Turkey Day and Trail Maintenance

This is a photo from my dinner table. Honest...

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! With the holiday over, it's now time to enjoy the Christmas season as we wind down the last few weeks of 2011! Racing starts again with the Beacon Double Down Hoe Down, only 4 months away! 

On an impulse last week, we picked up an Xbox Kinect. It's really fun.

Ruth cooked up a big Thanksgiving feast for us and few friends. We ate a great meal, played some Xbox Kinect and watched the first Christmas movie of the season. It was fun having people over for Thanksgiving, and hopefully we can do it again next year. Rylie was going crazy all day with all of the smells of everything cooking. She calmed down a little after we gave her the turkey neck. I don't think I've ever seen her that happy!

This doesn't have anything to do with this update, but the soda machine blocking the exit can't be up to fire code.  South Everett...

I managed to sneak away for a little bit on Thanksgiving day and head over to the Duthie MTB park to do a little trail maintenance. Living in the Pacific Northwest means we get rain. The last week we've had a lot of it, so the trails were in need of some love. When building out here, drainage is a major issue. A lot of the berms need to have drains built into them. Overtime the drains clog up and need to be cleaned out. I grabbed a polaski and headed out. 

Clogged drain before.

Clean and dry (er) drain after!

Not much of an update, but hey, it's the off season. Ruth and I are going to get a Christmas tree and start getting ready for Christmas! 

-KT

Typical Morning Ride - Grand Ridge

A map of Grand Ridge. It's my usual morning ride.

Most mornings, I am lucky enough to get to ride. I spend most of my time on my "XC" bike. (I refer to almost anything with a front derailleur as "XC") In my case, it's my Diamondback Mission Pro.  I can ride from my front door to a really fun trail called Grand Ridge. It's a 7 mile out and back trail that climbs 1100' up and over Grand Ridge in each direction. The trail connects the Duthie Hill MTB park to exit 18 on I-90. It's not technical, but it is a great leg and lung workout. Check out Evergreen MTB - Grand Ridge for more details.

Rylie enjoying the leaves when they were covering the trail.

After last nights "wind storm" (or "slight breeze" for anyone reading this back in North Dakota) I was greated with a trail covered in big maple leaves. I was shocked to find King County out about half way through the trail with a crew and leaf blowers clearing the trail! It was great to see that the county was maintaining the trail as quickly as they were after last nights wind.

And what the trail looked like a little further down. This was much more fun to ride!

The other project happening at Grand Ridge is the boardwalk being built by the Washington Trails Association at the north end of the trail. The trail crosses a bog that is almost impassible in the winter. WTA and King County have been working on a boardwalk to make the trail more user friendly all year long. The last section is nearing completion and it will be great to finally be able to ride across the bog without getting wet!

The board walk over the worst part of the bog. (In progress, obviously)

The groundwork below the boardwalk.

The completed portion of the boardwalk.

As the only member of my family without any sort of glasses or contacts, I've started to try and take better care of my eyes. I was getting tired of mud and dirt being flung into my eyes on wet XC rides. I called Spy Optics and got a hold of a pair of their new performance Alpha glasses. These things are great. Interchangeable polarized lenses, 100% UV A, B and C protection, lightweight and very strong, and inexpensive (compared to other eye wear). MSRP is 119.00. Spy Optic - Alpha

They look good too!

I can't believe I haven't been riding with eye protection on XC rides. It really makes a difference, and you only have two eyes!

-KT

Old riding video are fun

A few weeks ago, Ruth and I got an Apple TV box to connect our TV to the internet. It's a really cool device that lets us stream Netflix straight to our TV. Another cool feature is that you can search Youtube. Naturally I looked up my old account and found some old riding videos from back in the day. I've got quite a few old videos floating around the web. As I come across them I'll post them up.

Old riding photos are funny. This was yours truly at  the 4th of July Parade in Medora ND circa 2003?  Check the sweet Cannondale F-500. Things that were cool back then, haha!

Up first is probably my favorite. This was made in 2006-2007? while I was in school for Fox Racing Shox's Where Ever You Ride contest. I ended up getting an honorable mention. I did the riding and editing. This kid named Jack did the filming and Ruth even makes a guest voice appearance. We did sneak into some random Japanese Cultures class to film the opening shot. Pretty sure I'm one of the few people who ever snuck INTO a class.



-KT

Season wrap-up!

Game over! 2011 race season is done for me and what a success it was!

Story of the year! 1st overall again!

We headed out to Moscow Idaho for the last race of the season. I was rolling with Bobby Stenson, Cam Hoefer, Kevin Littlefield, Ruth and Rylie. We rolled into the Moscow La Quinta Inn and hit the hay, ready for the best race of the season.

Moscow Mountain Road. I can't count how many times I've drifted my jeep around this corner.

Saturday was early for us. I built the course while I was in school there (Ok, I had a LOT of help!) and have helped put on the race for the last few years. Mike Smith usually does a ton for this race, but a broken ankle meant he was stuck at home and wouldn't be able to make the trip. Alex Eley stepped up and did a bunch of work prior to the race by renting a hedge trimmer and cutting back the brush and making an easy out around the off camber section. Tyler Martin got up there before the race and did a bunch of course taping, which also helped out a ton. Usually I try and get a little time on the track before practice starts to fix anything that needs it and add something to keep it new and exciting every year.

Alex hitting the off camber, thanks for the help this year!

This year we hiked the course and didn't have to make any real changes. The course was in pretty good shape. We knocked out the rut that was forming on the off camber section and added a few option lines in two other corners. Beyond that, we didn't have to do much. I took a practice run and remembered that Moscow is always strange the first run. You drop into the track and you are going. There isn't really any pedaling, or anywhere to rest. You are turning or jumping or trying to stay upright the whole way down the track. As soon as my run finished, the rain started coming down. It poured down and the trail turned into a muck fest right away. It became impossible to see. I hung out at the pit and grilled some brats with Jon Kennedy, the marketing manager for Diamondback. After an hour and a half, the rain let up and Kevin Littlefield and I were freezing. We decided to hike the back way to the top of the trail to warm up. After pushing to the top, I felt a lot better. I was warm, and we beat the shuttle truck!

Kennedy and Bobby. A long story goes with this photo.

Kevin and I dropped in and decided to stop at the off camber section. This section is hard in the dry, and crazy in the wet. We hiked and worked on how to ride it a few times before heading down the hill. By the time we made it to the bottom, the sun was starting to shine again. We grabbed Tim Zimmerman who was there to do a story for VitalMTB.com on the race. We went up the hill and shot a few of the sections, which was actually beneficial for us to be able to session and repeat a few of the harder spots. The trail was starting to dry out well and we were getting ready to wrap it up for the day.

Along with the DH course, Moscow has some amazing XC riding. We all brought our XC bikes and Jon, Tim, Kevin, and I decided to go for a XC ride with Rylie. We took the shuttle to the top of the DH course and pedaled to the top of Nemisis from there. We rode Nemisis and Gemini back to the bottom of the race course. It was such a fun ride. The trails were in great shape and flowed really well. Big thanks to Jim LaFourtune for all his years of hard work on the mountain. (For those that don't know, Jim passed away recently. Moscow lost a really good cycling advocate among other things. Check out Jim's Page for more info)

Thanks for the trails Jim. Your legacy will be enjoyed by many.

We all headed out to the Moscow Alehouse for some drinks and dinner. We had quite the crew rolling with us and were excited to head down to our old college drinking hole. We were all little bummed when we found out that the brewery was moving and wouldn't be brewing beer for a while. Hopefully they are back up and running again next year.

Me: "How's that for Brian Lopes parking job?"   Bobby: "Nah, you aren't in two handicapped spots!"

Sunday started with another early morning. I took 3 practice runs to make sure I was dialed on the course. The first one was just a nice coasting run. The second was a pushed a little harder and the third one was pedaling the whole run. I felt great and headed back to the van to wait for my race run. I have been doing the All Gravity Series all season and even with missing one race, I had a pretty good points lead going into the final race. I just had to finish to win the series, however, that's not a result I want to settle for. I love racing at Moscow and was going for the win.

My race run started off a little cold. I was a little loose around the first few tight corners, but quickly pulled it together. I came through the top section on the gas and hit the off camber section faster than I ever have. I shot over the wood jump and carried great speed through the tight corners after it. The rock roll didn't seem to be rough at all and I wove through the tight little trees after it without issue. I set up wide to drop onto the last road before the final section and in the middle of my corner, a root ball caught my rear wheel and I went flying over the bars down onto the road while my bike tumbled over me. I quick grabbed my bike and hopped on and started pedaling. My seat was twisted to the side which made pedaling weird, but that was quickly overlooked and sprinted it to the finish line.

I rolled over to the van and laid my bike down in disappointment. I was really bummed. I wanted to win that race really badly. I started to feel my wrist tingling as my adreniline was wearing off. I've broken it enough times before to know when I crash I put my hands out. I looked down and noticed some swelling starting to happen and ran and grabbed a bottle of fork oil from Cam's toolbox and dumped it on my hand. I was able to get my wedding ring off with quite a bit of tugging. I went to the medics and got it taped up then hiked up the hill to watch the impromptu "Huck to Flat" contest.

A rare shot of Justin Covey on the ground.

Last year before the race, we built a large jump towards the bottom of the course without a landing. We had always talked about having a huck to flat contest and Bobby managed to put one together this year. Justin Covey won without question, however he ended up breaking his collarbone on the last attempt. That ended the contest quickly and everyone funneled down the hill to check out the results. I waited for the crowd to disperse a little bit to find out how far down the pack I ended up. Ruth said I didn't seem far behind the guy in front of me, so I still had a little hope that I might pull out a mid pack result. To my surprise, the results sheet showed me on top!

I was pretty excited to see that result. I guess almost everyone had issues in their runs, so my crash didn't hurt my time as bad as I thought it would. I was excited to hear my name called to the top of the podium and for the first time ever, I got a champagne bottle to spray! Click the link below for Tim Zimmerman's photo/audio slide show from the race.

Vital MTB Moscow Slide Show

It was a great weekend, and I can't wait to go back again next year. I was excited to wrap up my season with another series win. That makes my season complete with 2 series wins, 11 podium finishes, 15th at National Champs, and another year of staying healthy. Not to bad and I can't wait for next season. I wore a wrist brace all last week after the race and my wrist seems to be doing alright. It's a little sore still, but I don't think it's broken! I'll keep an eye on it, but it doesn't seem to be bothering me.

Proof it is running!

In other news, Ruth and I are looking at houses now, I got my VW caddy running again, and trail work will be commencing this winter. I also figured out how to update the blog remotely, so expect more frequent updates throughout the winter as we start training for next season!

Stevens Pass Filming Trip

Andy wasn't messing around and brought out the big equipment!

I commuted from Charlotte to work on Monday morning and as soon as I was done with work, I headed home and picked up my trailer. I met up with Andy Tran at work on Tuesday and we left from my office to Stevens Pass. Stevens Pass is a ski area about an hour and a half east of Everett. They have been in work on a bike park for the last 7 years. They finally got all of the approval neccessary and broke ground this summer. Andy and I have been talking about doing some filming again, but the hardest part is finding something new to shoot. Stevens wasn't even open yet, so it seemed like a great place to go. After a few calls with Joel Martinez and Chris Rudolph, the bike park manager and head of marketing, we were set to film.

It was nice waking up and seeing this!

I awoke on Wednesday morning in the parking lot and built my bike, which was still in the box from National Champs. It poured all night long, so I was able to leave my mud spikes on! Joel met up with us and shuttled Andy and me to the top of the hill. Rylie and I managed to get a few laps in as a warm up while Andy got all set up to film.

Rylie resting after testing out the DH course

Billy Lewis joined us that morning and the plan was for me to film in the morning, then head to work, while Billy filmed in the afternoon. I was going to come back up from work that night and we could shoot again the next day.

Getting ready to drop in for the first run!

Filming went well and the trails were really fun. I can't wait to race Slingshot Wookie (The DH course). Billy wasn't able to make it up the second day, so we had to figure out how to do an intro and exit without him around. It's hard to make a video with a "storyline" different from everyone rolling up and hopping out of a truck. Andy and I decided to film me breaking into the area and being caught and turned into a jump for the finish, just as something different than the norm.

Without further adieu, here is our final video!

Diamondback DF5 Riders Shred Stevens Pass from Diamondback Bicycles on Vimeo.

I've talked to Stevens, and they want to do some more photo/video shoots in the near future!

National Champs

All Smiles during dual slalom practice!

I knew September was going to be a crazy month and it didn't disappoint! Two days after arriving back home from Interbike, I was sitting on a flight heading to the land of NASCAR, Charlotte North Carolina. The plan was to meet up with Eric Hatch, my roomate and good friend from college, and drive to Beech Mountain for the 2011 US National Gravity Championships. I landed and picked up my rental car. I ended up renting a Dodge Grand Caravan. This thing was a little more high tech than my cargo van. Pressing a button on the key fob made all of the doors open. It reminded me of a Transformer. It immediately got nicknamed Optimus Prime.

The rally squad. Rental cars are fun!

We met up and drove through the night to Boone, where we grabbed a hotel for a few hours of needed rest. We awoke to a beautiful day on Thursday and drove to the mountain and started building bikes. A few years ago I met a guy named Daniel Sapp when he was living up in Bellingham Washington. He was from North Carolina and after talking with him recently, he said we could stay with him when we got down there. Daniel ended up having to work, but pointed us in the direction of one of the local shops, Cycletherapy. Mike Cobler and the rest of his crew welcomed us with open arms. They allowed Eric, Myself, Lear Miller and Mikey Haderer to use their pit space for the weekend and let Eric and I stay with them. We were blown away by the hospitality and couldn't thank them enough. If you are ever in NC and need a shop, swing by and support those guys.

#3 on the track but #1 in the hearts of the locals. I saw three different posters of "Dale" between my gate and the bathroom at the Charlotte Airport.

I grabbed my number plate and headed up the hill for a course walk. I had never been to Beech Mountain, and neither had anyone else I talked to, so the first thing we did was Google the mountain stats. I was disapointed to learn that it was a small hill ~700" elevation. However, we quickly learned that former US national dual slalom champion, Chris Herndon was the course builder. That calmed some nerves. I will say it here, BEECH MOUNTAIN WAS AWESOME! The course was laid out really well, it had some flat grass turns, tight berms in the trees, a huge rock garden, and a few jumps. I was so excited to ride the course. I went back and immediatly put my mud spikes on. The course rode as well as it looked. Lear, Mikey and I rode a few laps before grabbing our slalom bikes and heading over to the slalom course for practice.

Chris Herndon built an amazing venue. Big thanks to him and his crew. I can't wait to come back next year.

The slalom course was really fun too. The upper part was really fun with a few hard gaps, but the bottom had a strange dirt jump line that was giving people a lot of trouble. You could go around it and it seemed just as fast, so that's what I decided to do. We practiced until the course was closed and went out to dinner.

Lear and I during dual slalom qualifying.

For dinner, we decided to try a new local restauraunt. It was a hot dog restauraunt that opened that night. Mikey and I went on an eating binge. They hot dogs were delicious, but we all knew they would be a bad choice the next day!

This was amazing. I don't know what was on it, and probably don't want to.

Friday started with some DH practice and then ended with Slalom qualifiers. I don't normally do gated racing, but since they we racing dual slalom instead of 4X, I decided to give it a shot. I put together two mediocre runs and qualified 10th. Mikey ended up 7th and he and I would end up facing each other in the first round. Mitch Ropelato and Jill Kintner won the qualifiers.

A local artist made this. The metal work was really good. The wheels are the drive gears of an old bulldozer. It was for sale, $5000. One day I'll have something similar in my front yard.

The night ended with Eric and I heading to Fred's mercantile, the local general store. This place was a real general store. It literally had everything. Eric and I grabbed food for spaghetti. Once we had paid for our food, we headed to the parking lot. After the days practice, Eric and I loaded our bikes into the CycleTherapy trailer. Lear and Mikey didn't get done riding in time and were locked out. They had to load 4 bikes and gear into their Chevy HHR. It was packed so full that the rear hatch couldn't close. We saw their car at the parking lot of Freds and without hesitation, we proceeded to unpack their entire car! As soon as we were done, Lear and Mikey walked outside. We quickly sped off in Optimus Prime laughing all the way home for the night knowing we had just started a prank war.

Verg from Shimano (and Eddy Merkin) making some custom bump stops for my frame.  

Sharpie Anodizing.

Saturday morning rolled around and started with DH practice. I took a cruiser lap and prepared for qualifiers later in the morning. My qualifiing run was nothing special. I made a big mistake in the rock garden that caused me to come to a stop and nearly crashed on the first rock hump on the course. I kept it upright however and pedaled to the end. I ended up qualifying in 7th! I was less than 4 seconds off of second place with 2 big mistakes. I felt great! Gwin ended up qualifing first by 11 seconds, but we're not going to talk about that!

Results were:
1. Gwin
2. Riffle
3. Keene
4. Bingelli
5. Memmellar
6. Ropelato
7. Me!

I was feeling on top of the world and got ready and headed over to Dual Slalom finals. I ended up with Mikey in the first round. I held my own, but Mikey ended up beating me. Ropelato ended up matching his qualifying and won the finals beating Neko Mullally.  Jill was unstoppable and dominated the womens category all night long. I was excited to have a top 10 finish to add to the race resume.

This was in the parking lot at Lowes in Boone. It says Tow Mater in the back window. 

Eric, Mikey, Lear, and I went out to grab some food. During dinner, the skies opened up and it dumped rain down. I was praying for rain and my prayers were answered. I fell asleep with a big smile on my face.

We awoke on race day to blue skies. Everything was soaked from the torrential rain the night before. I went up for a practice run and was blown away by how muddy the course was. We were litterally riding through a swamp in sections. It was AWESOME! I was having so much fun sliding around down the course. I got done with practice and walked up the course to watch Eric's race run. Eric put in a good run in the muck and ended up second in Cat 1 (expert) by .03 seconds! He was the happiest most bummed out person I've ever seen. In an update since the race, Eric petitioned and got his pro upgrade for next year. Congrats dude!

Mud bog corner into the woods

I watched the junior race and the womens race before heading up for my run. Congratulations to Jamie Rees for her third place in the Pro Womens category and of course, Jill Kintner for winning the class again. I went up for my run and hung out at the top waiting for my run. It was the weirdest national champs I've ever been at. It was really relaxed and everyone was just joking around. I dropped into my race run with the intent on ending up on the podium. I came through the big mud bog before the woods and felt great. I had a good upper woods section before dropping into the big rock garden. I pinned it into the left line and did it cleaner than I ever had. I carried a ton of speed through the line and jumped too far off the log at the end. I ended up T-boning the corner and killing all of my speed. Due to the lack of speed, I crashed on the next little jump onto the skatepark rock. I quickly grabbed my bike and hopped on again. I was pissed. I figured I had lost 5 seconds or so, but I was still on a good run. I knew I could still easily get a top 10 and get the UCI points I needed to race the world cups in 2012. I sprinted out of the woods peddaling as hard as I could to make up time. I trippled the step down into the big hip and launched the hip way bigger than I had in practice and blew up on the landing. I hit the ground and ripped my lock on grip in half and bent my bar. I got back up and pushed to the finish knowing my run was over. The worst part was that I came through the line and finished 15th. I was 15th last year with a good run. This year I crashed twice and ended up 15th. I was really dissapointed in myself, but that's racing.

Riding the bog in my race run. Bonus points for keeping my feet on the pedals!

I had a great time in North Carolina. The track was really fun and everyone I met was really friendly. I can't wait to go back next year and get some redemption on that course.

Flying with bikes is never fun. I knocked over some guys coffee pushing this this.

I know it has been 3 weeks since my last post. This month has been hectic. More riding and filming projects to come. I'll have the updates in a few days.

-KT

Interbike

My first poster!

As the race season is winding down, it starts to become that time of year where we start looking towards next seasons new products hitting the shelves. The best place to find the latest and greatest new products, along with the vast majority of the cycling industry, happens to be at the Interbike tradeshow located in the desert wasteland that is Las Vegas. Interbike 2011 was actually my first time at Interbike and I had no idea what to expect.

I wasn't able to attend the dirt demo for the first few days. I decided to fly out early Thursday morning. I was working late on Wednesday as we are working mandatory overtime. I had to get from Everett to Sea-Tac late at night. Normally this involves a trip through Seattle down I-5 and pay for parking. Alternatively, if you happen to work at a company that maintains aircraft and is delivering one to the airport you are departing from, you can get a nine minute flight straight to your terminal. Getting to go on a flight at work is almost a badge of honor for us, so being able to take one that was also utilitarian was awesome.

Private flight!

The pilots were really nice and even let me ride in the cockpit in the jump seat. I am not a huge fan of flying, but being able to look out the front window of the airplane while flying over Seattle and seeing the lights at night was a sight very few people get to experience.

The view is much better that this photo shows.

This started my trip on a great note. After riding in the cockpit, it's hard to know you have to go sit in coach. However, I managed to sleep the whole way to Vegas. I awoke to beautiful sunny tempuratures and headed to the tradeshow. After finiding my way through the maze of cycling eye candy, I arrived at the Raleigh America booth. Raleigh is the parent company of Diamondback, and they had a combined booth at the show. The booth looked amazing and was packed all weekend with bike shops and media personel.

New DH prototype on display!

The 2012 Knucklebox Frames on display along with the Utah trip video.

The end of the first night started with Billy and I heading to a dinner with Kali Protectives. I had been to Vegas before, but this was a little different experience. Starting the night with steak and lobster was hard to beat. I want to send a huge thank you to Brad and the rest of the Kali crew. Their new product is amazing and I can't wait to get some riding time on it.

Pure nightclub VIP area overlooking the Strip.

From their we headed to a party at Pure nightclub at Caesars Palace. Go-Pro had a VIP area reserved on the second level was impressive to see along with overlooking the middle of the strip. From their our party ended up at the Wynn for the Contour party which was the best part of the night. Such a good atmosphere there along with running into a huge crew.

Anytime your night involves Cedric and a Limo, it gets a little hazy.

The rest of the night gets a little hazy from this point on, but I ended up back at my room at Treasure Island to get a few hours of sleep before the final day of the tradeshow.

Friday morning wasn't as painful as it probably should have been. A few liters of water, a good brekfest, and some coffee can make a person feel pretty good. I walked across the street to the Sands Convention Center and began my journey for the day. Casey and Scott from the NW Cup series were unable to attend the show and asked if I could do some promotion for them. I spent most of the day talking to potential sponsors of the series and my own sponsors as well. I'm really excited about my program for next season and the NW cup should be in good hands as well.

2011 was good, 2012 will be great!

As soon as the bell rang at the end of the day, the booths started being torn apart. I gathered all of my belongings and headed back to the room to get ready for dinner. Raleigh was having a big dinner to celebrate a great show. We met up at a sushi restauraunt and sat down for an experience. I like sushi, but I was blown away by the meal that was put before me. The meal consisted of amazing sushi, along with Kobe beef cooked on a hot stone at the table, plus crab legs and other stuff I'm sure I can't pronounce. That was the best meal I think I've ever had in my life.

Sorry for the bad photos. Camera phone photos don't work very well in low light.

From there we were told to get dressed up for a night on the town. Everyone was waiting in front of Treasure Island when a stretch hummer pulled up. Sitting in a stretched hummer, blasting Black Sabbath, cruising down the strip wasn't on my bucket list, but I am adding it now that it happened. The limo pulled up to the Mandalay Bay and we were ushered to the top floor. There was a little private club up there that overlooked the strip with one of the most amazing view I've ever seen. A DJ was playing music while go-go dancers were doing their thing throughout the club.

Best view of Vegas!

The night ended with a stop at Mcdonalds and a short trip the the Casino. I turned three dollars into ninety dollars before losing it all. I need to learn when to stop. Net total only losing three dollars in Vegas is considered a win! 

This guy was passed out next to us at Mcdonalds. He didn't move the entire time we were there. 

Being back in Seattle is a treat. I am probabaly the only one who was happy to come home to some rain. The trails really need it and I've never been a fan of warm tempuratures anyways. I head to North Carolina on Wednesday for National Champs! I'll have another update when I get home!

-KT