"I thought I was going to get sucked off....."

....into the deep stuff." So said the Rabbit as we were driving back to the top of Ester Dome to retrieve my vehicle. The trail today was fantabulous. Packed just hard enough that it was very fast, but with the typical soft fluffy edges that beg you to ride faster, urging you to push yourself because crashing won't hurt. Those soft fluffy edges, however, will drag you into a crash if you venture to near them. And I think it happened to most of us at least once. The big news today was that we had three people who hadn't rolled a winter downhill run yet.

All of us were wondering why we haven't been doing this for years, because it is ludicrously fun. We have shuttled this trail for years in the summer, but none of us are professionals, all of us all well past our teenage years and the rocks, trees and washouts littering the trail demand respect and a high toll for lack of it. They are sleeping beneath a deep soft layer of winter's best right now, so we'll continue to shred with total abandon for another few weeks.