Road we turned right and started following the old roadbed. I imagine when the snow pack isn't on the ground this is a fairly easy climb all the way to the Black Mountain trail. With the snow pack and hiker's boot marks everywhere along the old road bed, it turned out to be a moderate leg burner.
Upon reaching the first switchback in the road, I stopped to have a drink and enjoy the beautiful view of the surrounding mountains. I looked back for Mike and suddenly realized he wasn't there. He'll be up shortly, I told myself, as I am riding a lightweight hardtail cross country steed and he was riding his beast of a downhill rig. I waited for about ten more minutes, as much as my feet could stand in the snow. Finally I turned downhill to go see what happened. I didn't have to go far to see him making his way up towards me. He had seen some deer and tried to get some photos. "They just wouldn't cooperate; they turned their tails and ran up the hill", he said with some disappointment in his voice. We continued our journey, which was made slow going by the snow. However, the views were well worth the effort. Looking Glass Rock was to the left and in front, and a distant view of the Blue Ridge Parkway was behind us.
Upon reaching the Black Mountain Trail, I momentarily became confused as to where I was. At this point in the trail is a four way intersection, and I had only been here once before on the way down from the top of Black Mountain at Buckhorn Gap. Looking around for a few moments as I waited for Mike and the beast to make their way to the top of Maxwell Cove, I saw the blue and white dots marking Black Mountain Trail to the right.
The Black Mountain Trail at this point is level ground. Turn left to go towards Buckhorn Gap, and you are immediately hit with a 1100' climb at the way to the top in a little over a mile. This climb is no small shrug off the back. What makes it worse is the littering of chicken heads and waterbars all the way up. To the right, the way we turned starts off with about fifty yards of moderate climbing and then bam, four hundred feet up in a half mile! We started trudging our way up as I tried to get into a steady spin. I tried to yank the handlebars and move my bum as far back on the saddle as I could, only to keep having my rear wheel spin out in the snow. This continued all the way to the top of Hickory Knob, as we alternately hiked and rode to the top. Hickory Knob is over 3500 feet high, and had snowdrifts on it as deep as six inches! The great part was, we were done with the major climbing.
Opening my quick release, I lowered the seat four inches and prepared myself mentally for what was about to come. From this point, Black Mountain drops about eight hundred feet in a little over a mile. It has water bars, small drops, two tight switchbacks, and a couple of mean rooty stairs that would like nothing more than to greet your body and pulverize it step by bloody step. My kind of riding! The problem was the same nasty six inches of powder that inhibited my new/slightly used Panaracer Fire XC tires from hooking up on the climb to Hickory Knob. Now was on the downward slope we were getting ready to bomb!
Shrugging off the feeling of impending doom, and thumbing my left shifter to pull my 44 tooth gear, I cranked forward. Immediately I started gaining speed, weaving my front wheel through the snow and feeling the cold wind start to beat at my chest. A smile started to creep across my face as I plunged farther and did a power stroke across the first water bar. My bike launched into the air and for five seconds I defied gravity. Landing effortlessly, I launched the next four bars in succession. Coming to the first switchback, I placed my bum on the very back of my lowered seat. I lightly tapped the brakes and started my plunge again. Coming to the next switchback, I navigated my trusty steed around it. Just as I started to descend, my front tire went out from under me and I was a human sled for about 25 feet down the trail. Laughing and brushing the snow off, I walked back, remounted my bike and started down again.
Coming down to the rooty staircase, I unclipped my left foot and sat my bum right on the rear tire for a sketchy ride down. Black Mountain turned into a bobsled run from there to Thrift Cove, with a couple of nice berms on the way down. Upon reaching the Thrift Cove trail, we met some hikers who had spent the night in the Buckhorn Gap shelter. After saying our hellos, they heard a few whispers of awe from us about the tough son a .... We continued with a left onto Thrift Cove for a short climb and a fun, fast downhill. Reaching Grassy Road, we climbed to Sycamore Cove. We thought about doing the usual upper side, but ultimately decided to do the lower side. Besides, we had never ridden the lower side, and my feet were frozen!
At this point Sycamore Cove started out tight and fast, with a couple of nice berms and a great two-foot drop to launch. It just got better all the way to the road. There were lots of short downhill sections with a couple of stream crossings. Near the end there was a log that had fallen across the creek. It looked as if someone had been trying to ride across it, and I made a mental note to try it when it was a little warmer out. A short ride on the pavement, and we were loading the truck up to go home. It was time for a hot shower and a bowl of tomato soup, spiced to sear the tongue of course.
© Blue Ridge Bicycle Club Inc. 2004