It’s North Carolina State Fair time again, a fact I was reminded of this morning when I drove down Hillsborough Street this morning and saw a guy hawking parking spaces for $10. $10! Do you know how many Krispy Kreme hamburgers you could buy for $10? Then I was reminded of a post from last year encouraging people to save a sawbuck and their waistline at the same time by hiking to the State Fair. I’ve updated that post slightly and rerun it below.
Weekend plans? Get mtb religion, howl, hike
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 explore a different branch of exercise ecclesiology: mountain biking.
Nia: Exercise that won’t burn you
A condensed version of this story by our print alter ego appeared Oct. 12 in both the Charlotte Observer and The News & Observer of Raleigh. It appears here with additional information and links.
It’s about indulging yourself. It’s about pleasure. It’s about listening to your body and doing what it wants to do, not what some hard-body drill instructor wants it to do.
The 31-mile Art Loeb Trail: A nice day’s run
It wasn’t so much the five hours of rain they endured, nor the nearly 3,000 foot of vertical climbing in three miles to start the day (there would be 17,000 total feet of up-and-down during their 11 hour and 10 minute ordeal). It wasn’t getting lost at Butler Gap, nor the “quad-shredding” descent down Pilot Mountain. Rather, it was the need for a good sugar fix after running 27 miles straight on the Art Loeb Trail, which runs 31 miles through the rugged Pisgah National Forest (including the Shining Rock Wilderness) in western North Carolina.
Wake up, America! We’re losing step
Last week I heard an ominous observation on a British TV show. The context escapes me, but the phrase, intended as a benign descriptor, stuck. In referring to the United States, the narrator referred to us as “currently the most powerful nation in the world.”