Epic Ride at Alafia!

My mountain biking buddies, the Landshark Racing team from up in Michigan came down to ride Alafia with me this weekend. It turned out to be an epic ride that everyone will add to their own list of riding stories.

Alafia is my favorite mountain biking park in the Tampa area.  It is globally rated as the #9 best mountain bike trail in the world on singletracks.com. It is quite a challenging ride and very different than most other trails.  I think the best description of Alafia is that it is an amusement park for mountain bike riders.

 First Trail of the Day

My buddies had ridden quite a few trails around the country - but had never ridden down in Florida before.  So, it was fitting that on the very first trail of the day we ran into something that set the tone for the rest of the day. It was about 1 mile along the north creek trail that our lead driver was stopped dead in his tracks.  Laying there right smack in the middle of the single track was a huge 8' alligator!  We stopped about 40' shy of it.  There was no getting around it.  Our best guess was that he was laying there waiting for his breakfast to be delivered on two wheels.

Being the DUMB bikers that we are, we all jumped off our bikes and climbed up the hill next to the gator to get a better look.  It was awesome!  Off in the water about 15' to the left, there was yet another gator waiting to be next in line for breakfast.  We all took some pictures and I took the following video.

That's my buddy Christian (the DUMB biker) that comes over next to me (in case the gator was still hungry after eating me).

Last Trail of the Day

The sun was starting to get low in the sky and we were back out at the trail head (again) fixing a broken chain. Throughout the day, everybody had been breaking equipment and wiping out except me.  The other guys had 3 broken chains, a broken seat, 1 flat, and countless wipeouts.  Yeah - this set of trails is that tough.  

Two of the guys were working with a local biker to make the repair and were ready to pack it in for the night and try to catch the rest of the trails the next day.  I wasn't ready to head back to the camp ground yet, so I asked Bill if he wanted to make one last ride.  He agreed and we selected the Roller Coaster trail since we hadn't yet ridden that one and it was a fairly easy going trail.

We head out and were doing great.  I was in the lead since I was familiar with the trails (being the local).  I'd charge down the trail and every once in a while check back to see if Bill was still with me.  You never know when someone will make a slight error and take a tumble.  It was on one of these checks over my shoulder that I screwed up.  As I was looking back, the trail curved and dropped away.  Swinging my head back, I noticed that this sent me perilously close to the ledge on the right AND the 20 foot drop into the alligator infested swamp.  I hit the brakes and put a foot down dragging along the roots sticking out from the ledge.  Suddenly, my bike hit a root that stopped it instantly.  I, however, kept moving forward and my leg hit my chain ring driving it deep into my leg.  For a second I balanced there on the ledge not sure if I was still going to fall into the water or not.  

After a few seconds (lasting an eternity), I stepped back up onto the single track and yelled back to Bill to lookout for me - that I was off my bike up ahead of him.  He came to a stop next to me as I was examining the deep cut in my leg.  It had dirt and sand from the trail in it (and all over my legs).  He had a camelback, so we used that water to wash the trail off my leg and out of the cut as best as we could.  The blood stopped almost immediately - being dehydrated tends to help with clotting.

Being DUMB bikers, our very next impulse was that we had to get a video of this!  So, there you have it to the side.

Afterwards, I wrapped my shirt around my leg to feebly try to hold the cut closed - but mostly to keep more trail dust from getting down in it.  I then had to ride another 2 miles back to the trail head - riding was easier on the cut than walking.  Next I had to ride back to the camp ground.  Then I after showing the vid to my other two buddies which had headed back early, I drove 30 minutes to the nearest emergency room.

They stitched me up and I was back out the door within an hour.  I drove back to the camp ground and sat with my buddies around the campfire drinking beer and telling stories about the day.