Snow riding before Snowapocalypse

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Sat.
I went out riding the last weekend of January in the snow on Sat. and Sunday. The Sat. ride had promise, but turned out to be not that good. I went riding at Wakefield. I had been at volleyball and was going to get some more of my workout on with some riding in the snow there. By the time I got there the snow had gotten too deep. I like to ride in snow that is like 3-4 inches. The snow was closer to 5 or so. With my SS I couldn't stand on the hills so I was slipping. I had an ok time of it on the flatter stuff. The snow was slippery and not very good at cushioning the fall. I was hating life going down the bermed downhill where I fell twice hurting my knee and arm.










Sun.
I was to ride with some folks on the CCT and Fairlakes, but after Saturdays's adventure I decided to just ride the C&O canal. I rode the SS and the canal had a fair number of users walking and CX skiing. I was able to ride fairly well with my SS, I had a leaking ft. valve so I had to run the front tire a little higher then I would like. It was sometimes faster to ride in the fresh powder and hit real ground then to ride in the ski tracks. I started from chainbridge, and then by the time I got to 495 I decided to ride with a Bike Doctor rider who I be playing leap frog with. He was bolder then I riding a CX bike in like 6 inches of snow. We rode together with me gaining on the rougher sections, and Eon gaining when going through fresh powder where he could get to the real ground and use his gears. We rode to Great Falls, and I then turned around. Ended up doing like 2 hours of non-stop pedaling(and I really couldn't stand up). I am glad I ran into Eon, who I found out was on the rain ride I had done the week prior with his teammate Evan, and the DCMTB crew. He gave me the extra motivation to get to Great Falls, cause once I was there I had to ride back to get to the car :-).