redstone underground

Winter Blah, but the Ridin' Ain't Too Bad

2012-01-19T21:57:00.000-07:00

Winter. Over it and ready for Spring. Right? The weather has been a serious tease lately. Got a solid snow day, followed by warmer and warmer temps. Til the next snow day. The cycle repeats. Problem is, the cycle hasn't been allowing for much real quality dirt. Maybe a day or two if you're lucky or now where to go. I got my day in. Last week, Monday, at Bobcat Ridge just outside of Masonville.

I got up there, ironically, about 10 minutes after Kevin so we rode together. Bobcat was fun! Road climb up followed by a meandering, fun descent that had very characteristic Tony Boone style. Does anyone know if that was Arrowhead Trails that helped design that? Well, whoever it was did a darn good job. Bobcat Ridge is most definitely worth a visit if you're remotely close. Go.

Then more snow. Just as things were starting to get rideable. Really rideable. Now we're kinda back to square one. I'm going to go to Hall Ranch to check out the rock garden. Maybe we'll have a run of dry weather for a while ;)

Arizona Roadtrip!

2011-12-31T16:57:00.001-07:00

2009 was my first visit to Phoenix, AZ with a bike. My wifes family has a house that's, fortunately, only a 10 minute bike ride to South Mountain park. It's like being at a ski in/ski out condo right on the mountain. 2 years ago I said, "I'll be back. Next time, though, I think I'll have to nab the car for a day to check out some other riding areas around Phoenix."

Needless to say when Christmas rolled around this year and there was talk of an AZ road trip, I said "Sign me up!"

I managed to get in over 12 hours of riding over 4 days there. Not too shabby. The house was the closest pedal to the Mormon Trailhead, which is one of the tougher trails on the north side of the mountain. It's rocky, it's steep, and it has some big moves. Loose rocks, too. Last time I was out here, I went up and down Mormon a few times. On this trip, however, I only climbed it once and wasn't on it again. No offense, Mormon Trail. I will definitely see you again.

I did have to stop at the top for a glamour shot of my latest ride, the carbon fiber Carbine from Intense. Such a sweet bike. Dare I say, Intense took my favorite bike ever, made it lighter and snappier and stiffer? Just might have a winner on our hands with this one!

Mormon Trail intersects the world famous South Mountain National Trail. National is good stuff. On the eastern side of the park, it's a series of ups and downs, washes and technical rock gardens.

I climbed National to a trail that I was introduced to by the downhill shuttlers on my last visit. The Geronimo Trail. I think Geronimo is a new favorite trail. It's steep, it's fast, it's chunky and technical, and it's full of small drops and launches. It's good stuff.

The next day, I did basically the same ride but started in a different location. From the house, I can take a canal path all the way to the eastern side of the mountain. There was a plantation along the way. Is that Palm trees?

From there, a sandy wash up the middle of the park.

Then more climbing on National Trail. I love that trail, too. Good stuff.

Then, of course, more Geronimo Trail!

Rocky steep, goodnesss.

I did not come out of this one unscathed. This is where I missed a 2' slab step up on a climb. It's just a flesh wound, really, primarily paint. One of the goals of this trip was to put the Intense Carbine thru the ringer out of the gate. That, I did.

As luck would have it, fellow Redstoner Lee H was visiting family in Scottsdale, which is surrounded by McDowell regional park. He offered up a guided tour on some of the riding he hits regularly in AZ. I could not say no. I also could not say no to Polibertos Taco Shop for breakfast. Mmmmm, good.

McDowell park was completely different than South Mountain. The terrain was less technical and definitely more rolling with longer, gentler climbing. The trails saw seemingly less use with better maintenance, too. Groomers. But still great terrain for riding. Hardtail 29er was all I was thinking.

On the backside of the park, we caught a view of Fountain Hills. Named so because of this retirement communitys landmark, the worlds largest water fountain. Something like a 200' water fountain in the middle of the desert doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Seems kinda wasteful and extravagant, doesn't it?

The backside of the park had a little tighter singletrack, too. A lot of it was fall line-esque, but made for some fun riding.

The views were outstanding. See the radio towers in the pic? We went up and over Bell Pass, to the right of the towers, and back around to the main trailhead. It was a great ride, about 3.5 hours in 70 degrees and sun. Oh yes.

Our last day in AZ and back to S. Mt. We drove up to the top to check the views. It was cool to see a paraglider take off from right where we were standing!

I had always wanted to go down Telegraph Pass, which was reputed to be uber gnar. I started the day with a quick but steep climb up Ranger.

At the top, Ranger connected with National, which was more of a ridgeline trail at this point. Very cool views.

Sorry, no pics of Telegraph, but it was super gnar. I left some skin and blood on that trail, even walked about 5 times on the descent. If you go, bring a big bike, lotsa skills and balls, and maybe even a little body armor. It was that good. Petroglyphs at the bottom, too!

Originally, I had decided to wrap back around the mountain on the rolling hills of Desert Classic.

BUT... I decided to make better use of time with a 45 minute hike a bike instead. This way, I could get back to the top of the ridge and hit Geronimo one last time.

The hike up Corona de Lomas actually wasn't too bad. There were a few rideable sections amidst the walking. Outstanding scenery in every direction made the hike a memorable one.

And it was all worth it for one last run down Geronimo.

And another run at the canal bike path.

If you get to Phoenix and like the kind of riding that we like, definitely get yoself to South Mountain. You will not be dissapointed. Especially if it's winter in CO and 75 and sunny out there!

Intense Carbine!

2011-12-29T21:24:00.000-07:00

For the record, so far I'm LOVING the new Intense Carbine.

Carbon fiber, 5.5 or 6" of travel, 12x142 rear thru axle. Damn, this bike is sweet and rides every bit as nice if not nicer than the oh so awesome Tracer 2. After 12 hours of hard riding in the Phoenix area desert, this bike has been thru about everything I could throw at it. Incredible. Expect a full write up soon!

Cyclocross comes to Lyons for some Ghetto Singletrack Lovin

2011-12-11T18:10:00.001-07:00

The last stop of the Boulder Cyclocross Series came to Lyons on Sunday 12/11. With the exception of maybe 1 year, Lyons has played host to an annual cross race since the State Champ Cross race in 2007. The original course was in the middle of Bohn Park. It would've been blazing fast and flat, but the big dump of snow a couple of days before the event set the park up for some great racing. Since then, promoters have moved the course to the high school allow for a better course, more parking, and better spectating. It was a good move.

I was out in the morning for the 35+ open race, then later for the singlespeed class. Sounds like the Pro class was perfectly fast and muddy but I had family stuff and didn't get to check it out. The Singlespeed class (last race of the day) easily had the best course. The mud was firming up and getting fast. Almost made me want to get out my cross bike. Almost ;) Big bonus also, one of my racing friends from ago, Jesse Swift, won the race! And he had the baddest ass beard of the day, too.

Anyway, you'll be able to read a full race report elsewhere if you look hard enough, but I thought I'd throw a few pictures out. When we say "Lyons Getto Singletrack" this is what we mean. It was cool to see the crossers crossin on it. LGS!

XT Trail Pedals, PD M785

2011-12-01T10:58:00.001-07:00

Favorite things. Favorite, not because it sells well or is marketed well. This is stuff that we ride and like and ride and like some more. Because we like it, because it works like it's supposed to, and because we don't have to work on it any more.

Todays Favorite Thing - the Shimano XT Trail Pedal. This is a new pedal, part of the 780 series XT. Shimano introduced the XTR trail pedal early in 2011(reviewed in Bicycling here) with the new 980 group. By late summer, that had trickled down to XT level and fortunately, XT price point. Enter my interest!

I'll have to admit, being a loooooong term Shimano pedal guy, I'm more than a bit biased. The very first click in pedals I got were some no float havin' 525s back in 92. After having my knees get weird from no float, I had a brief stint with Onza pedals (remember those?), but once Shimano introduced float into their flagship 747 pedal I haven't looked back. AND I still have my 747s going strong on a bike now for, holy cow, has it really been 16 years?

Whereas there are many click in/platform pedals out there in which they design the retention system inside of a bigger existing cage, the new XT pedal looks at it another way. Why not put a small cage around an already existing top notch design? Exactly.

This is the "trail" version of Shimanos traditional XT pedal. I guess the traditional design will henceforth be knows as the "race" model like the XTR, but really, I couldn't be bothered to look that up.

Anyway, I've been riding these pedals for a few months now and absolutely love them. They are just as easy to click in and out as they always have been, but they offer considerable more shoe support. If you're a racerboi type with carbon soled uber stiff shoes, you probably won't notice a difference. Then again, you probably wouldn't be buying this pedal anyway. I've been wearing several different versions of Pearl Izumis X Alp series shoes for several years now. They are excellent shoes for the type of off roading we do - technical terrain with lots of rough hike a bikes. The downside is that they don't have the stiffest sole in the world, and it can be felt on long rides. The new XT Trail pedal took care of all of that. I LOVE this pedal. It's got just enough platform for extra support. That extra platform, although not huge, is also great for those times when you're not quite clicked in. I've been running these on my singlespeed for a while now. Sometimes on a SS, you've got to step into it and give it all you got whether you're clicked in or not. This pedal has helped my singlespeeding for sure.

About the only drawback I've found was, so far, an isoloated incident. Recently, we found ourselves riding in fresh wet snow on top of what was a dry 2" powder dusty surface. Every time I'd step off the bike, the cleat would attact all sorts of pine needles, mud, and ice. In that instance, the XT Trail pedal packed up with a little more mud than the race body, and it made it quite a bit harder to get into the pedal. Once in, getting out was no biggie. If you're going to be riding in significant amounts of mud, this is probably not the pedal. Fortunately, we rarely ride in mud here on the front range of CO. This is an outstanding pedal for this environment.

XT Trail pedals. Another thing we really, really, really like. Check 'em out.

Trail Work on Picture Rock's First Corner

2011-11-19T14:30:00.001-07:00

Redstone Cyclery has been the designated trail steward of Heil Ranches Picture Rock trail since it's inception. Any time we'd have a trail work day set aside, County staff would ask us what we wanted to work on, we would figure out a place, and we'd get a crew out there to get 'er done. About 8 months after the trail opened, it was obvious that the very first uphill right corner (and the very last downhill left hander) was built wrong. Going up was no big deal, but coming down was a decreasing radius off camber corner. In short, it was a corner designed to spit people off trail. After a few years, the corner got more blown out with more braking bumps and just plain got worse. We kept bugging Boulder County to let us rebuild the corner. Always, the answer was, "No, that's too big of a project." We kept plugging away with other trailwork sessions and continued to build our relationship with Boulder County Open Space. Finally, when we sat down to schedule a winter Saturday for trailwork, we once again asked about this corner. Finally, we had our chance.

You can see in the picture above where the new line crosses the old line. Coming downhill, we made a slight dip to the left, then back up to the right. This is both to help scrub trail user speed and to help shed water from the trail.

We then brought OUT the upper radius of the turn by pushing the dirt farther to the outside. We removed the matting from underneath the previous and rehabbed the inside of the corner. The county crew had already planted rocks along the outside perimeter of the corner. It wasn't to make a "fence of rocks" but, rather, to make a basis for our berm. Better to use hard materials like rock over strait dirt for a bed.

Here, you can see the finished berm. LOTS of road base material was brought in. The road base is a better material for compaction. It takes over a year, but it sets up and hardens better over time than regular dirt. More road base, smoothing, raking, more road base, smoothing, raking, etc. We kept working and reworking this corner until it made sense.

In this picture, you can see the original, rehabbed line on the right and the newer grade reversal on the left. At this point, road base had been added and the vibrating tamper had been run over the trail.

Here's a better shot of that same area. You can see how the trail is benched into the dirt to help keep you on the trail. The trail bed is still slightly angled to the downslope to help shed water.

After we ran the compacter on the newly benched in trail, we took some more material off the upslope side to create a back slope. By this time, the tread of the trail was great, but having what is effectively a curb on the right can potentially catch a riders wheel or pedal. We got on that chain gang style and had the back slope dialed in within minutes. What a great working crew we had today!

Below is a shot of our newly bermed and compacted corner, looking at it as if you were coming up the trail.

Our good buddy Mike from the County gave this project two solid thumbs up. LOTS of riders on the trail today were especially stoked that we were finally reworking this corner. The worst corner at Heil no longer is!

Thanks to EVERYONE that came out today to make this workday such a major success. Maybe it's because I've personally wanted to do this corner for a long time, I don't know, but I think we really batted one out of the park here. Sooooo good. Got a new camera and don't have the timing down for action shots, but here's one of Chad railing the new corner on his way home.

Special thanks to Oskar Blues for providing the on site coffee. It wasn't cold, but it wasn't exactly warm either. The blustery weather and cooling temps made us all appreciate the hot joe. Thanks OB!

REEBin' it up in the desert down south

2011-11-16T11:39:00.001-07:00

Having heard so many great things about the Pueblo Reservoir and having never been there, the powers that be decided it was time for a REEB Cycles road trip to the south! Thursday pm, 4 of us loaded the car with REEBs, several cases of beer, good attitudes, and a serious desire for some Colorado desert riding.

Given that, it should probably go without saying that we all woke up early Friday with thundering headaches and a lot of empty Dales Pale Ale cans.
Good way to start the day, really. As soon as we could motivate, we sauntered out of our hotel across the street to what turned out to be a really unexpected highlight of the trip - Southwest Grille. SW Grille is a completely awesome greasy spoon diner just west of downtown Pueblo on Hwy 50. It's on the way to the Res and is highly recommended. My breakfast burrito with green chile definitely did not dissapoint. After food and probably way too much coffee, the 4 of us were feeling good enough for a ride. Time to roll!

Pueblo seemed to be a pretty cool town, albeit the fact that it kinda reminded me of Phoenix. Desert, apparently no zoning, etc. Geographically speaking, though, the place was cool. Pueblo Reservoir was cool, too. They basically dammed up the Arkansas River and flooded some canyonlands. The resulting topography of it all was pretty cool. Our sunny day never did actualize, but it was beautiful nonetheless.

Getting started, it was apparent that this would be no sidewalk ride. That was ok with us.

A couple of the crew (not me) had been down here before so they were our tour guides navigating this extensive trail network.

The local flora/fauna was particularly inviting.

Here's a few riding shots.

Oh, and a pile of REEB singlespeeds.

We visited on 11/11/11, Nigel Tufnel day. It was appropriate that we paid a visit to Stonehenge Trail.

Check out the cairns!

BUTTERY smooth singetrack on top of the mesas.

Chad was embarassed about his pimpy white shoes.

The riding down in Pueblo was darn good. Buttery smoove singletrack on top of the mesas and chunky, rocky, descents down arroyos both narrow and wide. There is something for everyone to enjoy down there. Was it worth the effort to get down there? Yep.

Pueblo Reservoir. We will be back.

sincerely, the REEB team.

REEB launches Website & Blog

2011-11-15T14:28:00.001-07:00

We have launched www.reebcycles.com and it will include all the history of this Oskar Blues, Brews & Bikes Blog and will also be the focus of all future blog entries.

Crack a can of beer and visit the site. Click on "You Say Somthing" to add what REEB means to you. Click on "Give Me More Said" to see what other people have said. REEB is you, you are REEB. REEB NATION!

Picture Rock Trail Work, Sat 11/19

2011-11-15T10:09:00.001-07:00

We're trying to get in one more work day before the snow shuts us down for the winter. We REALLY need to rework the very first corner on picture rock, the uphill right hander as you leave the parking lot. Coming down, it's got an off camber decreasing radius that's been forcing folks off the trail since day one. We're going to re-radius the corner and need about 10 people.

Sat AM, 9-10ish. Who's in?

A Word From BMA

2011-11-07T14:53:00.001-07:00

A History of Success and Progress...

Mountain biking has never been as good in Boulder County as it is today. The Boulder Mountainbike Alliance has made huge progress with every land management agency over the last 10 years and we still have big visions for the future. Think about a regionally integrated recreational trail system that would allow you to ride from your home to city open space to county open space to forest service lands and beyond! A carbon-free recreation experience that starts at your front door - that's a vision worth fighting for, and it is where BMA is focusing our efforts now that the West TSA is over.

The mountain biking community has proven ourselves the best stewards of the land Boulder County has to offer. We spend more time building and maintaining trail, advocating for the passage of open space taxes, engaging in peer to peer education, partnering with County Open Space (e.g. Hall, Heil) and City Parks and Rec (Valmont Bike Park) to accomplish great things.

We even recently had a constructive relationship with the City's Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP) Department - challenging them to get more creative in managing use on their lands and opening up new cycling opportunities in the Marshall Mesa and Doudy Draw area.

... With a Temporary Bump in the Road

Anemone Hill and the rest of the West TSA was in part a disappointment because BMA believes in win-win solutions. We believe that preserving the environment and providing quality recreational experiences are not mutually exclusive goals - in fact they are mutually supportive.

Giants of the environmental movement like Aldo Leopold and John Muir understood that people must experience nature to learn to love and value it. As Edward Abbey once wrote, "it is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it." Mountain biking provides us with a deep connection with nature, an experience our heroes demand we have.

Some environmentalists in Boulder are anti-bike because they believe deep in their bones that man-kind is out of balance with nature. And maybe they are right. Species are in decline, the climate is changing, forests are being eaten by the pine bark beetle and burned by fires.

But the solutions advocated by this narrow group of environmentalists (keep bikes out!) are disproportionate to the challenge they have identified. Mountain bikes are not drilling rigs and trails are not well pads. Our access issues have little to do with the regional and global environmental problems that trouble both of our communities. Mountain bikers are a great partner in conservation efforts, but we fear that bridge has been burned in Boulder - at least temporarily.

From where we sit now, it is reasonable to ask whether it was ever worth engaging with the City of Boulder on bike access in the West TSA. After all, the majority on City Council didn't say no to a trail on Anemone Hill. They said no to bikes. A trail will be built, it will have environmental impacts, it will have parking problems, it will cost money, but it will be open to hikers and equestrians only. The positive value of a near-town riding experience didn't hold water with a majority of city council - they didn't understand that we want to ride to our ride, that our kids need someplace to ride that doesn't involve jockeying with car traffic, that of the over 100 miles of trail in the West TSA, we were only asking for shared access to six.

We came very close to winning reasonable and responsible access, and that closeness is a sign of progress. The Open Space Board of Trustees voted 4 to 1 to give us a 4-5 mile loop on Anemone Hill. Four city council members - just one shy of a majority - voted to give us access to this one small piece of open space. These council members did not just vote yes, they gave passionate testimony on behalf shared access and the recommendations of the Open Space Board of Trustees. We have progressed substantially in educating city officials on the environmental impacts of mountain biking, and several trustees now acknowledge that the impacts from mountain biking are essentially no different than hiking.

We know the unspoken truth - that OSMP staff were split on the issue of allowing bike access. High up on the OSMP totem pole the idea got shot down, but the flesh and blood of the organization has seen that a purely political decision was made. They understand now, better that even before, that this is not about impacts on the resource, this is not about user conflict - this is about maintaining the status quo - no bikes in the West TSA. To city staff that have been open minded, we offer our sincere thanks! We will continue to persuade citizens and government officials that the gap between the conservation and mountain bike communities is narrow.

What Comes Next?

But what do we do now? Do we stick it to the man and start poaching trails? Does BMA give up on the city entirely and focus elsewhere where we have more constructive relationships with the county and forest service? NO! Every single inch of access that BMA has achieved has been done because we have proven time and time again that we are responsible citizens and that we are not going away. We have decided to make Boulder our home. We love it here. We are not leaving.

We were on the cusp of victory in the West TSA - as modest as that victory may have been. We will continue to show up; we will continue to make a difference; we will continue to build and maintain trail; we will continue to demand fair access; we will continue to lead a two-wheeled lifestyle; we will continue to prove that nobody is a better steward of our public lands than the mountain biking community - even when they slam the door in our face.

I and the rest of BMA want to offer our personal and heartfelt thanks to the many, many members of our community that have made a difference. We want to assure you that though we have lost this battle, our vision will win the future. If you are one of the numerous people disillusioned by this entire process, know that we understand. A small piece of our dream has been shattered. But we take heart in the community that we have formed together. It is that community that ensures our ultimate success. It is our willingness to continue taking the high road - even in the face of utterly inexplicable injustice - that has gotten us to where we are at today. And it is that same can-do attitude that will carry us into the future. So chill out, relax, and recover from this madness. Continue to ride. The job is not over yet.

Jason Vogel, President of BMA

president@bouldermountainbike.org

MRP 2X chainguide

2011-11-03T16:38:00.001-06:00

Episode 1 in a new category. Favorite things. Favorite, not because it sells well or is marketed well. This is stuff that we ride and like and ride and like some more. Because we like it, because it works like it's supposed to, and because we don't have to work on it any more. I'd like to point out also, that Redstone Cyclery is an independent bike shop. As in independent of any corporations telling me what we should and should not carry in the bike shop. We carry bikes and parts that our customers like and that we like. Not things that a company from WI or one with a big red S tells us to carry.

That said, here's one of our first favorites. Anybody out there recently move to a 2x10 drivetrain? Did you notice that on rough sections of trail, the chain has a habit of coming off the front rings no matter what you do? Enter the MRP 2x Chainguide. The MRP 2x is the only chainguide out there made specifically for a 2 ring setup on todays modern 2x10 drivetrain. It is available for ISCG tabs or bottom bracket mount. We've mounted a few of both. The ISCG tabs make setup a no brainer. On the bb mounts, you've got to get a little more creative, but it can be done effectively.

The MRP 2x before crank install

Inside chainring postion on the inside roller.

another shot of outside ring

outside chainring, outside roller

My first ride out on the 2x was a pretty fair sized epic outside of Breckenridge, Wheeler Pass. We climb, climb, climb, climbed out of Breckenridge on what became an increasingly steep and rocky road. Not having been a fan of chainguides in the past, being noisy and full of drag, I was a bit skeptical of how the 2x would perform when I needed pedaling efficiency to be at a maximum. I was surprised. If I really tried, I could feel the chainguide there, but I definitely didn't feel as if it was robbing me of any efficiency. So far so good. Perfect and smooth, but the real test would be on the descents. Fortunately, this ride had a couple of really good descents to test the tensioner. The MRP 2x worked flawlessly. I had zero chain tension related issues and everything stayed put like it's supposed to. Gotta point out the incorporated bash guard on the 2x as well. Having pretty much always been on a front triple, I've never had much use for a bashring because it would mean giving up my big ring. Not the case now. And I do have to admit, I've REALLY become accustom to having a bash guard on my bike!

Since that ride, I've put a bunch of hours on this chainguide. I can honestly say, it's one of the best and smartest upgrades I've made to my Intense Tracer all year. Good stuff. The MRP 2x Chain Guide msrps for $150.

My Take on MTB Access on City of Boulder OS

2011-10-28T13:22:00.003-06:00

I give up on mountain bike access from downtown Boulder. Why? Because it is too ingrained in Boulder's culture, staff, and elected officials to think that mountain bikes are the enemy.

Recently, Boulder City Council rejected a proposal that would've created a loop trail on Anemone Hill - basically Settlers Park on Mapleton. Tons of bike supporters called, wrote letters, and showed up for public comment at the city council meeting. Didn't even make a dent. What use is public comment at a meeting when city council people had prepared speeches and notes ready. Were they even prepared to hear what folks had to say? No. Like BMAs president Jason Vogel said, 99% of the people in that room had minds made up before they even got there. It's time to move on and give up on access west of Boulder. The time may come, but not until elected officials are voted out of office and city staffers move on. This cultural shift won't happen anytime soon.

In a recent Boulder Daily Camera Article read, "She [Boulder Mayor Susan Osborne] went on to say that she's "certainly sorry about the rancor" that the issue has caused, but she doesn't think the correct response is for the cycling community to leave the table."We make tough decisions all the time, and it's really rare that the person or group on the losing side does a, 'I'm going to take my marbles home and I'm not going to play anymore,'" she said. "We have another vote on a mountain biking trail that at least to some people seems like another pretty good option. I don't get the strategy where you basically take no prisoners."

Really? What does she want us to do, come back for another pounding after receiving continual poundings since being banned on city Open Space since 1984? It think 27 years of being shot down warrants either not playing their game anymore, or a DRASTIC shift in how we, mountain bikers, policiticize.

The more we beat our heads against the wall where policy makers obviously don't want us, the more we're going to hurt our chances when it comes to a place where they might actually give us some leeway, like Beech and N Boulder Valley Ranch.

I think it's time to take a step back take a look at what's actually been accomplished. the High Plains and Springbrook area TSAs had great outcomes, but the West TSA was set up for failure from the get go. City Council and OS Staff reconfigured the public process to achieve a desired outcome. Was anyone surprised when the bike ban in the west was upheld? In the ashes of West TSA, council threw it back to staff and said "explore Anenome Hill" in an attempt to immediately appease bike peeps. It wasn't to appease us long term with real access. This last meeting wasn't entirely about access on Anemone, it was about a specific loop trail on Anenome - something BMA asked for but OS staff was against.

Open Space Board of Trustees will convene on 11/2 to discuss a connector over Anenome to 4 mile. Even if Council approves that, once again, they are setting mountain bikers up for a predetermined outcome. An out and back trail in an already crowded area will do nothing but further anti mtb sentiment. Head on traffic, user conflict and too many users on one trail will be the result.

Focusing on mtb access out of Boulder is great, but I think it's unrealistic to see access out of downtown anytime soon, especially given current leadership. Let's focus more on southern and northern access on city property. There is a LOT of potential in Boulder County OS. Walker, Hall, and Rabbit Mt management plans will be up for discussion soon. Let's start refocusing on attainable goals.

Want more and better access from downtown? Call for Mike Patton's resignation and vote those idiots on Boulder city council out of office.

Rant off. It's time to ride. Somewhere that's not governed by Boulder City.

Consignment bikes 10/21/11

2011-10-22T11:07:00.000-06:00

Here's our latest bikes on consignment!

Giant Allegre flat bar road bike, great townie! $195/offer

Ibis Mojo SL, medium, $2900/offer

Santa Cruz Nomad small, $2800/offer

Another trail done gone

2011-10-22T10:12:00.000-06:00

I heard on Thursday that Boulder County, in conjunction with the USFS closed Bell Gulch. Bummer. I'm going to check it out soon. I will report back.

Before:

After:

The State of the Lyons Bike Park

2011-10-20T13:35:00.002-06:00

A few weeks back, Lyons played host to a really cool event called the Devil Dash. A bunch of my friends ran it and said it was super fun and a great event all the way around.

BUT... the race was held on our first crappy snow/sleet/muddy day of the year. And they ran the course thru pretty much all of the jumps at the Lyons Bike Park. Needless to say, 1600 people clawing their way up slick and muddy dirt jumps decimated the bike park.

I passed this info along to Park and Rec, hoping they would seek some action from the Devil Dash promotors. Having not heard anything back from P&R and getting frustrated every time I so much as rode by the park, I decided to email the promoters directly. Here is my email and their response. Let us hope for a quick turnaround.
***********************************************
MY EMAIL:

Hi Devil Dash folks. First off, thanks for bringing such a cool event to Lyons. Sounds like it went well, was well attended, and lots of folks had fun.

I run a bike shop here in Lyons and have to admit I was a little dismayed to see that you chose to run your course thru our bike park in muddy conditions. The bike park has been rendered unrideable and is completely decimated. Literally hundreds of man hours went into perfecting and sculpting all of the jumps in the park. The bike park has been a great asset for local riders and kids in the area and has also been valuable for bringing in visitors to the town. It is sad to see this resource in its current condition. To get the park to the condition it was in before the Devil Dash is going to take a lot of time, a lot of effort, and some heavy equipment rental.

What are your plans to repair the bike park to its state before Devil Dash?

I have copied Dave Cosgrove, head of Parks and Rec on this email.

THEIR REPLY:

We apologize for the condition of the track after our race. We started the day thinking we would be OK with the weather. We had waves of racers every 30 minutes and the weather held out for the first several waves, but then the rain came, and we already had racers out by that time.

We have been working with Dave Cosgrove on the track and the best way to proceed in order to get it repaired. We certainly will make sure that we can get it back into the condition it was before the race, and will follow Dave Cosgrov's lead on the best way to proceed.

***********************************************

I will try to keep everyone updated of the progress.

Been a long time update part uno

2011-10-19T22:29:00.002-06:00

Things are starting to take a seasonal turn towards the not super busy (but also not super awesome) months. argh. I guess that means I'll have a bit more time for blogging, be that better or worse. I was just reading the Redstone Underground blog and saw that it didn't cover a LOT of the fun stuff we did this summer. How about some highlights?

Montana road trip was great.

Later in the summer, we rode from Eldora Ski Resort outside of Nederland to Winter Park,

had beers and lunch in WP, took a lap on the ski lift to get a downhill run in.

and then rode back to Eldora.

On the same day.

Now THAT was a good ride. I think we were good for 11 or so hours after all was said and done. When we say "long day in the saddle," that's generally the kind of ride we're looking for.

Got in a road trip to Nebraska to see some family. And some uber sweet awesome dirt tight and twisty lovin kind of singletrack.

Believe it or not, those pics were taken about 1/2 mile from where I grew up. It's 9 miles of singletrack bliss surrounded by suburbiaville. The locals say, "ah, it's ok, it's all we got." I say, "it's buttery top notch singletrack."

Oh, can't forget BMA's sufferfest. That was a killer day in the saddle, too. Big ride with lots of climbing and other fun stuff.

That ride had lots of hard climbing.

But it was worth it. What a great day.

Hmm, let see what else? Got a doggie in March, Bella the Heagle. Part Heeler, part Beagle, all awesome. And awesome trail dog, too. Bella and I got more than a few hours in. Couple of loooong ones too. She'll go longer than I will, that's for sure. Yo Bella!

That's all I got for now. I'm going to finish this beer and head to bed. Part II will be coming soon. Really!

Transition Trans Am 29er

2011-10-04T16:51:00.003-06:00

Check this beauty out! Price will be right in with Transitions 26" Trans Am frame - it's a super smokin' deal on a good all mountain 29er hardtail frame. Want one? They're due in Jan and we're taking preorders now.

Tuesday Ride

2011-10-04T11:16:00.001-06:00

Sorry for being so horrible about updating the blog! I've got some stuff to put up, I promise, just been a little behind.

Anyway, tonight, 10/4, we'll be heading to Jamestown! Make sure your lights are charged. Meeting at the shop at 5:30pm and rolling over to Jtown as soon-ish as we can get it together.

Need people on the 24th and 25th to help area cycling!

2011-09-14T09:48:00.001-06:00

Boulder County, Colo. – The Boulder County Transportation Department is seeking volunteers to take bicycle counts at locations around the county.

Volunteers will be rewarded with a one-year Boulder B-cycle membership and a custom thermos.

When: Saturday and/or Sunday, Sept. 24 and 25, 9-11 a.m.

Where: Throughout Boulder County. A map will be provided with assigned location.

The deadline to volunteer is Sept. 22. Contact Brandon Smith at 720-564-2667 or bcsmith@bouldercounty.org to register and for more information.

A location map and a simple spreadsheet will be provided to volunteers to hand-write the counts as they happen.

The bicycle counts will provide the Boulder County with useful information in five areas of study:

Conditions and trend analysis – documents the number of people currently bicycling, how this number is changing over time, and characteristics of the cyclists.
Network planning – helps prioritize improvements and find locations needing attention.
Demand forecasting – allows for improvements to be ready before they are needed.
Safety – pinpoints areas of concern between cyclists, motorists and pedestrians
Usage – identifies shifts in seasonality or times-of-day

RMNP night ride this Tuesday!

2011-09-11T14:31:00.002-06:00

Our annual Rocky Mountain National Park night ride will be this Tuesday. Make sure to bring lots of extra clothing. We top out around 12000 feet and it can get cold up there. Cross bike, lights, food, clothing. It's going to be good. Estimated time of arrival back down to Lyons is probably midnight or so.

Big Fall Ride VI, Sunday 9/25

2011-09-08T09:39:00.002-06:00

We had so much fun last year (and the several years before that) that we're doing it again.

Big

Fall

Ride

VI

Meet at the bike shop at 7:30am on Sunday 9/25. We'll shuttle folks up to the Peak to Peak and make everyone ride back to Lyons on as much dirt as possible. It's about 55 miles, lots of climbing, lots of technical singletrack, some jeep roads, some county roads, and a little bit of pavement.

Here's a last years effort. It's an all day thing. We'll end up back at the bike shop where we will have beers and grillin fixins waiting. Hope to see some of you out!

2011 Tomac Diplomat 29er Large for sale

2011-09-06T12:30:00.004-06:00

It's that time of year when it comes for the shop to pare down its fleet of bikes. This Tomac Diplomat 29er has been very sweet, but it's time to move on.

This bike has maybe 300 miles on it. The only thing not new when we built this up was the crank and bb but we installed new chainrings to go with the rest of the new drivetrain.

Tomac Diplomat, $3100
*Large frame with a Fox RP23 rear shock
*SRAM X9 3x9
*Formula RX brakes
*handbuilt wheels on Mavic TN719 rims (Hope Pro2 Evo front, Am Classic rear)
*120mm Rock Shox Reba with 20mm thru axle
*Thomson post
*Race Face carbon Next bar and Deus stem
*Even the tires are in near new condition. This bike has been immaculately maintained during its short life span.

Shipping is included in the price as long as you are lower 48 states.

We can take credit cards or paypal. Call the shop if you have any questions 303.823.5810

Tnr 8/6

2011-09-05T18:43:00.001-06:00

Get those lights a charging! We're going high and riding late! 5:30pm at the bike shop.

Transition Bandit!

2011-09-03T14:23:00.002-06:00

We just finished up this small green Transition Bandit. Full SRAM X9 2x10 with a little bit of blingy gold bits.

We put a Race Face Atlas bar on it and Sun Ringle Black Flag Pro wheels for that little bit of bling.

26.25lbs as pictured. And the grips won't add that much weight when we throw them on ;)

Heil Ranch Trailwork

2011-09-01T10:41:00.003-06:00

Last Tuesday, we supplanted our normal Tuesday Nite Ride with trailwork on Picture Rock. We took out a couple things, added a couple things, and generally managed the flow of the trail to keep people on the line. We worked on a section directly above the old quarry where the line was getting blown out and folks were riding off trail around trees.

I revisited the area this morning and it seems to be shaping up nicely.

We are planning another workday for this fall, probably a Saturday affair so we can get more people and work a little bit more. We are definitely open for feedback on what Picture Rock could use and could not use as far as trailwork and maintenance goes. We would definitely love some feedback!

Tour of Colorado Jerseys are in!

2011-08-25T14:37:00.002-06:00

I know, I know, it's the USA Pro Challenge, but I prefer to call it the Tour of Colorado. Cause that's what it is. Anyway, we have a few of these sweet commemorative Pearl Izumi jerseys left.

Mondays Pain

2011-08-22T18:54:00.001-06:00

We rode Buchanan Pass a few weeks back. It was late in the day and a little muddy but all in all a good day. We went up Middle St Vrain and down BP, a good and efficient way to do the loop.

I was once again feeling the call of the Indian Peak and BP. Fueled by a stressful weekend and a need to hurt more than normal, I took my REEB Cycles singlespeed up to the peak to peak for a little Buchanan Pass lovin. It did not dissapoint. The skies and temps were perfect and the trail was in fantastic shape. The loop proved to be quite good on a 29er SS, although I walked more than I care to admit on Coney Flats.

A great day in the high country today. Better get some yourself, too, cause our time will be limited before you know it!

Tuesday Ride Schedule

2011-08-15T19:53:00.002-06:00

Tuesday 8/16 - I can't lead the ride but I'm sure others will want to ride at 5:30. If any parents of school age kids want to ride after the back to school meeting, charge up your lights so we can still ride!

Tuesday 8/23 - anyone have suggestions? We haven't been to Ned in a while, or maybe we could do Lion Gulch?

Tuesday 8/30 - Trail work on Picture Rock. Ride in around 5 and we'll work til dark. We'll be working near the quarry.

Tuesday 9/6- open to suggestions

Tuesday 9/13 - This will be our annual RMNP cross bike ride. Up Fall River Road and down Trail Ridge Road. In the dark with a full moon. Should be sweet.

That's the calendar as far as we've got it figured out. Try to make it for one or all of the rides!

Current Consignment Bikes

2011-08-11T15:21:00.005-06:00

Take a look at what we've currently (as of 8/11/11) got in stock for used bikes. Of course, all prices are negotiable :)

Maverick Durance, medium. Comes with Thomson post, Saint crank, headset and front der. $675.

Santa Cruz Nomad, small. This baby is tricked out, too. $2800

2010 Ibis Mojo SL, medium. Full XT, Fox fork with 15qr and Easton Havoc wheels. Oh yes - $2900

Giant NRS, large. An oldie but a goodie. This'll make a fantastic starter bike. $525

8/9 tuesday ride

2011-08-08T14:34:00.001-06:00

Lights mandatory for this Tuesdays ride. Technical terrain and dark - its going to be good.

homemade, handmade, carbon, and internal gearing

2011-08-03T10:49:00.002-06:00

Check this sweet machine out! A good customer of ours loved his Intense Uzzi, but was looking for something a little different. Hence, the homemade, handmade carbon fiber interal gearbox modeled after the Uzzi. Check the Shimano Alfine rear hub internal gearbox. Now THAT is a cool bike.

2011-07-26T23:00:00.002-06:00

When I was in college, I had some buddies that would drink til oblivion in the evening, then, just as a measure of how drunk they got the night before, they'd go out at 11am the following day to all you could eat Chinese and get all of the spiciest stuff they could. Just because.

Continuing with that spirit, after entering and racing the 50mile pain cave this past weekend known as the Inaugural Steamboat Stinger mountain bike race, I rode my singlespeed tonight, up to Miller Rock, just to make sure all the hurt left in my legs and my body was for real. It was good.

Next Tuesday, all you slackers need to get your ass up here. We're heading to Buchanan Pass.

REEB Cycles!

2011-07-25T19:22:00.001-06:00

After getting all of the REEB Cycles pre ordered bikes built, I finally got to build mine. Man, this thing is oh so sweet. 44mm headtube so we can run a tapered Fox 120 15qr, a super smooth Gates Carbon Drive system, and an absuloutely beautiful handmade steel frame. Oh yes.

Tuesday

2011-07-25T14:14:00.001-06:00

It's Tuesday tomorrow so of course we are riding! How bout let's do a classic and hit North Sheep? Any other ideas?

TNR 7/12

2011-07-11T16:13:00.001-06:00

5:30pm at the bike shop, as always. BRING A TAIL LIGHT. We'll be finishing up in the dark on the highway. You'll probably want to bring raingear too but you knew that :)

Recent bike builds

2011-07-06T10:09:00.009-06:00

So, I've been kind of behind the 8 ball lately when it comes to posting photos of cool stuff. Here's a few snapshots of what's been keeping us busy...

Reeb Cycles custom belt drive single speed

Ben's super pimp XTR Turner Sultan

John's 11 speed (11sp???) Campy Chorus equipped Lynskey R230.

Large Tomac Diplomat 29er (available for demo)

Mike's Transition Trail Or Park. Perfect for bikeparks!

Our large Intense Tracer 2 (available for demo)

And Ben's Intense Tracer 2

Solstice Ride!

2011-06-20T11:24:00.001-06:00

This Tuesday will be our annual solstice ride. Meet up at the bike shop at 5:30. There IPA a strong chance that we won't be back to OB by kitchen by close time so be prepared. LIGHTS ABSOLUTELY REQUIRED.

Bike Shots from Lyons Outdoor Games

2011-06-12T21:27:00.006-06:00

The fun started Friday night with the Yellow Designs stunt team and a fantastic demo show on Railroad Ave.

Sat day was mostly kayaking stuff and a 5k fun run Dash and Bash in the middle. I worked. Later Saturday, though, we got a baby sitter to attend the L.O.G. party at the Oskar Blues party barn. That was some fun times. So fun, in fact that I was hanging pretty hard today.

Nothing helps a hanging more than the hair of the dog that bit me. In this case it was the L.O.G. dirt jump contest. I was in the shop so I missed out on the pumptrack contest action, but I heard it was a pretty good time. The dirt jumpers went off. Big time. I didn't get a shot of it, but someone pulled off a no hander backflip. Damn, that's some mad skills right there. Here's a few action shots.

Random Monday Ride Shots

2011-06-07T09:44:00.006-06:00

Here's a few random shots from my Monday Funday exploration ride. STILL finding new terrain not a days drive away :) Stay tuned, I'll be putting a deathmarch together on a lot of this terrain. Clue - to put the whole loop together we're going to have to wait a while for some snow to melt...

Tight and twisty

Steep, loose, and rocky

Narrow singletrack

Technical streamside maneuvers

Moneyshot!

Moneyshot!

Steep sidehill action

Yep, all the way down there.

The other side of the slot

BIG views.

Yep, stay tuned for a DMD production coming later this summer. Expect some hiking ;)

Tuesday Ride!

2011-06-05T23:12:00.002-06:00

Going to Jamestown this Tuesday. Finally. Feels like we haven't been there in ages - I haven't been there since Big Fall Ride last year. Anyways, bring lights and maybe a dry pair of socks ;) It's going to be a late one. Meeting at the bike shop at 5:30. If anyone wants to meet up in Jamestown, well, we'll be there at some point after 5:30.

Fat Tire Fest 11 this Saturday!

2011-05-25T09:23:00.003-06:00

Wow, 10 years have already gone by and we're ready for another. What started as our housewarming party with friends and bike rides has turned into an annual event. An event that I really look forward to every year, an event that, to me, really signifies the start of the Spring/Summer season. Lyons Fat Tire Fest 11 is upon us.

I also look forward to the recon missions every year. That's when I get to ride a lot of the route at my pace, by myself. This year, though, I had my trusty companion, Bella, along for the ride. She says you're going to love it.

Fortunately, on our big Saturday ride, you'll get to avoid this road.
And you'll miss this view.

But you'll get this. You'll come up thru it. This gate is about 1/2 way on a 45 minute long hike a bike. You heard that correctly. 45 minute rock scramble. It's not mountain biking unless you're hiking, right?

Same route as last year, too. That means we'll have at least one more mandatory hike a bike. I'm still tossing around ideas to make it harder, too. Because of this:

The USFS has graded the shit out of the road. It used to be a relatively modest novice+ jeep road, but it's been graded enough for a logging truck to pass. That's ok, though, it'll be a good long rest section.

Oh, and don't forget, we're going to throw in quite a bit of singletrack, too. Stuff that most folks don't know about or haven't ridden. Not because it's super secret or anything, it's just out there. Way out there.

Couple of last disclaimers:
We'll be doing a lot of hiking.
Probably hiking thru some snow.
We'll probably get rained on.
The absolute steepest and most technical riding is at the very end. When you're tired.
Pretty much everyone blew sky high last year 90% into the ride.
If at least a couple people aren't using my name in vain by the end of the ride, the ride wasn't hard enough.

We'll have a B ride option for those of you wise enough not to partake in an all day sufferfest. Both rides meet at the shop at 8:30am on Saturday. The B ride option will be a point to point, so it'd help quite a bit if a few folks could bring vehicles that'll make shuttling easier. thanks!

Yep, that about covers it.

Multimodal in Denver with Bcycle

2011-05-22T20:58:00.008-06:00

I've been hearing a lot about the Bcycle program that's in Denver and Boulder. Enough that I wanted to try it out but since I try to avoid Denver and Boulder I figured it might be a while. I got my opportunity on Saturday night, though. The goal? U2 in Denver with as little of a driving headache as possible. And believe me, I've been a mountain man long enough that I despise driving in downtown Denver and super heavy I25 traffic. Mostly because I don't know where the hell I'm going so I tend to just blunder around.

I cruised to D town in the Jeep and got off I25 not far from downtown, pretty much exited the interstate as soon as traffic got too heavy. Within minutes, I had parked at the Pepsi Center and was ready to roll. I know, I know, Pepsi Center is a close walk to Mile High, but I had to go to LoDo first. Perfect for Bcycle. The Bcycle program works perfectly. It's $6 to buy in for a 24 hour bike share. Put your credit card in and you're charged $6 to take the bike. The $6 will get you as many 30 minute or less trips around town that you can fit in a day. Take the bike for more than 30 minutes and you pay extra. That's not sharing, Bcycle says. Bcycle has several stations located all over though, that you can ride from Point A to Point B, ditch the bike at another station, run errands by foot, then pick up another Bcycle at another station. Pretty slick.

Here's a shot of my pimpin' ride for the next 29 minutes. Trek makes the bikes for Bcycle. They are overbuilt and stout, and they have plastic or metal covering up all of the barrel adjusters and other things. Fortunately, riders cannot make adjustments to the bike.

They all come equipped with 3 speed drum brake Shimano hubs. Drum brake fronts as well. I guess you could really bang up a wheel then, eh?

I trolled around for 20 minutes or so enjoying the ride. I successfully checked into my next stop. Check in was easy, just park the bike in the stand til it clicks and give you a blinky green light. You are good to go.

After walking to LoDo from the bike stop, we walked to the light rail station where we took the train to Mile High stadium. Walking from the train was the most congested and difficult time of my multimodal experience. Way too many people and not enough room.

The payoff was good, though.

After all that, back on the trail, back to the car, and back on I25. All in all a big success. I avoided my phobia of heavily trafficked downtown streets, got to ride a bike, AND got to ride the train. Good stuff and highly recommended!

Intense Tracer 2 in the house!

2011-05-20T18:09:00.005-06:00

Finally got our new Intense Tracer 2 in the house.

Had to stick with Formulas "The One" brakes. My favorite brake ever. Note also the replaceable dropouts. I'll eventually be rebuilding the wheel with a hub that can take a 142x12 thru axle :)

And I've been lusting after the Chromag Lynx saddle as well. Done.

There's extra beef on this years Tracer 2. Great tire clearance as well. And holy cow how 'bout those beautiful handmade in the USA welds.

Adjustable 5.5 or 6" of travel. I decided to try out this whole 2x10 thing as well.

Yep, pretty good. Ride report soon!

Lyons Fat Tire Fest 11!

2011-05-14T14:34:00.002-06:00

This year is going to be pretty low key. Saturday of Memorial Day weekend. 8:30 at the bike shop. We'll be doing the same 2 rides we did last year. Big ol ride and a not so big ol ride.

Last year, our big ride was a giant loop, about 35-40 miles and around 7000' of climbing. Lots of hike a bike and lots of technical descending. The shorter ride gets almost all of the good descending and is mostly hike free. It's a point to point that'll be around 3-4 hours.

Here's more info and a signup on Facebook. Hope to see you out!
http://www.facebook.com/redstonecyclery#!/event.php?eid=211159215584707

Turner Demo Time!

2011-05-11T11:03:00.004-06:00

Howdy Folks. We've got some Turner demo bikes that will be here til Friday. The Demo Trailer will be picking these bikes back up on Friday and heading to the next demo day in Eagle. Don't know what time on Friday they will disappear, so first come first serve. Here's what we've got:

Flux, medium
Sultan - L, XL, XXL
Spot SM, XL

If you want to check out a size that we don't have, the rest of the fleet is currently living at Pedal Pushers down in Golden. Give them a shout, they're a good crew and will be happy to take care of you.

18 Hours of Fruita Done Gone

2011-05-11T10:27:00.009-06:00

18 Hours of Fruita. I will definitely attend this race again. Getting ready to head out from the Oskar Blues Brewery in Longmont.

Not long on the road and we've got to take a break, OB style. Park the RV on the side of the road and play catch in the ditch.

Arrived at Highline State Park and getting all fired up to race. Racing starts at 12 midnight and goes thru 6pm on Saturday.
The course had 2 major "climbs." This is one of them. I still was able to push a 32x16 all around the course without having to walk.
The Scenery wasn't too bad. Highline St. Park is a true oasis in the desert.

In an 18 hour race, rehydration and recovery are important. Old Chub makes good trail food.
Camp was great

Chef Rog at the top. Last climb, last lap. Time for a beer.
Cycling IS dope.

A thing of beauty. LOTS of 29er singlespeeds. Sweet.

Oh, and happy birthday Chad. How about a light up spinning plastic flower?

Post race was time for 18 road. We wanted something fun, easy, and SS friendly.

Mmmm, good.

What a wonderful day. My, oh, my.

Chad on Zippety. My favorite shot of the weekend.

We weren't the only ones out having fun. The family that rides together stays together.

Over and out. Time for a luxurious ride home in the DPARV.

my bike is creaking

2011-04-28T14:34:00.003-06:00

We get a lot of folks in here at Redstone that are annoyed by creaky bikes. I'm not going to write an entire tech article about it - there's lots of websites out there that explain tech stuff better than I - but here's a few things to look for.

9 times out of 10, creaks are caused by dirt. A clean bike is a happy bike. Rarely is something creaking because it needs to be lubed. Generally speaking, the opposite is true. Follow this logic - most bikes have sealed bearings in suspension pivots, etc. The lube is in the bearings, not the pivot bolts. Bolts and metal/metal interfaces must be clean and tight for the thing to work properly. Lube attracts dirt. Dirt makes things creak. If you put lube on a suspension pivot, it will be a dirt magnet. Remember, dirt makes things creak. If you can isolate a creak to a suspension pivot or link, take it apart, clean it thoroughly, and put it back together dry.

Here's a few others. This bike was creaky under power and the bb has been pulled relatively recently. When I decreak a drivetrain, I almost always start by pulling the bottom bracket, cleaning, regreasing (yes, use LOTS of grease on the bb threads) and re-assembling. If it still creaks, keep exploring. Some out of the stand testing revealed that a creak was coming somewhere from the top of the bike. We pulled the post out of the frame and pulled the seat collar off to find lots of gritty sand particles. We cleaned everything up, including the binder bolt, and put 'er all back together (yes, grease your seatpost, too). The creak was less, but still there. Look at what we found on the saddle clamp...

Once we got that back together, the creaking seems to have been silenced. But there was still creaking in the front end. Simple disassembly of the stem/bar interface showed this:

Putting it back together, again, made things better but not 100%. From that point, we pulled the stem and headset spacers, even took the fork out. EVERYTHING had this gritty sand in it so we pulled the hs bearings from their cups and cleaned absolutely everything spotless. Guess what? Creaks are gone!

Creaks can be hard to diagnose and even harder to solve but hopefully some of this will help you on your way to decreaking your bike.

Tomac Flint 29er SS

2011-04-21T14:36:00.002-06:00

New bike day is always a good day. Today I said goodbye to my old friend, the GT Peace 9er. It was steel, real, heavy, and rode great. I traded it for a 2011 Tomac Flint 29er. I also put on an Easton EC90 carbon post and Truvativ Stylo 1.1 GXP cranks. The new parts and the new frame saved me about 3lbs. I do believe that'll be noticeable, and hopefully, the ride of this aluminum frame will be as comfortable as I'd like. Fingers crossed.

The Flint uses AN6 aluminum and has a custom butted main triangle to save weight and to yeild a more supple ride.

It also comes with 3 bottle mounts. Better yet, is that the large frame gives me enough clearance that I can go back to running my flask!
The sweet Bushnell bottom bracket lets me use this sucker as a geared or single speed. SS please.
I'm looking forward to getting out on it. Too bad for my bum ankle, though, as I'm more excited about the new SS than my cankle!

2011-04-20T18:08:00.001-06:00

Redstone shirts are in!

And... We didn't forget about the ladies this time!

Couple of Trailwork Opportunities this Weekend

2011-04-11T21:32:00.003-06:00

First off, BMA has been partnering with Boulder County Open Space to do some touch ups on the Wapiti Trail at Heil Ranch. It's coming along nicely - busting ruts, armoring historically problematic wet areas, etc. They're looking for more help this coming Sat, 4/16. Start off around 8 or so, ending time is a few hours past that. More info here if you're interested.

In other exciting, news, the gracious hosts at Glacier View Ranch, outside of Ward, are working on building 7+ miles of singletrack that circumnavigates their land. They are looking for help and it will be open to the public. Now here's the really cool part. You want all day long mega epic rides? This area ties in directly to Raymond, Miller Rock, Cerain St Vrain, and all of those parts just east of the Peak to Peak. More info is here. The Maintenance Ranger, Austen, is organizing trail days this Sunday at 8ish as well as the following Sunday. We're trying to get a crew rallied to go up there this Sunday. Interested? Let me know!

News is news

2011-04-10T21:55:00.005-06:00

Longmont bike night is this week, with movies both on Thursday and Friday!

http://longmontbikenight.blogspot.com/

They'll be showing Ride the Divide at the Dickens Opera House on Thurs. Bicycle Dreams will be shown Friday at the Vance Brand auditorium. Dickens Opera house is a pub and Vance Brand is a school, so you can, uh, guess what that means. Help these boys out, proceeds go to Bicycle Longmont goodness.

How's this sound like for a fun race, Crusher in the Tushar. Damn that looks fun. And hard. Could be good preperations for Gravel Worlds 2011, if you're into that kind of gravel grinding pain.

Tuesday ride is coming up. How about a little of this?

Bike shop at 5:30 and we'll drive from there. Bring lights, it's going to get dark.

Pro Downhill Bike Bling, aka Sam's new ride!

2011-04-04T21:25:00.006-06:00

In case you haven't heard, our very own Sam Powers has got himself a sweet new PRO sponsorship! The Marzocchi Go Pro Team is 3 young fellas that just graduated out of the junior world to learn a few things and eventually kill it on the pro downhill tour.

Being sponsored by Intense/Marzocchi/Shimano doesn't suck either. Definitely no suckage here. Check Sam's sweet new Intense M9. DAyum!

Good luck in your first pro year Sam. And thanks for letting us drool over your badass new Intense M9 :)

adjustable dropouts

super pimpy and light downhill air shock from Marzocchi

Can't be pro without your own name on a sticker

Been a while

2011-04-04T20:54:00.003-06:00

Been a while since the last update, hasn't it? Fortunately, I've been able to get out on the bike a little bit. That's good, because I've actually got a couple of (cough cough) races coming up! 18 hours of Fruita on a singlespeed Oskar Blues team should prove to be fun. And maybe a little painful. Maybe the Reeb will help, eh? So I've been riding.

Temps and weather has generally been mild. I guess Spring is here, too. In some ways, you can only tell that Spring is here only by the fact that Winter has been noticeably absent. But it's not exactly green and full of Spring life yet.

But that will come.

Our buddy Farid from Singletrack maps was by with his absolute newest creation. Get your hands on them while you can. Singletrack makes some killer maps. Most importantly, they are maps of places that aren't available elsewhere. Check the latest - Ft. Collins and Lyons. It's got all of the Lyons area stuff, including a little bit of Lion Gulch. More importantly, this is the best map I've seen of Devil's Backbone, Blue Sky, Horsetooth, Lory St. Park, etc. I love me some maps and this is my new favorite. Speaking of maps, our map room is coming along nicely, too. Come check it out!

Oh, and Tuesday rides are in full effect for the "season." I still don't get that terminology, but others use it so why not, right? Kinda reminds me of my favorite Yoda quote - "Do or do not, there is no try." There is no bike "season" in my world.
Many of you have been fortunate enough to come in the shop to have our new doggy, Bella bark her arse off at you. Well, she's new so hopefully she'll come around. She's only 8mo old, too, so there's not a lot of chilling in her yet. And in case you're wondering, she's going to make a killer trail dog!
It's been windy out there, too. Remember, now that some forested riding has thawed out, you're only allowed to whine about wind if you're on the road. Otherwise, find some trees or a gulch or something and you're all set. Wind - bah, humbug wind.

Got some riding coming up

2011-03-21T09:22:00.003-06:00

Tuesday rides - the next Tuesday ride, maybe the next couple, will be meeting at the bike shop at 5:30 and pedaling locally. We'll be back to driving from the shop in a couple of weeks, or whenever LHC OHV opens back up ;)

Hey speaking of LHC OHV, we haven't done a big ol Saturday ride yet, have we? Who's in for a riding leaving the shop, heading south thru Heil Ranch, 1 loop at LHC OHV, then back on Heil? I think it'll make for a helluva all mountainy cross country bike ride. You know, the kind we used to call a mountain bike ride?

First DST Tuesday ride of the year 5:30

2011-03-14T19:37:00.001-06:00

Howdy folks. Now that DST is in full effect, Tuesday rides will be meeting at the shop at 5:30. This week, we'll pedal from the shop. BRING LIGHTS! After we're off of county OS legally by dusk, we'll click the lights on to hit up a little LGS action. Can't wait!

Heil Ranch Wapiti Trail Work Day Coming Up!

2011-03-04T10:13:00.004-07:00

(pic courtesy of Daily Camera)

BMA is partnering with Boulder County Parks and Open Space to maintain the Wapiti Trail at Heil Valley Ranch this spring. First workday is next Saturday, March 12 (March 19th if there's snow). They need 15 volunteers to work from 8:30 AM till 12:30pm with an option to stay longer. Contact John Bevans for more info: mtbcolorado[at]yahoo[dot]com

Tuesday Ride 3/1

2011-02-27T16:15:00.001-07:00

This will be our Happy March Day ride. After this Tues, we'll only have 2 more Tuesday rides at 6pm. DST starts on 3/13, so after that, we'll be meeting up at 5:30 to make use of more daylight.

How about this week we head down south of Boulder-town to check out the Dirty Bismark loop? Sounds like it's a mix of singletrack and wide bike path but we haven't been down that direction in a while. Who's in?

Or would you rather go to Left Hand?

Tuesday ride 2/22

2011-02-21T11:21:00.001-07:00

Get your snow gear on, we're riding high on Tues 2/22. Meetup at the shop at 6 and we'll caravan up to the frozen reaches of Peaceful Valley. You don't know winter riding until you've ridden frozen Nordic trails at night!

Snow Ride, Take it Easy

2011-02-16T10:55:00.005-07:00

Another Tuesday snow ride on Nordic trails is in the books! Last year, we got the wild hair last year to check out Buchanan Pass in the snow. We assumed that a majority of it would be packed enough for riding we were right! We even had so much fun we went the following week as well.

With the warm temps we've been experiencing, we figured yesterday's Tuesday ride would be a prime opportunity to get in a little nordic style action. Peaceful Valley and Buchanan Pass were the ticket.

The trails had been packed in, warmed, then re frozen to form a perfect layer of bike on snow traction. Early on, the singletrack was in PRIME condition. No snow bike needed. The trail was smooth and flowy and faster than it ever is in the summer.
Once we got higher up onto Buchanan Pass, a snow bike would've been a little more useful. There was a very tight, packed line to follow. Once your front wheel wandered offline, it would sink. Fork tip deep snow in this pic. Experiencing an "off line" moment would stick your front wheel immediately and send you flying over the bars.
We rode up past the waterfall on BP. On second thought now, it may have been prudent to turn around at the falls since the snow above it proved to unruly for riding up or down. There was hiking involved.
The rest of the way down was spent flying over the bars higher up where the snow was deep. As we got closer to the bottom, though, we were ripping stellar conditions on packed snow. It got fast enough you could drift thru corners and hammer up the climbs. Friggin perfect I tell you.

Next week? We'll see...

A little Redstone love in the Longmont paper!

2011-02-07T18:41:00.001-07:00

Lyons’ Redstone Cyclery grows into bigger shop:Longmont Ledger-Longmont,Colorado « LongmontLedger.com

Join th Army! The BMA Guerilla Army!

2011-02-06T11:43:00.002-07:00

BMA needs you to make our access campaign in OSMP's West TSA successful.

The mission of the BMA Guerrilla Army is to get mountain bikers off their asses and to public meetings. We'll have some guerrilla actions at strategic moments to bring out the crowds.

We have a lot of work to do to get 500 people to the OSBT meeting this Wednesday 2/9 at 6pm City Council Chambers 1777 Broadway (intersection w/ Canyon). We have a volunteer general for the Army who has some cool ideas for how to get people to the meeting, such as flyering cars with bike racks on them over the next few days. But our general needs help to make this happen. If you'd like to lend some elbow grease to the cause, please click on the "Join the BMA Guerrilla Army" button at the link below. Forward this message on to trusted friends that you think might be interested. More info to come on all the other ways you can help if this ain't your shtick.

http://bouldermountainbike.org/takeaction

What are you talking about?

On Tuesday, February 1st at 9:26 pm, Boulder's Open Space and Mountain Parks (OSMP) Department recommended the continuation of a total ban on mountain bikes in the West Trail Study Area (the open space between Mount Sanitas and Eldorado Springs Dr). To justify this decision they cited "irreconcilable visitor conflict" and said new shared-use trails were "not a reasonable option from either an environmental or a cost perspective." BMA stands ready to engage with staff to resolve the problems that BMA's modest proposal could cause. Learn more about BMA's position at the link above.

Boulder County Access Politics at their Finest (I)

2011-02-01T18:02:00.007-07:00

Let me set the background in this first post. I'll get to my real point in post II, which I'll put up when I feel like typing more. City of Boulder is in the middle of a very long term project that involves revisiting the management plans of all of their Parks and Open Space land. They are breaking these areas into chunks called TSAs or Trail Study Areas. Each TSA is visited seperately to make it easier for city management to make it thru all of their properties.

City of Boulder has already made it thru 2 TSAs already. Those TSAs were manged in the typical way that local land managers use for public input. The process is basically simple:
-initial public info meeting and comment period
-some sort of interim status and comment period
-suggestions A, B, C, D are presented and there's a comment period
-Staff final recommendation based on previous comments and feedback and comment period
-City of Boulder puts the plan into effect

The first involved the Marshal Mesa area South of Boulder and East of 93 and it stayed pretty low key. Key bike related takeaways from that TSA were a new trailhead for Marshal Mesa right on Broadway and new trails like Cowdrey Draw, High Plains, Coal Seam and Marshall Valley. The plan also laid out the initial framework for the "Dirty Bismark," a ride that has been dreamed of by Boulder Residents for years. Things turned out well and the whole project, although it was still very much "on the radar," didn't bring out a ton of press or comments from the public at large. Thanks largely to Boulder Mountainbike Alliance (BMA) for being on the scene and having the job well handled.

Next TSA was the Doudy Draw area, which included all of the park land south of Eldorado Canyon Drive and West of 93. Now we were getting into some touchy territory, as bikes had been banned in about 95% of this area. Until this TSA, bike access was limited to the Community Ditch, and the very bottom part of Doudy Draw so you could ride off of the ditch and down the draw to the parking lot. Basically pretty lame already and we didn't have much to lose. This was a much bigger deal for Boulder area peeps, both mountain bikers and non mountain bikers. Boulder hikers and haters wanted to keep the bikes out. They got banned for a reason after all, right? But bike supporters came out in throngs to the public meetings and made a lot of good, logical, fact based suggestions. Remember how the process works? City management tries to reach a decision, based largely on public input. Because bike support had been vocal, well thought out, logical and based on facts, OSMP staff recommended opening up Doudy Draw in it's entirety (complete with a reroute to make the trail more sustainable). OSMP staff also called for the creation of what is now Springbrook Loops and Flatirons Vista Loop, both of which would be bike accessible. Again bike peeps were happy and non bike peeps were not.

Now, enter the introduction of the West TSA. The "crown jewel" of Boulder OSMP as it's referred to by staff and some Boulder area residents. This is also a TSA where there are ABSOLUTELY ZERO bike allowed trails in the region.

There's the background. Now do some reading, catch up, and form your own opinion of how it all came down. I'll tell you mine shortly.

For a refresher, go here for the official word from the city and here to learn a little about the politics as they have already played out.

Reasons

2011-01-31T14:58:00.002-07:00

5 reasons why it makes perfectly good sense to go for a bike ride when it's 5 degrees and snowing.

BMA Banquet is this coming weekend!

2011-01-30T23:22:00.003-07:00

This Friday, February 4 is the 6th Annual BMA Banquet. Put on your fancy duds, head to downtown Boulder and be prepared for a fun, bike peeps party and auction. All proceeds go to BMA. It typically sells out, but there are still tickets available. Check here if you're a FB person, otherwise, find it at BMA's new website!

Some cool techy tidbits

2011-01-26T12:00:00.003-07:00

Earlier this week, we got to check out Dale's new handmade Raven snowbike. It was oh so sweet.

AND it came complete with the absolute newest iteration of the Gates Carbon Belt Drive. I want to get out on this bike!
Rock Shox Reverb height adjust seatpost in the house, too!

NICE hydraulic remote, too.

Turner 5 Spot Bling

2011-01-13T10:11:00.003-07:00

How about a very nicely equipped large 2010 Turner 5 Spot for sale that is "used" but has never been ridden? For only $3500.

Tuesday, Tuesday, Tuesday!

2011-01-07T10:06:00.005-07:00

Boulder Mountainbike Alliance is a great organzation. We like BMA and think you should, too.

BMA is our regions mountain bike trail advocacy effort. BMA offers a united voice of mountain bikers for municipalities and land managers to hear, their trail work efforts have dedicated hundreds upon hundreds of community service, and they promote social rides for riders of all abilities. The management of BMA comes from a group of extremely dedicated mountainbikers and some of them have been at it for 20+ years.

Redstone would like to offer our thanks to BMA as well as our full support. In light of that, we will be supplanting our normally scheduled Tuesday Ride next week (1/11) with BMA's party to launch their new logo, new website, and membership drive.

Details for the party are here.

Hopefully we'll see some of next Tuesday at Avery's Brewery in Boulder!

We're open in our new location! Redstone v3.0!

2010-12-31T11:09:00.003-07:00

This battle station is now fully operational. Come visit us at our new location at 355 Broadway, SE corner of 4th and Main. First ever happy hour in the new location today, too. Get here early though, cause we're leaving early. it's New Years Eve and time to party!

Boulder's Valmont Bike Park update!

2010-12-30T13:12:00.000-07:00

Valmont Bike Park Update

The City of Boulder's Parks and Recreation Department is making great progress towards a spring 2011 opening of the Valmont Bike Park. While an exact opening date has not yet been selected, the site is still a flurry of activity with workers installing utilities, restrooms, parking facilities, landscaping, and riding elements. Fourteen months ago we were celebrating the Bike Park's ground breaking - now we're very close to it opening. Your donations have made a significant impact in making the park better for the community; we want to thank you not only for the financial support, but your patience as well - as we all await the big day.

Recently, the park was awarded an additional $45,000 grant from Great Outdoors Colorado (GOCO) for the informational and trail signs at the park. To most observers, this seems like a lot of money for signs. The signage is one of many important safety elements of the park. The park will be teaming with kids and new riders, and safety is of paramount importance. All the riding features must be clearly marked, like a ski area, to steer inexperienced riders away from the expert level elements. Parks & Rec is wisely taking risk management seriously, we not only want a good riding experience, but rider safety cannot be compromised. GOCO is the agency responsible for allocating state lottery proceeds, and we want to thank the state of Colorado's Lottery for awarding us this grant. Between the coordinated fundraising efforts and grant writing of Parks & Rec and BMA, we have added $500,000 to enhancements to the park!

As of the week of December 20th, the restroom building was framed and sheathed, most of the irrigation pipe and sprinkler heads installed, 90% of the trails complete, seeding and erosion control mats installed, and concrete work is complete. The hub plaza is 80% complete. Local artist Christian Mueller was tasked with the design, and his vision is nearly complete. The hub plaza will serve as the gathering space for riders and park users, and is a true work of art. The plaza is shaped like a chainring, and has enormous stones radiating from the center like spokes of a wheel. For more photos and progress report, please see the city's website www.ValmontCityPark.org

Judd DeVal of Alpine Bike Parks is the bike trail contractor. He and his crew have come from Vancouver, BC, Santa Cruz, Boise, and North Carolina to build the bike features. Alpine Bike Parks has built some of the finest parks in the world and we are fortunate to have this crew working on Valmont. They are out there long days sculpting the trails, pouring concrete for the wall rides, and welding the structures for bridges and jumps. They have made impressive progress, and you will be grinning ear to ear when you get to ride the finished product.

Chance Brown of J2 Construction, the site's general contractor, has done an amazing job coordinating the park's major excavation work and overall progress. These two teams are doing a remarkable job to bring make this dream park a reality.

We had poaching problems when the park construction began, but most of these problems have subsided as riders realized poaching was creating havoc for the construction crews and delaying the project. Thanks for being responsive and letting the crews get their job done unhindered.

The single biggest question we hear is "When is the park going to open?" The Parks & Rec Department has been working hard to get Valmont open. They are doing a great job in balancing the maintenance of existing parks, while simultaneously building the Bike Park and installing synthetic turf (and other upgrades) at East Boulder Community Park.

Since we have been working together on the fundraising, we have witnessed the monumental task first hand. There are other city departments involved, various contractors, wildlife and irrigation ditch concerns, and budgets to manage. Park construction is a large undertaking - as they must ensure adequate parking, restroom facilities, landscaping, and information signage commensurate with the number of visitors the park will attract. They must also comply with all clean water, clean air and noise regulations and make required transportation improvements to Goose Creek, Valmont and Airport roads to keep traffic (both bike and car) flowing seamlessly. We hope to be able to pinpoint an opening date in the New Year, but rest assured, this is going as quickly as possible and no one is dragging their feet.

We have had many generous offers to volunteer to help, and we are sorry there has been no opportunity to date. We hope to have some opportunities soon, but most of the construction is beyond the scope of volunteer days. If we had to move 16,000 yards of dirt (a dump truck holds 6 yards) with shovels, we would be out there until the year 2071. With earth movers, cranes and concrete trucks buzzing around and open utilities, the site is not safe for volunteers.

If you see any members of Parks and Recreation, from the guy shoveling snow on the Pearl St. Mall, to the staff behind the desk at one of the Rec Centers, they all deserve our thanks. We have a new appreciation for our Parks and Recreation Department, let them hear it.

Intense Tracer 2 coming soon!

2010-12-22T14:48:00.002-07:00

Get your orders in early, because these bikes are going to dissapear quickly. My Tracer VP was one of my favorite bikes of all time. I cannot wait to get on the new Tracer 2. Bikes are scheduled to start shipping in February.

How about some Turner bike bling!

2010-12-19T12:50:00.004-07:00

We just finished up this super sweet Turner Flux for our good buddy Dr. Mike.

This 2011 medium Turner Flux started as their "Expert kit," an XT level bike. We made a few changes along the way.

The new Dynasys 10 speed Shimano drivetrain is smooth and good looking as ever.

We upgraded the bars to carbon Race Face Next bars. Also note those pimpin' brakes...

Even though the kit came with Formula RX brakes (which we love) we decided up upgrade to our favorite brake ever, the Formula The One. Even though it's technically a dh oriented brake, it's still lighter than a Magura Marta SL and has more stopping power than anything we've ever used. Win! That's not your everyday rear hub there, either. Powertap SL+ disc baby!
We used one of our favorite front hubs to round out these handbuilt wheels with Mavic 819 hoops. The DT Swiss 240. Even though it's a qr front end, we spec'd it with the 20mm version of the hub. That will allow Mike to run whatever fork he wants down the road. These hubs are easily convertible to 15qr or 20mm.

All done, it's about 26.5 lbs as pictured with the powertap rear hub and no pedals. This Flux will be a great all around, racy, do everything kind of bike. Thanks Mike, hope you love it as much as we do!

Thursday update!

2010-12-16T12:02:00.002-07:00

Couple of news bits...

Don't forget, our 2nd Annual White Elephant 6 Pack Exchange is tomorrow, Friday 12/17!
The official invite Linky is here complete with rules, etc :) Start time is normal happy hour time and we'll get going on the exchange around 6:30. Please wrap your 6 pack.

CYCLOCROSS IN LYONS!!! This Saturday in Bohn Park. OB will be on hand with beer so you can enjoy the excellent spectating of this fun course. I'll be working in the shop here that morning so make sure to swing by to say hi.

Oh, and the bike shop is moving as well. New address is 355 Main St. Expect to see us there sometime around the first of the year. It's on 4th and Main Street on the SE corner. It's the big building/old gas station just to the north of the world's smallest bike shop, now Redstone Radio.

Read This!! Boulder Access/West TSA info inside

2010-12-06T09:33:00.001-07:00

I just got the latest newsletter from BMA. If anyone was wondering about bike access in South Boulder in the "West TSA" area, here's the latest...

The End of This Process Is Near

We need you to show up on Dec 9th to speak to the Open Space Board of Trustees(OSBT).

After countless hours of staff and volunteer time spent on the Community Collaborative Group's proceedings, we are exactly where we thought we would be before it all started.

Bikes are the most significant "non-consensus" item, and our fate will be decided in the next 60 to 90 days. The schedule has been set, and even though it is subject to change, we know what the process looks like all the way to City Council.

Here is the schedule:

December 6: Open house to present CCG package of agreements. This is all about what they agreed to, so bikes aren't on the radar. BMA WTSA Strategy Meeting instead.... read below at the bottom of this alert!

December 9: West Senior Center, 909 Arapahoe Ave, at 6PM. OSBT considers the West TSA. TIME TO SHOW UP... BIG TIME

December 15: OSBT Study Session for West TSA. Format of meeting to be decided at December 9 OSBT meeting. No public comments at the this meeting.

Feb 1 - OSMP publishes West TSA Draft Management Plan - with CCG recommendations and staff proposals of non consensus items.... This the day we find out what OSMP is going to do about mountain bikes.

Feb 9 - OSMP Open house for Draft Plan and OSBT Study Session

Feb 23 - OSBT Plan Recommendations

Mar 16 - City Council considers the West TSA

At this point in the process, we have no idea what staff is going to recommend regarding bike access in the West TSA. What we do know is that there is a well organized group of people who are dead set against even our very modest request for access so we can have a fossil-fuel free recreation experience from our homes.

We, as a user group, have been the most constructive and mature group in this process. We have published a white paper and advocacy document that details our vision for bike access from central Boulder to outlying areas where we can disperse and get a quality bike ride without the use of a car. We must continue this strategy if we are to be taken seriously as the next generation of stewards of our open spaces.... which we are.

These last few meetings will require a massive turnout of our constituency if we are to influence the outcome. We'll be publishing Action Alerts for every meeting that needs a big showing.

The "Bikes on the West TSA" discussion will begin this Thursday. Mountain biking needs you. Be there and be a part of making Boulder a more friendly place for mountain biking for generations to come. We won't have another opportunity for at least a decade, if ever.

Want to take a more active role in this discussion? We will be holding a BMA West TSA Strategy Meeting at the same time OSMP has their CCG Open House. That's tonight at 6pm.

CONOR O'NIELLS

1922 13th St

seating area in the back

Monday, December 6

5:30 - 7pm

See you there. Rough trail ahead!

This weeks Tuesday episode will be Lion Gulch

2010-12-05T13:46:00.003-07:00

Tuesday ride 12/7. Bring your best lights (and best batteries) and your best skillzez because we're heading up to Lion Gulch. This is strictly an attempt to draw out Rockin' Ron because he said he'd come if we go to LG :) Keep your fingers crossed for dry terrain. It could get dicey if there's precip...

How 'bout some Friday ride stokeage?

2010-12-03T11:19:00.003-07:00

On some Friday morning, I'm able to coordinate family and work enough to manage a brief ride. Today was one of those days. I had less than an hour so I did the ol' "up and over" at Hall Ranch. Up Antelope, over the top, and back thru the rock garden back to town on Highway 7. Despite the wind, which was pretty mighty at times, the ride was fantastic.

December? Check
55 degrees? Check
Shorts???? Check

Crocodile warnings? Check

Dry slick? Check
Fast, rippin' smooth singletrack? Check
Some rocks to have fun on as well? Check
Uncrowded singletrack and witness to a beautiful rising sun? Check
And a great day with the water moving in town? Check
Make sure y'alls get out today and tomorrow. Might be the last good ride for a while. But we've been saying that for a month now, guess we'll see!

Transition's all new bike, the Bandit!

2010-12-03T10:45:00.004-07:00

For all of you that've been loving on Transition, but looking for something smaller and/or lighter than their most excellent Covert, look no further. We got a press release yesterday about their new frame, the Bandit.

Transition mentions in their press release, "The Bandit is a 130mm travel frame designed for use with 140mm forks. This bike is a lighter weight offering than the Covert, aimed at riders looking for more of a traditional “trail bike” than an enduro bike. The frame will have a 68 degree head angle, 429mm chainstay length and 8.5mm of BB drop for a assembled BB height of roughly 330mm. We will be offering this bike in 4 sizes to give riders several options to fit them “just right”. The wheelbase will range from about 1080mm to 1160mm for the small to extra large sizes. With corresponding top tubes of 546mm to 622mm. A 74 degree seat angle helps give you an aggressive climbing position without having to shift your weight around too much. The bike is extremely balanced with a great suspension feel. Perfect for getting out and exploring the mountains on epic rides."

It's got a linkage very similar to their Bottle Rocket

And it looks great dirty, too!

If you want one, get in line. As of right now, expected delivery is May.

Tues ride 11/23

2010-11-22T09:30:00.001-07:00

Join us for our pre Thanksgiving Tuesday ride. Meet up at the shop at 6pm and we'll take it from there. We'll do a trail conditions check and male the call at the shop. Another round of Left Hand perhaps? A sides this time?

Friday report

2010-11-19T11:51:00.003-07:00

Picture Rock Friday morning action time today. I rolled out of the office around 9am. Condtions were 95% good on the way up. A couple of spots were getting a little greasy, primarily between the pic-a-nic bench and the silo. I did see something that bummed me out a little. Foks, regardless of how greasy or muddy it gets, please do not let these stray tracks belong to you...

I've talked to County trail employees ad naseum about mud. They would still prefer you to ride down the middle and make a rut vs. going around. Ruts are easy to fix. Wide trails are tough to narrow back down.

I rode all the way up to the junction with Wild Turkey. Above the silo and quarry, conditions were top notch. A bit soft here and there, but otherwise dry or perfectly tack dirt. Good stuff I tell you.
The trip back down was another story. It was a little after 10 by this point and things were starting to warm up. Between the silo and the pic-a-nic table were getting very greasy on the way down.
So greasy that my bike ended up kinda filthy and in need of a wash. Those same sections are only going to get muddier as it gets warmer, too. I suspect they'll be dry and good to go by the time we get more moisture :)

If you're going to ride PR, depending on the time of day, be prepared to turn around. And don't let those stray tracks off the trail be yours.

11/16 Tuesday ride Left Hand!

2010-11-15T14:20:00.001-07:00

Left Hand OHV is a callin'. I got up there today for a little recon ride and found conditions to be most excellent. Meet at Redstone Cyclery at 6pm or the OHV main entrance at 630ish.

Intense Tracer 29 and SlopeStyle 2 on SALE

2010-11-10T13:32:00.003-07:00

Just got word from our boys at Intense that they are putting Tracer 29s and SlopeStyle 2s on sale.

Here's the lowdown:

*While supplies last
*Tracer 29 frame and Rock Shox Reba 140 on sale for $2500 package deal.

*SlopeStyle 2 completes for $3900.

Call or email us for more details on this most excellent deal from Intense

Exploring new local terrain. Still!

2010-11-08T16:35:00.007-07:00

Ahhh Mondays. The day that everyone hates because their weekend is over. But not me. Monday is my weekend. Today I fully intended to take every advantage of having a Monday to myself with the kids in school. DST is over and there's snow forecast. My deductive resources indicate that if I didn't enjoy the 70 degree weather today, my opportunities at 9000' may well be over until next Spring.

So I drove out of town and up, up into the hills to take advantage of the weather. Not knowing what I'd experience, I brought my duffel bag with a full complement of apparel. Starting at 8000'ish and knowing I'd spend the day between 8 and 9000' I decided on knickers, baggies and short sleeves. Short sleeves at altitude in November. Woot!

There was not a lot of snow up there. Actually, not any.

But there were some "no bikes" signs. Unfortunately, gotta respect the signs. It wasn't where I really wanted to end up anyway, so I didn't mind turning around.
The Aspens look different without the foliage. Beautiful, but different. More Blair Witch stick style beautiful.

A once relatively fun-ish jeep road now isn't.
Because the good ol' USFS doesn't mess around with typical road graders. If their roads are bumpy, they go straight for the pair o' dozers.

But the views didn't dissapoint. Neither did the new bike, a Transition Covert. So far this machine has been allllll good and zero bad. zero. I'm loving it.
There was technical climbing. (note to self do not come here when it's 90degrees in July)

And some equally technical and viewtastic descending.

And some creek crossings.

Oh damn. Did I mention the views? Money.
And even a little pavement. Even that was fun.
Best yet, this ride was legal, mapped, and marked on the ground by the USFS. Secret trails? Nah, don't need them. I've been explorin' these lands for the better part of 12 years and this one was still new to me. All I had to do was open the map, point, and there it was.

Do I need to point it out to you? Nope. Grab a map and explore. Go somewhere you've never been. You'll find something good :)

DST Sale!

2010-11-07T21:11:00.002-07:00

Now thru Sunday 11/21, we're having our first ever "Goodbye DST, we'll miss you" Sale. Since things are getting dark early, we thought we'd do something to help you cope with the shorter days.

15% off lots of things that will help you with night riding like:
-Niterider (includes non stock items)
-gloves, socks, and cold weather accessories (booties, warmers, etc)
-Tifosi and Optic Nerve eye sunglasses (with interchangeable clear lenses!)
-Tires (but not because they'll necessarily help with night riding, tires are just fun)
$4 26" and 700c tubes
$5 29er tubes

So, Lyons peeps, you want a FREE year long RTD pass?

2010-11-07T14:24:00.003-07:00

Great news for anyone that lives within the Lyons Planning Area! Thanks to our friends at Boulder County, Cemex, and town of Lyons, you now qualify for a free ECO pass for RTD. These passes normally run about $1800 but if you're in the LPD, they are totally free.

This ECO pass will get you a free ride on any RTD bus or light rail. Period. For one year. Here's the details...
*****************************************************************************As a Lyons resident, you are eligible for a Free RTD Eco Pass. This is a community-wide annual pass starting December 1, 2010 and will entitle you to unlimited usage of RTD services.

Eco Pass holders are entitled to unlimited rides on RTD transit services, including:

Any local, express or regional bus.
Boulder's Community Transit Network: HOP, SKIP, JUMP, BOUND, DASH, STAMPEDE and BOLT.
SkyRide bus service to DIA ($5 to DIA, free return fare).
"N" bus to Eldora Mountain Ski Resort.
Light Rail.
call-n-Ride

Using your Eco Pass is easy. Just show the Eco Pass photo ID card to the bus driver or light rail inspector. Then take a seat, relax and enjoy the ride.

All Eco Pass cardholders are also eligible to use the Guaranteed Ride Home Program from Ride Arrangers free of charge. This peace-of-mind program gives cardholders a free taxi ride home in the event of an emergency, illness or unexpected schedule change that requires you to work late.

Get Your Pass: To qualify for this pass, you must live within the Lyons Planning Area. Bring proof of residency to any of these locations on the dated indicated and sign up for your FREE RTD Bus Pass.

Dates to pick up your pass: November 6th, at the Lyons High School 12-3:30 pm; November 13th, Walt Self Center, 8:00am-1:00pm, November 16th, Lyons Town Hall, 3:00pm-7:00pm.

These passes are made possible by The Town of Lyons, Sustainable Futures Commission in conjunction with Boulder County and CEMEX.

For more information contact the Town of Lyons, 303-823-6622.

Wow. Today the bike world says goodbye to Titus

2010-11-05T10:52:00.002-06:00

An email sent from Titus this morning to it's dealers:
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To All Titus Business Partners:

As many of you know, Titus has been working through a challenging year.* We have made significant efforts to restructure the company.* Unfortunately, we have run out of time. *

Our largest lender is foreclosing on an outstanding loan.* Commencing immediately, they will initiate an orderly liquidation of company assets.*

Titus is well known for great customer service, including warranty service.* Please be patient with us as we work through this most difficult time.* We will do everything possible to keep our loyal riders on the trails.

All inquiries and requests will be answered beginning Monday, November 8, 2010.

Many of you have been partners with Titus for a very long time.* We deeply appreciate your support through the years.

You are on our list because you are a dealer, have been a dealer, or have requested information about becoming a dealer for Titus.
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Here's a link to an article in MBA posted today.

This is hugely horrible news. Titus has been around since day one and has made great bikes since the beginning.

__________________

Happy Halloween

2010-10-31T22:03:00.002-06:00

Got out for a ride outta town today with Jrog. Good stuff I tell you. Just don't fall.

Where's everyone hankerin' to ride on Tuesday? Peacefull Valley area? Lion Gulch? Pole Hill? Or even the wheel of rides?

And a happy birthday to the one and only Rockin' Ron. Great times were had at the Rockin household on Saturday, including but not limited to some amazing backyard pumptrack action. Maybe we'll have to make Rockin's house a stop on our Tuesday night adventures...

New Woolies and other stuff!

2010-10-21T10:50:00.003-06:00

It's been long enough since the last run of Redstone embroidered wool jerseys. Enough of you have said "MORE!" and we finally caved. Check out the 2010 Redstone Woolies. In house and very limited. Get yours now!

In addition to our woolies, we're stocking up on warmers and cool weather gloves. More winter duds are showing as we speak as well.

Christmas is coming up as well. To that end, we're stockin' up on kids bikes. Right now we've got 2011 20" and 24" mountain bikes from GT. More kids bikes as well as adult mountain bikes are arriving as they become available. Don't get your kid vids or something equally lethargic this year. Get them outside appreciating the world around us on 2 wheels!

Tuesday Nighter, 10/19

2010-10-17T21:58:00.002-06:00

Meet up at the bike shop at 5:30 for a late night Sourdough rendezvous. It's entirely possible that conditions could yield a shutout for Peaceful Valley so stay tuned for alternate plans...

Crossin on the Peak to Peak

2010-10-17T21:51:00.003-06:00

If you didn't hit up the cross race today at Aspen Lodge just south of Estes on the Peak to Peak, you missed out!

Twin Sisters provided quite the backdrop for this fantastic venue.

So did Long's and Mt Meeker. The course was a techy mountain biker style course, too.

Pro men's field was great spectating.

Hup Hup!

Help the Lyons HS MTB team on 10/27!!!

2010-10-17T21:47:00.002-06:00

Dinner at OB on Wednesday 10/27. Be there and bring all of your friends. Let's try to raise some fundage for our high school mountain bikers!

Consignment Bikes update

2010-10-14T16:54:00.004-06:00

We've got a couple of very nice bike with skinny tires here on consignment.

First off, a 2006 or so Schwinn Fastback. Medium, 51.5 c-t seat tube and about a 54cm effective top tube. Aluminum frame and fork with 8sp Shimano Tiagra triple. Looking for $300 on this one. This Fastback would be a great starter bike for a smaller person. It has barely been ridden and is in great shape.

Next up is a 2007 Specialized S-Works cross bike. 54.5cm aluminum frame with carbon fork. It's build is very nice - SRAM Rival group, Thomson post, Ritchey WCS stem, Salsa Bell Lap Bars. This bike is super clean. $1300.

We're not in Summer anymore, Toto

2010-10-13T10:29:00.003-06:00

A few pics from last nights Tuesday ride. Slush and snow above 8500' or so and perfect dirt down lower. Winter's coming.

Tuesday Ride 10/12

2010-10-11T08:52:00.002-06:00

Bike shop at 5:30 or Jtown around 6ish. It'll be pretty much a full dark ride so bring as much light and battery horsepower as you've got!

The latest in Boulder Mountainbike Alliance news

2010-10-08T11:07:00.002-06:00

BMA Membership Party

Wed Oct 20th @ the Draft House from 5-9pm

Get ready to do some mingling at the annual BMA membership party! It's time to have some fun and participate in BMA's Board of Directors elections. Let's celebrate another productive year and look forward to new opportunities on the horizon. Interested in serving on the BMA board of directors? Hit reply and let us know ASAP!
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Celebrate the Dirty Bismarck:

Vote YES ON 1B & Support Boulder County Open Space

On Thursday October 14th Boulder County Parks and Open Space will open up another critical link for the Dirty Bismarck off-road recreational loop. This is another example of why you should support the county open space program and VOTE YES ON 1B Marshall Valley to Marshall Mesa to Cowdrey Draw to the new Mayhoffer-Singletree trail to a soon-to-be-built connector to Coalton to High Plains to Greenbelt Plateau to Community Ditch to Coal Seam. This will make an all dirt loop mirroring the route of the Morgul-Bismarck Loop of the Coors International Bicycle Classic from the 1980s. THIS WILL BE AN AWESOME 4-SEASON LOOP TRAIL!

In the past few years, Boulder County Open Space has built miles of awesome trail that can be experienced on two wheels. Picture Rock, Wild Turkey, new trails soon-to-open at Betasso. There are more opportunities on the horizon. That's why BMA supports ballot issue 1B and Boulder County Parks and Open Space. The most important thing you can do to support BMA's closest partner in building world-class single track is to spread the word (and of course VOTE, VOTE, VOTE!!!). Cut and paste the following paragraph into an email and educate your friends and colleagues:

You should vote yes on ballot issue 1B this year. You love biking in Boulder County. You enjoy Hall Ranch, Heil Valley Ranch, Walker Ranch, and Betasso Preserve. This is what open space gets you. A vote for 1B will get you more trails - including another Hall Ranch sized recreational open space park and the possibility of connecting existing parks like the Picture Rock Trail did for Hall and Heil. Some of the best, last private property in the County is up for sale. If we don't buy it now, private developers will. And they won't build biking trails, organic farms, or wildlife corridors. Please spread the word. Vote YES ON 1B and support open space, recreation, our economy, ecosystems, and wildlife. For more info check out
http://www.yesonopenspace.org/
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Valmont Bike Park Update

Thank for your patience during the design, development and construction of Valmont Bike Park. BMA has been working in tandem with the City of Boulder Parks and Recreation Department, and we are very excited about what is right around the corner. Your generosity has made a large impact, and we sincerely thank you for the above and beyond donations.

The Parks Department, as the landowner, is working tirelessly to get the project done within budget, and as soon as possible. I am sure you will be disappointed the park is not opening this fall, but the wait will be well worth it. We cannot commend the Park Department enough on their work. There are many layers of complexities in the construction, and they have met the challenges well. We are grateful for their efforts. Please read the statement they issued below for the status and opening dates.

BMA would like to address an issue that has negatively impacted an already tight construction schedule and budget. Numerous incidents of poaching (trespassing) have occurred, and the ramifications are causing delays, damage, increased costs, and stressing our relationship with the Parks Department. The trails ARE NOT READY TO RIDE, and riding them is requiring the contractors to repair them first, before they can finish them. So it is not harmless poaching, it is causing damage and delays. We cannot emphasize this enough.

Current Project Status

Approximately 50% of the bike park features have been roughed in or completed. Many additional features and elements need to be added or completed before the park can be opened.

Please Note: The bike park site is currently CLOSED to all non-construction access. Entering this site at anytime is trespassing and violators will be ticketed. Many of the park features are not complete and riders attempting to access the park risk personal

injury and damage to the trails, increasing construction delays and resulting in diverting limited funds from park features to repair damages.

Bike Park Improvements Currently Underway

constructing terrain park features
constructing restroom facilities
installing irrigation, landscaping and erosion controls
grass seed establishment
obtaining easements, engineering and constructing bridges across irrigation ditches
improving parking lots
developing trail maintenance standards and agreements
developing and installing safety and information signs

Projected Bike Park Opening: Spring 2011 (contingent upon weather)

Again, please DO NOT ENTER or attempt to ride the park until it is opened for public use. We sincerely appreciate your patience and cooperation as we enter the final months of bike park construction.
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BMA Mixer

October 17th

The next BMA MIXER will be Sunday October 17th. We will meet at the Southern Sun Brewery at 12pm. The ride will leave from the Southern Sun and head to Marshall Mesa Trail Head. After Marshall Mesa we'll head back to the Southern Sun for food and drink. If you are short on time you can meet us at the Marshall Mesa Trail Head for the ride. We should be at the Trail Head at 12:30, but it's a group ride so we could be a couple minutes late. If you can't make the ride, come meet us at the Southern Sun to plan your next one. We will be returning to the Southern Sun at approximately 3pm.

If the weather turns bad we still meet at the Southern Sun at 12pm for food and drink.

This is a fun, no drop ride. If we have some fast riders, we will make a fast group. The trails are all beginner to intermediate, no advanced or expert riding, but it's still fast and fun! All riders must have a working bike, helmet, jacket, and water.

Tuesday Ride, 10/5

2010-10-04T13:48:00.002-06:00

Meetin' up in LYons at 5:30 or the West Mag lot off the Peak to Peak at, oh, 6:30ish. Bring lights. We're going to do a tour de West Mag. Warning - if you openly admit to having been at West Mag twice or more during the last year, you will become the default ride leader :) Otherwise, if you follow me, we'll just kinda stumble around. I know only enough to be slightly dangerous.

Big Fall Ride 5 recap

2010-10-03T22:31:00.024-06:00

First, a little history. We started the Big Fall Ride several years ago. BFR was set to be the annual end of the season blowout ride/party. I'll never forget the first one. We were to meet up at the world's smallest bike shop, drive up to Peaceful Valley and engage in some epic riding. The day came and I rose early only to find temps in the 50s and constant rain. blech. Out of sense of duty only, I got my gear together and made it down to the bike shop expecting to see no one. Much to my surprise, a handful of hardcore showed up with big smiles ready to ride. Cold rain and all. Exactly my kind of people. Fortunately, the storm was entirely a low elevation event. We drove up and out of the rain to a bluebird day west of the peak to peak. We rode, cooked out, dranks some beverages and pretty much had a grand old time.

Since then, we've had one really disgustingly rainy and cold Big Fall Ride, but for the most part, we've been blessed with great weather. 3 BFRs ago, we found ourselves in a new situation with the creation of Picture Rock at Heil Ranch. I had been dreaming of a big ride that could start west of the Peak to Peak and finish up in Lyons. Big Fall Ride in its current state was born. Since BFR3, we've done some fine tuning and minor tweaks on the route, but it's pretty much stayed the same.

Enter 2010. Big Fall Ride 5. I can't say 5th Annual cause it's not. We skipped a year, 2007, I believe. 8am meetup time. Time to start getting the bikes into vehicles. Uh Oh. Main shuttle vehicle not hear yet. Better LOAD UP the truck!

Turned out to be a thing of real beauty. I love to see a vehicle utilized at maximum capacity.

After some minor delays, it turns out that meetup time really meant 8:45am and our main shuttle vehicle for the day arrived. We got everyone and all the bikes loaded and ready to rumble. Up to the Peak to Peak we went, destination Bunce School Road. Even got to do a little off roading with the shuttle vehicles before we could unload :)

And we were off. Finally pedaling around 9:45ish. And it felt great. Temps were absolutely perfect and the sky looked like something out of a Simpsons cartoon. The colors were going off as well.

Bunce School Road turned out to be a perfect warm up before hitting the technical climbing on Sourdough. Technically, Bunce is a county road, but it sure feels like a USFS jeep road. Someone told a story about witnessing a non Outback Subaru Legacy on Bunce. I would liked to have seen that one.

On thru Peaceful Valley and up Sourdough, which never dissapoints. All smiles.

But then again, there is hiking. It's a tough climb. I used to be able to clean it but it seems like a lifetime ago. I still think it's in me, at least one more time. One of these days. It's not mountain biking unless you're hiking, right?

And then, even though we're climbing, it's all smiles again. Love me some Sourdough.
Just a little bit more climbing...

Then snacktime.

I had received some last minute beta suggesting that the South St. Vrain trail would be closed for tree removal. Kip and I volunteered to scout ahead to check to see if SSV was closed or not. If it was closed, I had a good plan B worked out and wanted to save the rest of the riders the inconvenience of dropping down to SSV, then climbing back out and backtracking. Fortunately, SSV was open for bidness. And what good bidness it was.

Turns out, they had done quite a bit of deforesting but weren't working this day. And that's pretty much all I've got to say about South St. Vrain. Except for the fact that it smelled pretty darn good on account of all the fresh cut trees:)

From SSV, we connected some dirt county roads over to Gold Lake (what used to be a) Resort. I should've taken a picture. The current property owners of the Gold Lake property have put a big ass sign up right in the middle of the road saying no admittance, closed, etc. Don't worry about it. It's just another case of idiot property owners trying to exersise their own domain on public property typical of the BS you encounter around rural Boulder County. FYI, the road is closed (gated) but only to motorized. It's still completely open to non motorized pursuits. We ignored the signs, went around the gate and were on our way. It was time for lunch!

Onward we pressed with Jamestown as our next destination. Some good descending was in store.

I was starting to get a little tired by this point and we still had about 15 miles to go. A little road time first...

Followed by a tiny little scramble up a rock or two...

And it was time for a little more singletrack.

And it was good.

Then a little more time on the road. Despite the fact that it was on the road, at the very least, it was A)downhill, B)fast, C)scenic and well... I guess that pretty much sums up good road riding, right? Only a couple of miles and it was time for our last obstacle, one last park. Heil Ranch. Only about 13 miles to the bike shop! I've said it before. Normally, the climb up Wapiti at Heil is not a biggie, but when you've alreay got several hours, several thousand feet of climbing, and a crapload of miles behind you, it's tough. And it starts with a mile+ on a slightly deceivingly gravel uphill. Before you get to the climb.

Awesome.
But Heil is close. Good singletrack and good views.

And everytime I get to this point

I think, "ahhh, home." I rode on ahead to get the grill setup so the rest of the riders could have some food with their frosty beverages when they were done riding. But some riders were still out and relishing in a day well spent on the bike.

I believe "spent" is entirely a good word.

Big Fall Ride 5 is in the books. What's next? I don't know... Right now, I'm tired, have had too many beers and want to go to bed. All I know is that this was a long post and I think I killed about 50 flies in the bike shop during the time I took to write this. Oh, riding? don't know... Stay tuned!

Extra huge, big, major special thanks to Oskar Blues restaurant and brewery for providing beer and shuttle service. Da' Blues Bus never dissapoints and neither does the beer! You guys are awesome!!!!!

Gotta get back on the horse that threw you

2010-10-01T14:24:00.004-06:00

This morning I made it out to Hall Ranch. I didn't have much time so the plan was to take the Tomac on a shakedown ride before Big Fall Ride this Sunday. Kids to school, down to the bike shop and I find a broken spoke on the rear of the Tomac. I had about an hour so I was going to take the full squisher up Antelope, down the rock garden, and back thru town.

With the broken spoke, though, I was relegated to the SS. My normal SS ride is out and back on Picture Rock, but I wanted to hit Hall since we'll wrap up our Big Fall Ride on PR. Truth be told, I kinda didn't want to take the SS up and over Hall since, last time I did, I burped my front tire and ended up ass over teakettle in the rocks. It left me hurtin' for days. Well, when the syrens of the rock garden call, you've got to answer.

I pushed the gear up Antelope and topped out. I lowered my saddle a couple inches, took a breather, and headed down. This time a bit more carefully than last time. Admittedly, a little slower and more in tune with the rigid GT. I made it down in one piece - a clean run without touching the ground. All good. Sigh of relief?

Oh, and speaking of sigh of relief, the "redstone" section of the lower rock garden by the parking lot is in fine condition. The dirt is hard packed and you can hit the corners hard. Much, much better than the old off camber gravel version.

BFR5 10/3!

2010-10-01T10:49:00.002-06:00

Don't forget, Big Fall Ride Five is this Sunday at 8am. We'll shuttle riders up to the Peak to Peak and make everyone ride back to Lyons from there. The grill will be waiting with brats and the cooler with beer! See you there!

Big Fall Ride 5, Tuesday Ride, I raced for 8, etc

2010-09-26T23:43:00.003-06:00

Going backwards in time here, we rode our annual-ish Rocky Mountain National Park ride. It was awesome. Full moon, perfect temps and zero need for lights on the entire ride. Up Fall River Road, and up and over Trail Ridge was all done in the dark. Very excellent. I even broke out the Bridgestone XO-1 for the occasion :)

I was a bike racer again last weekend at the most excellent Stone Temple 8 at Curt Gowdy State Park. ST8 is an 8 hour endurance race. I ended up racing solo and finishing 9th out of 18. I made 7 laps on a pretty technical (for a racecourse) course. Had a couple of mechanicals and I found myself on the ground a couple times, too. All in all, not too shabby for this fat out of shape non bike racer bike shop owning dad. Least I thought so.
So for future events, this Tuesday we're riding Coulsons. We're going close so we can go to the Redstone Tuesday Ride Grand Opening of Chubway in Lyons! Normally, Chubway will close around 8 or so, but I've got them convinced to stay open for us. Beer, BBQ and Burritos, here we come!

Oh, lastly, keep this Sunday 10/3 open. Wide Open. Big Fall Ride #5 is coming up! 8am at the bike shop. We'll be back around 6 or 7 to grill, drink beer, and pretty much have a good time. Yeehaaaaw!

Gettin High, Goin Big and Takin it Back to the Beginning

2010-09-20T21:14:00.024-06:00

"He was born in the summer of his 27th year
Comin' home to a place he'd never been before
He left yesterday behind him, you might say he was born again
You might say he found a key for every door"

Or at least that's how the late great John Denver puts it. For me, it was 22. Back in '95, my good friend Bryan and I road tripped (with bikes, of course) from Nebraska to Boulder over Labor Day Weekend. Bryan had lived in CO that summer so he knew his way around the Front Range relatively ok. One of the goals for that long weekend was to hit up a ride that Bryan had described as legendary, or something to that effect. It was Jenny Creek to Rollins Pass and back from Eldora. I was on my Tange Ultimate tubed, Judy SL forked ParkPre at the time and Jenny Creek was about as gnarly a trail as I had ever witnessed. Technically, JC is not a trail but a Jeep Road, but it's still something to be respected. I came away from that ride in love. In love with Colorado. And in love of a strange new way of riding. Hiking up boulder fields and root gardens to get the great view at the top. And then to bomb back down in the saddle. Ahh, memories.

I think it's safe to say that without that ride, without Jenny Creek, and without Rollins Pass, I may not have made it to Colorado. Definitely a game changer. How did John Denver put it? Oh yeah, "Comin' home to a place he'd never been before, He left yesterday behind him, you might say he was born again." That pretty much sums it up.

Over the past 15 years (has it seriously been that long?) I've managed to make the pilgrimage up to Jenny Creek every few of years. We've done it quite a few different ways, even starting in Nederland. Bummer about that one, as starting in Ned involves a poach on private property now (well, technically it always did, but we didn't know, and now the landowners cares). Unfortunately, I think the last time I was up to Rollins Pass was probably about 5 years ago.

I started getting the itch a few weeks ago. When I get the itch, I start pouring over maps, even though I know the route. It gets me hyped up, almost to the point where I can't get it out of my head. I know, I know, I'm and addict. Admitting is half the battle, right? :)

My time came today. It was a rare occurance where all the moons aligned for me. Kid's in school and at playdates til 3, then time for Z's dance class. I can do all that and still be home by 3, right?

The ride starts right at the gate of Eldora Ski resort. Why they don't build some trails for bikes to ride in the summer is completely beyond me. They could have some great riding there, even lift accessed. But I'm not going to rant on that too much today.

After a short grunt of a climb, a nice and beautifully rocky singletrack leads from Eldora Resort over into the Jenny Creek drainage.

After not too long on Jenny Creek, a spur trail goes up the Guinn Mountain Hut. I've actually not ever been up that one so, always having a mind for adventure, I decided to climb it.

The sign did not lie. I had to hike about 1/2 of the trail. But it was great. I finally made it to the hut. A quick trip thru a meadow and I dumped out on the pipeline trail. It's not really an official trail, but it follows the gas pipeline from Eldora up to the divide. It's narrow and wonderful and super steep. Not technical, just steep. Almost to the top...

And then views! Yankee Doodle Lake below. The tallest peak in the background is James Peak.

And the Needle's Eye Tunnel that collapsed in the 80s. Rollins Pass was, at one time, intended to get a little bit more traffic than it did.

From there, it was a major PUSH up to the twin trestles road and over to Rollins Pass. Probably not a good ride for folks that don't mind hiking thru scree filled old and closed jeep roads. Probably not a good ride for folks having issue with vertigo or heights, either. Or rickety old structures that creak eerily when you ride across them.

And FINALLY to Rollins Pass. After all these years, this area kinda feels like home to me.

I actually made it to Rollins Pass ahead of schedule, which meant I had time for more riding! The thought had crossed my mind earlier in the week, but I honestly didn't think I'd have time to do it. Rodgers Pass. The start of the Rodgers Pass trail was only a few miles down the road and I had never done it, even though it had been on my list for at least the last 10 years. There's no time like the present so it was down the road and past Mount Epworth and Deadman Lake. Outstanding views towards Winter Park, too.

Rodgers Pass Trail starts on the East side of Riflesight Notch. This is one trestle that is anything but safe these days.

Once on the Rodgers Pass trail and up out of the trees, the view towards Rodgers Pass was heartbreakingly cruel and discouraging. Nothing but a looooong, windblown and rocky switchbacked climb up the side of the mountain. I entertained thoughts of turning around. The one thing that kept me going, though, was that it had taken me over 10 years to get to this point and it would likely be another 10 before I made it again. Up! The final stretch to Rodgers Pass. That's James Peak again, too. Closer now.

And finally Pass Number Two of the day - Rodgers Pass, 11,860'.

Big Big views. Heart Lake.

And James Peak was looking pretty damn big at this point.

By now, of course, I was under the impression that I was running late, so I forewent my beer and lunch and made onward progress back down the mountain. And back down the Rodgers Pass Trail to Corona Road.

And back on Rollins Pass Road heading towards the trestles. It was easier to make time going down than up and I was quickly back on schedule.

A quick stop for that Dale's Pale Ale, then back down the pipeline.

This time, after rolling by the Guinn Cabin, I opted for the "other" Guinn trail back to Jenny Creek Rd. This trail went the less direct way and would allow me just a bit more enjoyment of Jenny Creek Road. It was all too short. A quick climb out of the Jenny Creek drainage (which felt way steeper on the climb out)

and I was back to the resort. Goodby Eldora,

and thanks again. My urge for the pilgrimage had once again been satisfied. I felt fulfilled like I had not been in a long time.

Oh, I made it home by 3, too. Everyone was happy with that one.

Tuesday RMNP Cross Ride

2010-09-19T19:02:00.002-06:00

The forecast for Tues looks great! So far, the plan for RMNP ride is a GO!

Meet up at the shop at 5:30p to caravan. We'll drive up to Estes and park at the start of Fall River Rd. We'll ride up Fall River Rd and back over and down on Trail Ridge. Most of this ride will happen in the dark.

You will need:

Change if clothes ( think cold descent, really cold )

Food

Front light - a real bike light. At the speeds you'll hit on the descent, a camp light or commuter light will not cut it.

Blinky

Cross bike