Nike Media Apprentice

It's been a while since I've updated this blog due to the growing use of Facebook. But seeing as I have just entered the Nike Media Apprentice competition I thought I would also add my chosen pictures here.

Happy gappy chappy

Remember this post from my first visit to the Filthy Trails in Belgium? The one with the photo below:

Well the weekend just gone I returned to the Filthy Trails for the Kona Comp 2008 and I nailed the gap in the above photo. Well I guess a more accurate statement would be that the gap nailed me!

I went along with the view to take more photos than actually ride the competition. But the conditions were fast yet grippy due to rain earlier and the week and I was stomping the 4th jump on the big line which previously scared me.

So I thought "Sod it" and went for the 5th jump - the road gap. I've read somewhere that the gap is 8m which I find hard to believe but looking back at the photos and video that I took it does look like it is 4 x bike lengths so maybe 8m is true!

I pedaled what I thought was like the clappers and sailed off the launch ramp. The rest was a bit of a blur but my interpretation of sailed was more like falling. Although I did land on the down ramp, I think I was still going too slow and my lardy arse pounded my rear wheel slightly flat.

But there was no kick from my shock, no pain in the ankles or wrists and gratefully no landing sideways so I was able to ride out to a stop. I knew something had happened to my bike cos it was loud but I was stoked and didn't care. I survived!

God knows how I managed to egg a DT Swiss 6.1 rim (the heaviest duty rim DT Swiss make) but I managed it and I didn't hit any of the bigger stuff again that day in fear of collapse. It also gave me a good excuse not to enter the competition ;-) So I managed to get some excellent photos instead:

The guy below was heel clicking the gap - big balls!

And no footing the top drop:

This custom green Kona was a sweet setup and I caught a sequence of him hitting some shore:

I landed about 3 feet behind where this guy landed so how come his wheel is still round?!

There was some nice style over the last jump:

It wasn't all big boys with big balls though. This kid was loving it and has great helmet taste ;-)

I tracked some of the guys dropping the large drop which blurred the background nicely:

This guy also had some sweet style:

The flash worked really well on the wall ride:

I was loving the use of the flash as the light through the trees was tricky. But if there are any photo geeks out there, then I would appreciated an answer to a flash question. My D40 camera would only take photos at 1/500th sec when using the built in flash. If I bought an external SB-200 would I be able to use a faster shutter setting or do I need a better flash or is it not possible with my camera?

I also created a short video clip of the day that shows the gap jump in all it's glory. I've registered with Pinkbike now for biking videos but you can also rate it on YouTube here.

Finally at the end of the day I spotted someone riding my new bike to be. I got chatting with the guy and found out it was a small which is the size I have ordered. I was previously only able to try a large so I jumped at the chance to ride a small with a 55mm stem (I'm getting a 50mm stem). I took a full run from the top including the drops and although the setup was a little stiff for my preference, the size was spot on. It's going to be a long 23 days until I'm on the plane to Canada!

In the meantime enjoy all my photos here or in slideshow format here.

Oh and I forgot to mention that Emma has bought me an awesome birthday present - a coaching session with Shaums March from MMR for when we are in Whistler - sweet! I wonder if I'll be gapping 8m in my sleep after that :-)

Redneck biking

In response to my recent post about going biking in Canada, maybe I don't need to travel as far to get my fix. Perhaps I could just build something locally like these rednecks:

Aspirations

I'm really looking forward to a biking trip to Canada this summer - must get round to booking the flights soon.  The roots of the style of biking that I love came from where I'm hoping to visit.  However, parts of this video of the area scare the hell out of me.  I think I also need to ensure I have pretty damn good health insurance!

Professional riders only

Just a quickie to say that although this weekend has been a quiet one, mainly due to a 6am Friday night out here, but I have still be out and about recently.

This week the weather has taken a turn for the worst. After 7 weeks of glorius sunshine, it's been a wet and windy week. However, that has meant the surf has been up. So I was out for a session in my kayak after work on Weds with a local club. I never thought I'd ever be able to say "Last night I went surfing" after moving to Amsterdam! Nowt special but enough for a bounce and a blunt plus I got a good backstab. The water was surprisingly warm so I'll be out again once the waves come back up. I've been missing the boating but for next year I've spotted a Corsica trip with the Europagaai guys or maybe I'll get lucky with a Grand Canyon lottery application if I can be bothered to follow the long registration process.

But I am loving the biking as of late. Last weekend I made a trip back to Winterberg and had a great time pushing myself. I didn't nail the wall like last time as it was a bit erroded. There was a gap between the top of the berm and the bottom of the wall which I didn't fancy negotiating!

However, I was much faster down the downhill and nailed a few lines I hadn't done before. I was also racing off the smaller drops so went to the freeride park to step it up a bit more. Remember these drops?


Well, this time I noticed there is a sign before them that states "Professional Riders Only". Not sure why it is in English but then perhaps it is ony the stupid English that bust themselves. So being the stupid Englishman that I am I decided to give them a go.

I naturally started at the bottom on the smallest drop but was soon to find that the run out slope was perfectly designed - it was smooth as. So I nailed the smallest one 3 times to get the confidence going then stepped up to the next size which had a slight downwards slant to it. This helped adding more speed to my nervous attempts. 3 goes at that one got my heart pumping and I was walking up and down the next size up trying to muster up some bottle.

A few skips on my shuffle found a suitable track and I attacked the head height drop with everything I had. Which wasn't quite enough, I landed less than perfect but survived to ride it out. Unhappy with my attempt I gave it some more wellie and hucked another go. Much better. To prove that wasn't just luck I gave it a third go and was stoked with another clean line. No pics or video of me but here's a guy from the last time I went:


I knew that was my limit for that day. The 4th drop is a good couple of feet higher and I think it will take some abusive friends wanting to see me crash to get me fired up for that one. But I'm not ruling it out for the future...

We may all be getting older and with the thirties around the corner it's a nice feeling that I can still scare myself but then push myself to overcome those fears in order to progress.

Well 3 day week this week at work and I have a Weds evening ferry booked to get me back to the UK to see Emma for a long weekend. It can't come quick enough plus I also get to pick up my new toy :-)

Winterberg

So as shown in my last post I went biking last weekend. A Dutch rider, Tanja, left me a comment on this blog after I posted about Megavalanche and I emailed her asking where to go ride anything other than flat cycle paths here in the Netherlands. The short answer was to join her in a trip to the nearest bike park with a chair lift in Germany called Winterberg - just 3.5hrs drive away.

It was cracking weather and I had an awesome time. Tanja showed me around and generally proved a fun challenge to keep up with. She's sponsored by a local shop in the Netherlands so had all the gear including a brand spanking new Switch. It was great to follow her line and get a few tips about better cornering. I avoided some of the gnarlier lines she took but wasn't too far behind in the long run. I think she was holding back though, recovering from a dislocated shoulder last October!

There's one 2 man chairlift and basically 4 defined tracks down. 1 dedicated downhill track, 1 north shore run, a fun run and a 6X track. The 6X ended with a freeride park and joined either the fun run or the north shore run to the bottom. There was also a separate dirt jump section but I never made it over there.

The 6X was nuts but ridable. Full credit to anyone who completely clears the tabletops, let alone amongst 5 other people. I was tanking it and still only made it over halfway! Below is a little helmet cam footage of the 6X:



The downhill was what I rode the most, there were some tough drops on it, a harsh rock garden section and a steep slippy tree section. I rode this track a good few times and kept adding a new drop to each run but there were still 3 or 4 drops and 2 doubles where I took the chicken run instead. Something to improve on next time :-)

The north shore was tough, I only rode this a couple of times because I had to walk a fair bit! Although I did take on some drops larger than my comfort zone and I also rode a seesaw. At first I thought the seesaw was a drop so hit it too fast and pulled up on the bars to take off but as my back wheel dropped with the seesaw I manualled off the plank. Probably looked quite cool but scared the hell out of me and I nearly binned it.

The fun run was exactly that - fun. Just like one track I rode with the lads in Morzine, nearer the Les Gets side. Berm after berm after berm with the odd jump thrown in - fantastic. Here is some more helmet cam footage and I'm the guy in red right in front of the camera:



Later, I stopped to take a few shots in the freeride park. I've created animated GIFs of the best sequences shown below but Blogger is not showing them animated so click on the photos to show them animated on their own. Here's a sweet line one guy took:


Here's one wall ride:


Then Tanja showed me how to style it:


I had a go at that wall and that's how I got the photo on the previous post. But there was a bigger wall:


And a HUGE fun box:


The drops at the top of the run were pretty crazy too:



Here's a little helmet cam action of the whole freeride park including the comedy wonky bridge thing at the end:



In browsing You Tube I also found this video from someone that gives a good overview of the whole place:



So thanks to Tanja and friends for a great session. I'll be back for sure and here's all the photos:

Flash Slideshow

New favourite pic

Wow! What a fantastic weekend. I'll write more when I have some energy but I couldn't resist immediately adding my new favourite photo of me taken earlier today :-)

Megavalanche

I love riding my bike, but I've never entered a race. Why? Well I don't see the need to race against the clock. But I'm always racing against my buddies when out on the trail. That's why the Megavalanche caught my eye in a magazine recently.





700+ riders on a mass start at the snowy top of a mountain all the way down for about an hour to the finish line. I found the following pictures of last years event and I'm really keen on going this July if I can convince anyone crazy enough to go with me!