Friday, October 14, 2011

So long...

Goodbye old buddy. I'll miss you.

Friday, October 7, 2011

Lee McCormack at Valmont Bike Park

I caught Lee McCormack, the man behind LeeLikesBikes.com, teaching a mountain bike skills clinic today at Valmont Bike Park. They were working the drop in on the Large slopestyle line and Lee stepped it up to hit the XL line for, what he claims, his first time.

I won a series of private lessons with Lee several years ago at the Boulder Mountainbike Alliance Annual Gala and I continue to see ways to add new elements of what he was teaching.

Monday, October 3, 2011

Breck Epic Stage 1


I've sat down and started sorting out some of the video I took during the BreckEpic mountain bike stage race. Stage One took us up Boreas Pass Road and over to Pennsylvania Gulch and descending back onto Boreas Pass to ride much of the same trails as the Firecracker 50 ultra endurance mountain bike race held annually on July 4, such as Bakers Tank, the Iowa Mill climb, Nightmare on Baldy, Sally Barber Road and Little French Gulch.

You'll note that I had a second row starting position for stage one. Because I was racing in the Open Mens division, I had the opportunity to line up with riders like 2 time (now 3 time) National 24 Hour Solo Mountain Bike Champion Josh Tostado, who I am directly behind in the video, and other riders like Federixo Ramirez, multiple La Ruta de Los Conquistadores mountain bike stage race winner, and Travis Brown, a long standing figure in the mountain bike community. Even though I would finish on Day Six placed 18 out of 19 riders and 10 hours off first place, it was still fun to be able to start on the first few rows each day.

The clips in this video include the start, Aspen Alley, Baker's Tank, Pinball Alley, Iowa Mill, Nightmare on Baldy (enterance), Nightmare on Baldy exit on to Sally Barber Road, Carter Park switchbacks. I have oodles more footage from this stage but I wanted to keep these videos pretty short.

And for you data junkies, here's Stage 1 from Strava, crack for competitive cyclists.