Snowshoes?

Jordo rode the log like a champ
Once we got below the main snow it was all good

Lots of walking

It was harder to stay on the side hill than it looks

I think Mark tried to ride that
All the above pictures are courtesy of Stoker and his GoPro

Loafer,Mark,Brian,Cody(I think he's pooping),Me,Jordo,Dave

There is a road under there somewere

Dave was almost eaten

In this case your supposed to look down

Sometimes we prefer to walk, it's better than dying.

A picture of the view from this bridge wouldn't do it justice so look at our dumb asses instead.

The pass may be open but the upper DH trails are not. We tried to climb the road to lower PCP and almost made it without needing snowshoes. Unfortunately once we got on the trail itself, snowshoes would have been a much preferred mode of transport.

After we found dirt, we headed all the way down to the bottom of the canyon on some incredible single track. I think Griz kid has been doing some maintenance and left us with mostly clear flowy/rocky single track all the way to the river.

Due to time constraints we had to loose half our group before they made it to the promised amazing downhill. But I think everyone had a good ride, nobody got hurt, and I didn't break anything. Oh yeah and Cody still hates me. It won't be long before all my friends/suckers learn to live on 3-4 hrs sleep.

P.S. A downhill bike is a beautiful thing until you try to trail ride one for 8 hours.

He had to make the Blog

Five days later

That should feel better when it quits hurting

The hard to see Waterfall behind us was an excellent place to refuel the dog

Can't be hurt too bad if he's still smiling

Spray & wash might work

Fish out of water?

Dave made me get out of bed today. He told me I had to go riding. We decided to knock out a 40 miler up to Beardsley and back. Unfortunately the Loafer couldn't be reached so we set out to beat the winter storm that's supposed to show up tomorrow. It's almost June right?
I started to see the tracks of a worn out pair of Kenda Nevengals and figured the Loafer was ahead of us. Sure enough we ran into him behind Crandel Peak.
We finished out our ride and parted ways with Loafer. Dave and I were going about as fast as we could go back down from the lake when he was reminded how much we hate Kenda Nevengals (I really don't see the magazines love for these tires). His front tire washed out in a turn and he got to sample the muddy gravel at about 20 mph. The up side is he was relatively OK, minor cuts and a little blood, and I didn't brake anything today.
By the way, He said two things at the beginning of the ride that brought him to his demise. "I just came today because I wanted to make the blog" and " I figured I wouldn't need my knee guards since we're just riding road"

Still Got It

Dave said today was just like almost every other ride with me. He had to finnish his ride without me.

I don't think it's salvageable

Ever since I started this blog my ability to smash bike parts has dwindled. I thought maybe the blog was a good luck charm. Today ended that theory. It should have been the simplest of rides. All most all dirt road, a thirteen mile training loop. I made it almost half way when I tried to fold my front chain ring in half. I'm guessing one of the chain ring bolts started to come loose and I stomped on the pedal and felt it fold. I was able to use my new Specialized (EMT comp, very cool) multi tool to take off the crank and get the chain ring off, and SRAM quick links made it supper easy to take the chain off as well. Once again I was riding a very expensive scooter. Anytime you think anything is all down hill try taking your chain off.

Winter ride in May

Me, The Loafer, Sam, and Cody

Cody wasn't to happy I beet him to the top

The Loafer and Cody comming out of some of the flowiest singletrack around

Sam lovin life on his first real trail ride

May 17 2010, I decided to drag the crew out on a rain epic. 27 miles with it raining almost the whole time. Normally I would reserve the word epic for more mileage but today we earned every inch. Sam passed his initiation with flying colors. Especially the flying part. A quarter mile down the first single track of the day he took a header and knocked himself loopy. We got worried when he didn't show up at the bottom so we climbed all the way back up (bonus climb). We got real scared when he wasn't at the top. Turns out he was so loopy that he went the other way. Fortunately cell signal is good out there.

The rest of the ride was just laughing and sliding. Its kind of nice when you are so wet you don't even try to miss the puddles. Great day. I think one of the best parts was knowing that most people wouldn't even dream of going out on a day like today, let alone try to cover as much of the Stanislaus forest as we did.

Thank to Cody, Sam and the Loafer for not bailing.

5 13, 2010

Its hard to see, but the plastic base is cracked all the way across right through the middle.

After working back to back sixteen hour shifts I decided to go on a ride before I went to bed. I called my go to guy for every adventure ride Bobby. Of course he was game and this time he even suggested we go farther. It turned out to be about 43 miles. All the way to Beardsley dam and back. Katie the psycho dog was a little thrashed after that one. All road, 99% dirt though but we couldn't have asked for better conditions. I did manage to brake my Specialized Henge seat though. I have two of them an they are the most comfortable seats I have used so far. It appears that this one wasn't fat ass proof. I was riding on flat dirt road when I felt the seat "pop". I pulled over and found a crack all the way across the plastic base under the padding. It was still rideable but it put pressure in some inconvenient places. All and all perfect day of riding I wore out the dog and still got three hours of sleep before I had to go back to the grind.
P.S. German Short hairs are amazing. Katie never stops amazing me on every ride she goes on.

May 3, 2010

About 50ft from the top of a gruelling dirt road climb I was standing up pedaling with all I had (Very happy to be in front) when a loud crunch had me walking the rest of the hills. I was riding my Niner AIR 9 with WTB laser disk wheels. The bike is set up with a single 32 tooth ring in the front. That usually leaves me out of the saddle climbing on anything steep. The 29 inch wheels and stiff responsive scandium frame make it as easy as I could hope for. Unfortunately the WTB hub was not up to the mass of meat pushing down on those pedals. It turns out I sheared two teeth of the drive hub. WTB was very quick to warranty the hub and I had new parts in my hands in a matter of a couple days. Unfortunately this is not the first time this wheel has let me down.

About the seventh ride on this bike I was able to brake a spoket in half and rip it right out of the cassette. I'm not sure if it was torque or bad alignment or what but a SRAM 990 cassette is not crappy hardware. The wheel jumped out of the rear drop outs and smacked into the frame. Sram was nice enough to warranty the cassette but I still had to replace the rim and rotor.

April 26, 2010

Picture quality kind off sucks (taken with a cell phone) but you get the idea.

I was riding one of my favorite local loops when my chain broke. I didn't think much of it until I tried to fix it and noticed I had actually broke about six links at the same time. The side plates of the link were ripped open around the connector pin. I have yet to find anyone who has seen the metal torn like this before. I attempted to ride the rest of the loop with my shortened chain knowing I should stay out of the 34 tooth cog in the rear. I made it about three miles before my thumb automatically shifted down before a climb and ripped my XO rear derailleur and hanger off. Neither survived and it was a long walk out.
The reason the picture is blurry is I gave the chain back to the shop. He had to send it to me on his phone. Hopefully SRAM will warantee it. It was a 991 crosstep with about ten rides on it. The rest of the chain was not out of spec. We'll see.

Pinball even harder

Lucas,Khris,Me,King George,Cody,John,Bruce,Bobby,&Joe

****

I took some flat landers for a ride yesterday. They wanted to ride pinball. I don't think they appreciated the way I took them there. It ended up being 32miles and about six hours of riding. The King was not pleased with me. He may not listen to me on route decisions again. The up side is it was an awesome ride and I didn't break anything.

I rode my Firebird with a few extra links in the chain that seems to have done the trick. Shimano says you should wrap your chain around your biggest sprockets front and rear and then add four pins. That is where I had it when I ripped off the last hanger so I added two.

It should be noted that the adjuster screws on SRAM XO derailers are aluminum and are very easy to break. I had to scavenge two screws out of an old X9 to make it ride able. The last XO derailleur I had was the same way but I only bent the screws on that one. You might want to consider a X9 if you bash yours a lot, or consider the shadow by Shimano which is supposed to be out of the way.

Made it

Cody thought it should have been me braking a chain

*****

As you can see the weather was horible, The crazy part is the trail looks almost smooth.

*****

Cody, right after he threatened to lose my number

*****

Cody was nice enough to take pictures for us, Bobby, Fish, Katie the psycho trail dog, & me

*****

I made it through a whole ride today without breaking anything! I even crashed once, and only got a couple of scratches out of the deal. Out of the last seven rides I have been on, I have only completed two without walking out or having an extra bike brought to me.

I tried to do the one bike for everything bit, and my Pivot Firebird fits that bill superbly, but I must have extra bikes for the down time. Waiting for parts kills me. My wife says that I get unpleasant when I can't ride.

Today I rode about 19 miles and about 12 of them were filled with Baby heads and loose lava rock. I tried out some new Avid Codes on my Uzzi. Thats a lot of power. Now all of my bikes have Avid brakes on them. I couldn't be happier with them.

I'm waiting on a derrailleur hanger in order to fix my Pivot. Hopefully it will come in the mail tomorrow.

Thanks Dave, Cody, and Bobby for joining me today.

Dale

New to blogging

Some of my friends have told me I need to document the stuff that I break on my mountain bikes. I have an uncanny ability to break bizarre parts. My friend at the bike shop threatened to not warranty my parts anymore. I think he was joking.....??

I haven't been documenting it up until now, but in the last year I have broken 3 hubs, a pivot bolt,ripped the sideplates open out of several links of chain all at one time, busted derailleur hangers, derailleurs, ripped a sproket out of a cassette, smashed a rotor, and that's just the ones I can remember off the top of my head! Oh yeah, and I broke two cell phones while riding also, once was from a 50 ft fall off of a cliff.

My wife says I need to become a product destroyer/tester, in order to afford my "sickness" as another friend calls it.

I thought I would start posting pictures/ride info from now on just for fun. Who knows, maybe SRAM or some other bike company will take sympathy on me someday and start throwing parts my way to try. Hey, I can dream, can't I???

Dale