After only deciding to do this event at the last minute, due to the distance i was going to have to travel. It turned out to be a great decision. It was a tough race in bonny Scotland. With a crazy amount of climbing and an even crazier descent, which i think was part of the down hill course!!

As expected it was wet, which is pretty much the norm in the UK at the mo!

But all this said i had a cracking day in the saddle picking up the silver medal and only 20seconds down on gold an the title of British Champ!

Maybe next year eh!

Bring on the world champs in Pra-Loup France!

Well…. I love and hate Mount Snow all at the same time. I always forget how miserably hard it is to to race at this wonderful mountain in Vermont! Even though this would be my 14th year in a row racing here! This time I loved it more than hated it……Probably because I won the pro/open! Sunday’s race like Thom had mentioned will be the same race course as the upcoming Kenda Cup. I hope some of the mud dries up! Downhill mud is cool but uphill mud is not my favorite thing……I don’t know anyone who likes to push their bike uphill! To answer Thom’s question….How I won it? The only advantage I could see from the start line was that I was the only person riding a full suspension bike with BIG WHEELS! My fitness is good after a hard training week with Frankie Mac,but my HI-FI pro is also like a race car and a cadillac all rolled into one!

Good thing it was an '08 kit!!

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With a long break between the NUE series, I decided to do some XC racing.  With all the looong riding of the NUE, one tends to forget the intensity needed for the short stuff!  OUCH… (more…)

I want to start out this post by saying that I have been more thrilled with my Fisher 29ers than any other brand of 29er I have tried, and I’ve tried a few. Fisher nails that sweet spot between a bike that handles fast in the technical stuff and can still rail the high speed stuff; a majorly difficult formula with 29ers. Ol’ Gary has built a line of bikes which can do it all and force a grin all along the way, and for this I love my Fishers.

All of that said I will say that I have owned other 29 inch wheeled bikes from a couple of different companies. I have abandoned those companies for a variety of reasons mostly because of poor handling characteristics. But one brand I have ridden in particular stands out as really awful, for reasons you might not expect.

I bought one of these other 2NINER frames a bit over a year and a half ago, at the beginning of the year. I rode the frame and enjoyed the bike, though the handling was a bit too quick for my likings (negating some of the inherent stability in a 29er bike) , the bike was overall a very good bike and I was happy. Fast forward to the end of the race season and i was unfortunate enough to find a crack in the frame. Not a big deal (though I have never broken a frame before and am known for babying my equipment), Ill just get it warrantied since its within the couple year warranty period (compare to Fisher’s Lifetime warranty).

I was heading out for Scotland for six months at the end of December so when the rep told me it was going to be two or three months I said no worries, just send it on when it is done.  Fast forward about 4 months and I get an email saying that the warranty manager went AWOL and got the can. Hmmm?? No worries though, the new guy was doing a good job. That is until I call another month later and he says “oops, looks like we sent your frame to somebody else.” What?!?!?! Oh well, “When can I expect a new frame?” I asked, “about the beginning of May. May came, and went, no frame. Aparrently they oversold theiur product and didnt have one for me. So now they had given my frame away, and sold another out from under me. Um? Really? So fast forward again another two months and one more frame with “my name on it”  sent to somebody other than myself and here we are: end of July and I still dont have a frame.

Ive been told that one will be at my door by the end of the month…Ill believe that when I see it.

And that is why I will never buy another of those other 29ers.

Cheers,

Took a day trip [2.45hr] to Mt Snow in West Dover, VT for race # 8 of the Root 66 Series ” The Mt Snow Classic.” I had been there before for the old course which was longer and more technical. As usual, the course was muddy with all the rain we have been getting in New England.The woods sections of rock and roots where greasy and sloppy and the open traversing fields turned into mud bogs that would sap your power. I chose a great tire combo w/ the new 29-3TLR on the front w/ a Mud X TLR on the rear.
I went into the 1st section of single track after the access road climb in 4th place and would battle acouple of guys for the rest of the 2 laps or 10 miles. Ended up in 6th place with valuable points and still holding the series leader plate for another week by a slim margain. This was a great warm up for the upcoming US Kenda Cup East in 2 weeks. festival-xc-map

Today was The Root 66 Mount Snow Classic, this is the same Mount Snow that will be hosting the Kenda Cup in two weeks time. Mount Snow is pretty horrible, but it is also incredibly awesome. Each year they change the course to make it horrible in new and exciting ways. “You got the right gear?” was the question of the day. “No, no I don’t, you can never gear right for this course” was the answer of the day. How can you gear for 1000 feet of climbing in a 5 mile lap? You gear low enough to climb “comfortably” and you’re left with the feeling that you’ve dropped your chain when you try to pedal out of a downhill corner, It’s a Ski Area race, straight up, straight down. The climbing is steep, punchy and uneven. The traverses on the new version of the course were wet, grassy and boggy. The descending is insane, an uncontrollable free-fall down the side of a mountain, full of criss-crossing roots and slimy rocks. I would describe it in more detail, but you really have to see it believe it. Or disbelieve it. (more…)

Summer can be so hectic sometimes. So much happens in this season that there isn’t time to get out on those regular rides with friends and family as much as you should. But that is changing for me. I had to bust out alone the other night and I got a good backroad, gravel, pavement loop in. It was nice to push my pace and think where this season has taken me. Spooked a red tail hawk on a downhill and that bird ran with me for a couple hundred yards about 30 feet in the air. It’s right then at those moments on a ride when it’s just magic and everything is so simple and clear. I live for each moment and ride for the next one.

So I opted to move up to the top class for short track racing in this province, and so far the SS 29er hasn’t let me down . . . (more…)