Ruth had to work this weekend, so I was left without a running vehicle. This threw a wrench into my plans for the weekend of racing. After some frantic phone call and emails to friends, I found a ride to Mt Hood with my friend Ben Schepper. Ben just acquired a beat up Nissan truck, so we loaded the bikes, our gear, Rylie, and ourselves into the little truck on Saturday morning and headed south with the final destination of Ski Bowl in Government Camp Oregon.
Rylie, Ben, and I crammed in the little truck.
Lacy from Contour, the helmet camera company, has been hounding me to actually use the cameras she's given me. I decided this would be a great trip to try out the cameras. I spent most of my "packing" time on Friday night playing around with the cameras, figuring out how to use them, and charging them up before we left. I used to do a little bit of video filming/editing back in the day, so I was excited to try and do it again. In the few years I've been away from the video side of things, cameras have changed a lot! My new helmet cam is HD, and not much bigger than a lip stick tube with a battery. I love how simple the Contour cameras are to use. Turn them on and slide the button forward. You don't need to look at them, and can easily do it using gloves. They have a new camera that can connect via Bluetooth to use your phone as a monitor. The new camera even has a built in GPS system that records location, speed, and elevation!
Epic view looking down the final sprint of the DH course
We arrived at noon in Government Camp, which is nestled at the base of Mt Hood. We geared up, got registered, and hopped on the lift to the top, all while filming everything I could see. I got to the top of the hill, clipped the camera onto my helmet and went to put my goggles on. While setting up the position of the camera on my helmet, I took into account angle of the camera, alignment of the camera, ease of use etc. The one little thing I forgot to figure into my camera locating equation was that I wear goggles when I ride!
With my goggle strap bent away from the camera mount in the least uncomfortable way possible, I turned on the camera and headed down the hill for my first warm up run. I ended up practicing for the rest of the day and really enjoying myself on the course. I was feeling fast, hitting some good lines, and all in all, riding well.
Practice ended at 6pm, and I went on a course walk with Rylie to look at the track one more time and let her burn some energy before heading back to the hotel room for the night.
Spoiled doesn't even begin to describe this animal...
While back at the hotel, I tried to upload the footage from the camera. I didn't realize that I only had a 2gb memory card in the camera and had filled it up with all of the HD footage on the way to the race! Of all the runs I did that day, I only captured the first section from the very first warm up run! I deleted some of the useless footage, determined to at least get one run for Lacy on race day.
Mt Hood Race Day Warm Up NW Cup #3 2011 on pinkbike.com
Microwaved burritos provided the majority of our continental breakfast race day morning. Usually I'm a little nervous before race day, but I was in a good metal place this weekend. I headed up for a warm up run with Charlie Sponsel. I followed Charlie with the camera rolling. The footage came out great! After a little bike maintenance, we ended up at the top of the hill again for our qualifying runs. I forgot to turn on my camera, but I had a pretty decent run. I sat down on the fire road sprint and was really conservative in the woods. I put in a few good pedal stroked along the final sprint and came across the finish line in second place.
A quick shot I snagged from Greg Tubbs from my qualifier.
Mikey Sylvestri is the undisputed king of Mt Hood. He's the course record holder, and has put all of us to shame in the past on this track. I qualified in second place on the demanding course, with a 3:59, Mikey destroyed the pro field by an astounding twelve seconds, running a 3:47! I hate to say you "expect" someone to win, but really, when Mikey comes to Mt Hood, we all feel like we're fighting for second place. The only consoling thing I could tell myself was that Mikey did beat Greg Minnaar and a handful of other world cup riders last weekend at the Sol Vista race down in Colorado. (Minnaar just set a record of 51 world cup podiums at the last world cup. He's consistently one of the best riders in the world. His worst result last year was 3rd at a world cup!)
Mikey getting loose through the rocks.
After finishing my announcing duties for the race while Mike Estes, the NW cup announcer, went up for his race run, I prepared my bike for my race run. I cleaned my bike, adjusted my gears, lubed everything, checked my tire pressure, grabbed my helmet and headed for the chairlift. I arrived at the top and relaxed while the last few junior riders started their race runs. Final runs go in reverse order from qualifying, so I was second to last, with only Mikey behind me. After watching the usual suspects head off down the course, I rode into the starting gate as the announcer called my name.
Mitch Angus didn't have a good weekend either.
The beeps sounded, the gate dropped, and I put the power to my pedals. I came into the first section of course faster than I ever have. I jumped the entire first rock garden and did a little natural step up off a rock before jumping into the first rocky chute. I couldn't believe how fast I felt, I had never done this section this fast. When you're in the zone and really pinning it, it feels like time slows down. The adrenaline rush that you have during a race run in so intense. You don't hear people cheering, you don't notice what's going on around you. You're so focus on what you are doing... most of the time. I was in the zone, nothing was going to break my concentration, or so I thought. All of a sudden, I heard the worst noise a rider can hear in their race run. the loud hiss of my front tire deflating brought me back to reality in the blink of an eye. Trying to hold my bars straight through the rocky chute, proved to be a little difficult with the deflated tire, but I managed to keep it upright and pull off the trail. I said a few choice words that I won't repeat here, and waited for Mikey to come by.
I don't like being left out of this photo
After watching Mikey run off the track and nearly die through the section that caused my weekend to end, I hiked back up to the chairlift and took the ride of shame to the bottom. To add salt to my wound, I found out Mikey broke his own course record, even with his big mistake up top and took the win. Tyler Immer put in a great run for second, Charlie grabbed the third spot and Adam Ransavage put an amazing run together for fourth ahead of Eric Loney. It's hard watching the podium awards and not hearing your name get called. I was really bummed on the way the weekend ended up, but I'll be back in 2 weeks for the next round of the series. Without a result, I've dropped in points and I have to lay it on the line now in the last two races to have a shot at my overall NW cup title.
Most of the cover. My scanner isn't big enough for the whole thing!
I had a lot of coverage in the latest DECLINE magazine. Grab the July 2011 issue from your local news stand and turn to page 48 for a race recap about the Beacon Double Down Hoe Down earlier this spring, a few nice words from Joe Perrizo on page 52, and a good photo of me on page 76 from the first round of the Pro Gravity Tour in Port Angeles WA.
Mondays' are always rough. Mondays after a weekend of racing are worse. I decided to sleep in Monday morning, much to Rylie's dismay, and take a much needed rest day. With Jesse Ransavage back from school, we decided to hit up Exit 27 on Tuesday morning. 27 is a lot more fun on the Mission, but I needed to get some time in on the big bike before this weekends race, as I haven't ridden it since the US Open.
I never feel cooler than when I'm driving this thing.
The van is still in the shop, so I loaded Rylie and my bike up in Ruth's Beetle and went to the trails. After Jesse got done laughing at my choice of transportation, we headed up for a lap of Washington and Gem State. Washington has had some love lately with a new jump over a mud bog and a few new berms. It was really greasy, and hard to hit anything, but the changes will be good once they settle in. Gem State is unchanged and, like always, is a fun rip with some fun corners and good jumps. I felt like I was riding really slow, but then I realized with all of the vegetation growing right now, it was really hard to see the trail! It felt good to get back on the big bike and I'm excited for this weekend.
New jump over a little muddy bog.
This weekend we are racing at Mt Hood in Oregon. The course there is the hardest course we race in the Northwest. It's long, rough, fast, and technical. It has everything except big jumps. I've come to enjoy Mt Hood, and have had decent results there over the last few seasons. I'm in the hunt for the NW cup overall, so staying strong and consistent in both qualification and the race is going to be important for me. I'm amazed we are able to run the upper section. The ski area has had record snow fall this year. The race organizer, Petr Kakas had to dig through the snow bank to find the trail! It should be wet and wild this weekend. Watch the video below from last year to see the track.
In other local news, local world cup rider Luke Strobel is back from Europe and we decided to go for a ride yesterday morning. Luke has been killing it on the World Cup circuit this season. He's consistently been the fastest American besides Gwin. He was sick and finished a disappointing 50th in South Africa, but has had 2 top 15's in the last 2 races. The next race is at Mt St. Anne in Quebec Canada and he's always done well there, so hopefully he can keep up the pace! We rode some of the bike trails on Tiger Mt and really burned my legs for the next 24 hours. I'm taking today off to rest and recover! I've got another coaching session with Simon tomorrow, then I'm heading to Oregon for the weekend!
Lots of snow still up top. Bring the tear-offs, it's going to be muddy!
I'm working on the super post with the rest of my Mission modifications. Hold tight, it will be up shortly.
There was a dog show going on at the same time. Standing atop the impromptu podium!
Wow, what a weekend! With the van still out of commission, I had to figure out how I was going to get myself to Kellogg Idaho for the 2nd round of the All Gravity Series at Silver Mountain. After a few phone calls, I found some room with Adam and Jesse Ransavage. I had to work late on Friday and we didn't end up leaving Seattle until midnight. The plan was for Jesse to drive the first few hours, I'd drive the next few, and Adam would drive the last leg of the trip. I curled up in the back seat and tried to sleep, but that ended quickly as we were all still excited about the weekend of racing that lay before us. I managed to get a solid 20 minutes of sleep in before Jesse woke me up saying it was my turn to drive. I grabbed a RedBull at the gas station and we kept on heading east. I ended up driving the rest of the way to Kellogg with Jesse keeping me company in the front seat.
We arrived at the base of the mountain just before 5am local time. We went to check into the hotel and found out that the front desk wasn't even open for another hour. We were hungry too, so the three of us went on a mission through Kellogg trying to find anything that was open. Surprise, nothing happened to be open in a small mountain town in north Idaho at 5am. With a least an hour to kill, we decided to hike the course. We got a look at the last sections of both day's courses before heading down and checking into our hotel.
I brought both my DH bike and my modified Mission for the weekend. The initial plan was to ride the Mission on Saturday and depending on the course, ride either the Mission or the DH bike on Sunday. After registering, getting changed, and grabbing our bikes, we hopped on the gondola and headed to the top of the hill for Saturday's practice. Silver Mt. has racing on both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday is an enduro downhill, which is usually 10-15 minutes of mostly downhill riding. There is a lot of pedaling and nothing technical, then Sunday is the true DH race. Walking out of the gondola, we were treated to a winter wonderland. There was still quite a bit of snow at the top of Silver. We had to ride through the snow field to get to the start of the race course. Feet off, sliding sideways, trying not to wreck, was the only way down the soft, mushy snow. The enduro course was pretty straight forward. Local trail gnome PK, had fixed up a lot of the berms on the course and it was really fun to ride, albeit quite greasy from the recent moisture.
Tommy from Shimano was on hand all weekend racing and offering rider support. Steven Bafus is back riding bikes again too!
My first practice run went without a hitch, but right after starting my second run, I flatted my single ply tires. With another 15 minutes of riding left, I decided to wrap my tire and tube around my frame and ride the rim to the bottom. Surprisingly, my wheel made it to the bottom in one piece and after some work with a file, would be good to ride again. I switched to dual ply DH tires and headed up for my race run.
After riding without a tire!
After getting to the start much too early, we all stood around cheering the other riders on before lining up for our runs. Without a warm up, the start of the pedally course was brutal. I was sitting down much more than I should have and not really pushing myself. The 20 minutes of sleep I got the night before, probably didn't help me either. I still put a half decent run together and managed to finish 2nd in pro, but we all got beat by local pinner Rob Crump, who put a great run together and took the overall win. Nice job!
Creeper shot of Rob! USA cycling needs to give him his pro upgrade!
While standing around, covered in mud, it was collectivly decided to take advantage of the waterpark at silver. They have a big indoor waterpark with multiple slides, an indoor surfing wave, a lazy river, among other ways to keep people wet. We stayed there until it closed at 8pm, at which point we went back to the room and I fell asleep, still in my wet shorts, on the couch in our room.
Jesse found my camera while I was sleeping.
I awoke the next morning still soaking at 8am. 12 hours of sleep does wonders for a person! The morning routine of food, changing, lift tickets, bike maintenance, etc was performed and I headed up the hill. With the rain from the night before, the track was going to be REALLY muddy. I was planning on riding my DH bike, but Jesse had an issue with his bike. I was feeling pretty good on my Mission, so I said I would try and race that again and let Jesse use my DH bike.
It was a little muddy.
Shifting was difficult
Welcome to the NW!
I've never been a fan of Silver Mt. They had so much potential with the terrain, but their upper management, won't let the bike park builders build what people want to ride. The mountain is nothing but flat smooth trails. The race course was supposed to start by going into this flat, narrow, wooded section with a lot of roots that ended with a dumb uphill. Fortunatly, someone conviced the race organizers that we didn't need to do that section and we started right after that. Combining the new start with the high speed sections and the mud that mother nature gave us, turned Silver Mt into a legitamite DH course! I was actually enjoying the course at Silver for once! I ended up doing a few practice runs that morning as the course was really fun. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm actually excited to go back and ride that course! I wish I would have had my DH bike, but the Mission was holding it's own down the high speed, rutted, muddy course.
Coming into the final section.
I dropped into the course for my race run and had a few close calls along the way, but all in all it was a pretty clean run considering it was mud race. I tried really hard to use as many of Simon's cornering techniques in the mud and they saved me in more than a few places. I came through the line breathing hard and after looking over the timers shoulder, found out I had won! The modifications to the Mission were a success and they landed me on top of the podium again. Adam and Jesse wern't as lucky, with Adam blowing a brake line on his way to the start and Jesse having to ride a bike that was too big for him and set up for my weight and riding style.
The mud made times drop off fast!
The awards ended, everyone packed up, and we headed back west. A little pit stop with some friends at the Taco John's in Spokane ended the good weekend. Time to head back, fix up the bikes, and get ready for some real downhill at Mt Hood Oregon next weekend!
Fluidride Coach and the newest member of Team Diamondback.
I just got back from a morning coaching session with Simon Lawton from Fluidride. Simon is a NW local mountain bike coach who used to race pro downhill and now coaches full time. He's been telling me for the last two years that I was doing some funny things in my corners and he wanted to help me fix them.
The orange cones came out for some basic cornering drills.
Simon is now on Diamondback and I figured this would be a great time to finally take him up on his coaching offer. I went into it with an open mind, but in the back of my head I couldn't help but think "I'm fast, I know I'm fast, what can he possible teach me?" After 15 minutes I was blown away by how many things I was doing wrong. Simon films you riding and you get to see yourself on camera, which really helps show you what you're doing wrong. I can't express how much faster I feel on my corners after today. I learned what I was doing wrong, why I was doing it wrong, and how it was affecting my riding. The before and after laps were all of the proof I needed to know this was a morning well spent. Hopefully this is what I need in my riding to bring me up to the next level.
Reviewing video of my successes and failures
I can't wait to get out to Silver Mt this weekend for the 2nd round of the All Gravity Series. The course is pedally, with a lot of turns. This will be the perfect place to practice my new found skills.On a side note, I finished the Mission project last night and rode it this morning. I just want to say, it worked and it's sick! I don't have time to write that post now, but it will be up soon.
The bike I spend most of my time on is my Diamondback Mission. Most mornings I'll go ride XC at Duthie, Grand Ridge, or Tokul. I love that it can be set up to ride almost anything. I usually have mine set up with a Fox 36 up front, RP23 in back, Crossmax wheels, Hammerschmidt, Saint Brakes, 30.5" Gravity Light bars, and a 50mm Gravity light stem. As a downhill racer, I refer to this as my XC bike. I like to have my bike set up like a mini DH bike. I can pedal it to the top, but still rip corners and hit jumps and hard lines on the way to the bottom.
A few weeks ago, I went and shuttled a local NW riding spot. I was with a friend of mine who had never ridden DH, so I gave him my downhill bike to use and decided to use my Mission. I was blown away at how well my mission handled the steep, root covered, DH trails. This turned on a light bulb in my brain and made me think that the Mission might be an ideal DH race bike for some of the more mellow DH courses.
In order to convert my bike to the ultimate mini DH machine, I wanted to change a few things. These would reduce the all mountain ability of the bike, but would make something that would work great for my needs. My wish list went as follows:
1. Slacker head-angle
2. Lower bottom bracket
3. Stiffen the rear end
My initial plans were to run either a shorter eye-to-eye shock and/or offset shock bushings to lower the BB and slacken the head-angle. There wasn't much I could do to stiffen the rear end, but I figured I could build a rear wheel with a bolt on axle that would help a little. A quick side note, when I say I want the rear end stiffer, I'm coming at this after being used to my really stiff DH bike with a 150mm bolt on rear end and am smashing this bike into turns as a pro DH racer whose just shy of 200lbs. I am putting a lot of force into a bike that wasn't intended to be raced downhill. 95% of riders would never notice these flex issues, but this is my dream list. I figured I would try and make it feel more like my DH bike.
Prototype swing arm on the left, production swing arm on the right
Diamondback does a lot of testing of frames and parts that will never make it to market. They produce prototype parts for the proof of concept and to just see how various ideas will work in the real world. One of these pieces was a new swing arm for the Mission. DB had made a new assembly to test how much stiffer it could be than the current set up. The swingarm also had the new 142mm through axle standard to test as well. As soon as I saw it, I immediately asked if I could test it out. This would stiffen up the rear end just as I was hoping! Unfortunately, I found out it was designed only as proof of concept and would actually hit the seat tube under full compression. After talking with Mike Brown, the brand manager for Diamondback, he said I could try and make it work and gave me some different sized shocks to play around with and hopefully find a solution.
150 mm thru axle from an old Giant DH Team, cut down to fit the new 142mm rear end.
I went home and immediately bolted it on my Mission to see how much it was hitting the seat tube. Under full compression, it luckily almost cleared the seat tube. I talked to Mike again and he told me I could do whatever I wanted to modify it! I took a file and started filing the weld to make it clear the seat tube. A few minutes later, I could see light all the way around under full bottom out. After lacing a new wheel to a 142mm hub and cutting down a 150mm through axle to fit, I had a ridable bike. It still had stock geometry, but it had a much stiffer rear end now.
I didn't have to remove much material for it to clear the seat tube
I took it out for its maiden voyage at Duthie the next morning. Duthie is a great place to test an "AllMountain" bike. It has lots of berms, jumps, drops, and quite a bit of XC trails too. I took the bike out of the van and dropped into the first corners of Step-It-Up. The bike was noticeably stiffer and popped out of the corners with much more exit speed and held its line over the rough with much more precision. I was really excited and decided to see how hard I could push it. I went and hit some of the drops and jumps at the park. While doubling the rock garden at the entrance to the Braveheart trail, I heard a loud CLANG! I figured I had broken something, so I stopped and looked. I had put a slight dent in my seat tube. It was a little muddy that morning and with the dirt packing up, combined with the full bottom out, the swingarm had hit the seat tube. Luckily, it hit the seat tube lower than my seatpost will ever go even when slammed. The frame is solid there and the dent is barely noticeable. No big deal, but I'll have to do some more filing to get some more room here.
Apparently I needed to remove more material than I thought. The minor dent in the seat tube.
Overall though, I was really impressed with the upgrade. The bike feels much stiffer and I'm happy with that. However, the brace hits the seat tube, so that will have to change. I still haven't lowered my bottom bracket or slackened my head angle, so now the next step is to put on a shorter shock. The Mission runs an 8.5 x 2.5 shock stock, so my next possibility is to go to a 7.875 x 2.25. This will reduce my travel slightly, but will really slacken and lower my bike. I'll have to do some major cutting to the new brace, but that's what this project is all about!
As it sits for now.
More updates after the next round of modifications. The goal is to be able to race this bike at the 2nd round of the All Gravity Series at Silver Mtn on June 19th.
The weekend is over, Monday morning is here, and the race season is starting back up again from a 2 week hiatus. I started Saturday off by heading to Duthie Hill for the first anniversary bicycle celebration. Duthie has officially been open for a year now and more building is planned for the near future. I've been talking to Evergreen, the bicycle club that runs the park, and hopefully I can start building a mini-DH trail there soon. After all, I'll need a good trail to test my new set up on, but more about that in a later post.
Nolan has to hate this poster.
I had to leave Duthie a little early, so Ruth and I could head to Spokane for a friends wedding. Congratulations to John and Chelsey! I awoke from my champagne coma at 4am to get up and watch the third round of the UCI World Cup from Leogang Austria. www.freecaster.tv shows a live feed online and this was going to be a good race! American, Aaron Gwin, qualified first and all who were tuned in were treated to him decimating the field to gain his second world cup win of the season. Gwin is on a roll and seems to be unstoppable. Luke Strobel also had a good performance with another top 15 finish. Jill Kintner ended up crashing, which is too bad as she was on a blazing run with the fastest split times and the fastest speed trap. She's new to world cup DH, but will be on top of the podium soon. My fantasy team didn't fare as well, with Minnaar in 3rd, Mosely in 3rd, and Mic and Duncan crashing out. The only one who was worth his cost this weekend was Gracia who pulled an impressive 7th! I'm going to make some changes before the next race at Mt. St. Anne.
America. F*ck Yeah!
To top the weekend off, the dealer called and said the van's fuel tank is delaminating and clogging the fuel intake. The bad news is that a new tank, according to them, is $2500, the worse news is that they are backordered until July. Looks like I'm going to hit up Craigslist and the junkyards for a tank now.
Ruth's Dad is coming for a few days, so we've been busy cleaning the house, but I've got to get my Mission project finished this week so I can race the second round of the All Gravity Series this weekend at Silver Mt. I'm hacksawing stuff this morning!
I am not a fan of American football. I think it's a dumb sport and our public school system puts too much emphasis on it and too much money into it. Our society cares too much about it, and the typical American male is almost expected to be a fan these days. Maybe I'm jaded that I was bad at it growing up, maybe I dislike it because schools would rather spend money on after school sports than the physics department, but either way, I'm not a fan.
One of the things I've never understood about football, were the people who got so wrapped up in fantasy football. If you've never been apart of it, you basically pick your dream team and geek out over statistics with your friends and score points based on your players performances throughout the season. To me, this seems like the biggest waste of time in a persons life and I couldn't help but poke fun at those guys.
Pretty much my thoughts on the the subject.
I now get to shove my foot in my mouth, as I have found a great new way to waste time. Dirt Magazine is hosting a world cup Fantasy Downhill league. Last year was the first time it was put on and I made a team and they all crashed out and I finished almost dead last. This year, I did my research, picked my riders carefully and am currently in 6th place out of the 5000 people playing. Granted, we're only two races into the season with the third round in Leogang Austria this weekend, so a lot can still happen.
Team Bobby Stenson is killing it!
The best part is that you can form mini-leagues with your friends and compete against other friend groups. In our little group of five, we have 3 people in the top 8 and all of us are in the top 25. Our mini-league is smashing the competition. So, even if I can't win a World Cup, I have proof that I can pick those who can!
The sandbags surrounding Prairie Rose School are trying to keep the flood waters out
Some non-bike related content here. I grew up in Bismarck North Dakota. The heavy snowpack in the mountains of Montana combined with much more than the normal amount of spring rain has raised the water levels in Lake Sakakwea to record heights.
Basic North Dakota Geography. This also doubles as a topographic map of the state.
For those of you who aren't caught up on your North Dakota history/geography, the Missouri river runs from eastern Montana through central North Dakota. It used to flood every year. That flooding created some of the most fertile farm land in the US. People decided they wanted to farm the land, a big dam was built on the Missouri river 70 miles north of Bismarck, creating Lake Sakakawea. The state is pretty flat, so when the river jumps its banks, not much is going to stop it.
The 5th largest earthen dam in the world at 2.1 miles long. This is looking at the powerhouse, the spillway is at the other end.
That big dam has never had to open the spillway flood gates in the 60 years its been around. For the first time ever, the water was putting so much pressure on the dam that the Army Corps of Engineers decided they had to relieve pressure on the dam. The spillway gates have opened allowing even more water into the already swollen Missouri river. That equation is why my hometown is flooding.
The 28 gates on the spillway. These will all be flowing through July.
My parents house is fine, but lots of friends are out sandbagging or helping other with the flood prevention efforts. My thoughts and prayers go out to everyone back home who've lost their homes or are at risk of losing their homes. Good luck to all!
Building a temporary dam in Marina Bay to help save some of the homes from flooding.
It's a little late for this area of North Bismarck.
Sweet Schleybletop while Rylie hits the cheater line
I spent most of my weekend relaxing and hanging out with my wife and some friends. The weather was beautiful and it was finally time to enjoy summer. I did a big XC ride on Sunday evening to make up for being lazy all weekend. I did the Duthie cloverleaf, Grand Ridge to Issaquah, back to Duthie for another cloverleaf and back home. It felt good to log some miles, but it changed my riding plans for this morning.
Rylie patiently waits for the next run
I wanted to get up and go do another big XC ride, but I got a message from photographer Ki Kopkau saying he, and my Diamondback teammate, Billy Lewis, were going to shoot some photos and ride at Duthie. I loaded up my bike, and Rylie, and headed over to jump the hardtail. It's always fun riding with Billy as he forces me to stop being a racer and to try and dirt jump. We sessioned a new jump on the DWB line and broke in some of the new fresh jumps on the GHY line.
Trying to get sideways on the DWB line
Billy is getting over the shoulder surgery he had this spring and is working on getting all of his tricks back. He isn't lacking for style though, and it's really fun to watch him in his element.
We set up a photo where I had to lead Billy through this tight little rhythm section and then he had to pass me through a hip on the inside while I railed a berm on the outside. Ki nailed the shot though and hopefully you'll see the photo used somewhere in the media world soon!
