A year ago today, I wrote about all the things I planned to do in my 55th year. 55 things, in fact, all tied to the number 55. My inspiration came in large part from a National Institutes of Health report noting that men generally start dropping weight and, the report added, start falling apart at 55. If that’s the case, I thought, then I need to start working extra…

“I … I just didn’t have anything more to give,” I confided to my cycling psychologist on our ride this morning. “I was empty.” Allen and I ride one morning a week at Umstead. It’s typically a mildly competitive ride where we save just enough air to chat about bikes (lot’s of debate about whether to go the 29er route), rides (mountain centuries that Allen does and I talk about),…

Monday — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast, especially come summer. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. 
To help ease this trying transition, we’re running a new feature every Monday, at least during the summer, called 90 Second Escape. Essentially, it’s a 90-second video of a place you’d probably rather be: a trail, a park, a greenway, a lake…

Monday (or in this case, since yesterday was the July 4 holiday, Tuesday) — never an easy time for the outdoors enthusiast, especially come summer. After a weekend of adventure, returning to the humdrum work-a-day world can make one melancholy. 
To help ease this trying transition from out-in-the-Sun-day to Mon-I-wish-I-were-back-in-the-sun-day, we’re running a new feature every Monday, at least during the summer, called 90-Second Escape. Essentially, it’s a 90-second mini-movie…

I once told someone I could tell how I was doing mentally by my last mountain bike ride. If I’d taken an aerobic ride on fire roads — one where I could go relatively fast without paying much attention, one where I could let my mind drift — I was doing pretty good. I was still doing pretty good if the ride was half fire roads, half more aggressive, aggression-relieving…

Get religion at a Fat Tire Festival, howl at the coast. It’s all happening this weekend. Piedmont Saturday, we salute the Fat Tire. If you’re already familiar with the Church of the Fat Tire, we need only say that Saturday is something of our high holy day here in the Triangle. If you’re not already among the faithful, the 5th Annual TORC Fat Tire Festival is a great way to…

Spence March has long been concerned over whether his kids are getting enough exercise. Four years ago, he enrolled them in a running program. And being a good dad and realizing that kids pay more attention if you practice what you preach, he enrolled with them. It was a good experience for all, but March wasn’t content to let it be a one-time event. Like most parents, March likes the…

Steve uttered an annoyed grunt and pulled off the trail. “My seat,” he said. “It slipped.” Instinctively, I pulled over to take a look. He gave me a funny a look, gave the seat a quick shove, and hopped back on. Moments later, another annoyed grunt, followed by another trailside stop. “I need to get out my wrench.” Again, I pulled over and stopped. Nothing unusual here — one guy…

The kids were doing the math, and the numbers weren’t coming up in Ben’s favor. It was Sunday morning, around 9:30, and the fact that these 15-year-olds were able to do math at all was impressive. For most of the past 24 hours they’d been racing their mountain bikes at the appropriately named Dark Mountain near Wilkesboro, site of the 10th Annual Burn 24 Hour Challenge, a mountain bike race…