Dave, Joe & Jay hit the trails in Auburn last night. We started with the Clementine/Culvert/Confluence loop. Rode the entire climb in my middle ring - sweet! I think Joe did to as he was just hammering up the climb. We were hoping to finish the first loop in time to go back up and hit Tinker, but 2 flats for me put a damper on that. Luckily the second flat was almost at the bottom of the Confluence trail so I only had to walk a bit. It's time to retire my IRC Mythos XC rear tire. The threads are showing through on the sidewall and I had rock to rim contact twice last night. They weren't snake bites but nice fat holes in the tubes. So I'll be throwing on my Tioga Factory DH 2.1 rear tire tonight. Saturday morning we're heading up to Salmon Falls to tame the Mickey Mouse trail!

Saddles, I'm with Jay, I like the WTB's. I rode Selle Italia Flite's for 6 years and refused anything else, then I found the WTB SST.98. I didn't like their other SST saddles, but this one I did. I haven't tried the new Laser series like Jay has, but have heard good things. Saddles are super personal, so who knows. Just get what feels good :)

As for discs, I take it you want a cable based disc? Check out the Avids, I hear they're the best cable discs. SRAM could be ok, but hasn't been out as long. I'm personally a big Hayes fan. But, if you have integrated shifters/brake levers, then you probably want to go cable so you don't have to buy a new lever and shifter pod, etc. Anyway, Avid.

Cube Life Sucks!

I can't stand sitting in this god damn cube all day. All I want to do is go out and ride. But so is the saga. I guess we have to work so we can afford the little toys that bring us so much enjoyment. Still, humans were not meant to sit in cubes all day long. Down with the Cube Farms! I think we should work Saturdays & Sundays, then have Monday thru Fridays off. When I am elected king, I will make it so.

I'm not sure about the Sella Italia saddles, never tried one. But I can say that I absolutely love my WTB Laser V Stealth. My bike came with an SDG Satellite or something like that and after 1 ride it was replaced with the WTB.

Need Disc and Saddle Input

I'm in need of some advice and would like to solicit you guys who do read this wee little blog.
I've got a QPB catalog right now and am looking to do some upgrading. So far I've got my eyes on an SRAM 7.0 front disc brake and Sella Flite TT saddle.
I'm already pretty well sold on an XTR replacement crankset for my shite LX crap. But I'm more than willing to listen to arguments to other contraries.

Looks like tomorrow will be one of my last chances to go out riding for a while. Depending, I might ride in and take off early and go up and run Dela before buzzing back home. I've been missing my trail and I'm quite curious about these new tires up there. Then I'm on the east coast for a little while. We'll see how Ocean City is this year.

Thanks to Chris over at Headangle for the tip on the AXO Descend Gloves on sale at Pricepoint for $15.98. Just in time as I'm needing a new pair.

Phat Cycles

Check these out! I especially like the Recumbent Choppers.....

Mini Bike Heaven

Yeeha. Not only did I win the little toy bike, I got it for $6 less than I was willing to pay. $35 shipped and its already on the way! And yep, I will be posting pics of this toy. Why the heck not?
Right now I'm off to the bike shop to pick up a bike box and get my Mongoose packed and sent out.
Doesn't look like I'll have time to get a ride in today but I shall make an effort to get out and tear it up on my sweet new tires.

My God, I'm such a wanker. I actually want one of these mini bikes and am going to get one. $40 to have a tiny bike to tool around on? Why the heck not? And if I can get a basket for it, I'll go to the store on it! Might have to get a bigger sprocket though.

Yay - the "mini_chris" picture is back! My stupid ISP got a virus on their ftp/web server and this file got deleted somehow. Oh well, it's back now for us all to enjoy!

Nothing to crazy, just a pic from earlier this evening of me doing some endos and wheelies out in front of the house on My Blue. Good fun and notice that sweeeeeet new front tire! Thanks Cambria Bike!

A quest for new pedals....

Up at Northstar I've noticed me feet slipping all around on my Shimano DX platform pedals. The pegs on these are minimal and just don't provide enough traction. I really like riding the flats for DH. I can jump off or dab my feet down alot faster than being clipped in. So last night I was trying to get the pins out of the pedals to see how easy it would be to replace them with longer ones. They are basically 1.5mm set screws. Which is kinda lame because about 5 on each side of each pedal are just mashed from tagging rocks. So it doesn't look like it's going to be an easy task to replace these little suckas. I'm going to head over to Home Depot and see how much longer ones cost. It may not even be worth trying to replace them. If that doesn't work out I'll probably just pick up a set of the Sun/Ringle Zu Zu pedals. I think they are on sale at Jenson & Pricepoint for $28

The Godfather unveils the "Double Fritz" - Back-to-back backflips.

This is just a sick ass run, you've gotta see this video!

Click here for the highlights page. Then click on the "Mike Metzger Flips To Gold" clip.

Sweet pics, Jay, looks like you guys had a good day on the rocks. Not sure if I could hang with that, no armor and a hard tail make for good speed but not a whole lot of big dropoff fun. Or at least not much after the first one! Then a well taco-ed wheel and that would be that. But...that doesn't mean I didn't get out and tear it up myself today. No pics as I was solo but some damned good fun.

Mr. E's Wild(er Ranch) Ride

I'd been hoping that Duggan might come home at some point to join me on a moto but such was not the case. I watched some baseball this afternoon and then realized that I had a couple of hours to kill before the Giants came on (pretty much my reason for being after the Aptos Little League team got smeared by some rednecks from Kentucky this morning, did you see the size of their picther? he was an two inches shorter than me and outweighed me by at least ten pounds at the age of 12!). That and I needed to buzz to the bike store anyway to pick up a patch kit that's glue hadn't evaporated yet. The Bicycle Trip had a good deal on a patch kit ($2 including tax) and I snagged some of their cool new red stickers.
And tried to not engage a couple of knobs in the shop, one on an incredibly expensive Santa Cruz Bullit and the other on some funked out BMX. Both bikes far too new and clean.

So onward I rolled, still not quite sure where My Blue was taking me. Once we got to the top of the hill leading down into town, I knew and it was cool by me so we buzzed through town and headed up Highway 9 a ways. There's a nice little insertion just before the start of the fun curves on 9 (fun on Therapy but less enjoyable on My Blue) so I humped it up the hill and cruised along the railroad tracks to the trestle. Strange side note, there was somebody's full pack back next to the tracks, it looked nasty so I didn't touch, envisioning something from Stand By Me or worse.
The vertigo-esque carry across the tracks behind me I buzzed up to the real start of the trail in the Pogonip, which is trying to close down even UConn. Good old Uconn, the University Connector trail, the only sanctioned route through the Pogonip (don't want to squish any mating tiger beetles or whatever the hell humps there and keeps the bikers out, mostly, hehehe). UConn's not a whole bunch of fun to climb and it gets less fun when your (well my) granny gear's not available because my front derailleur sucks donkey c*ck. And yes, its on the list to be replaced.
While the climb was shorter (you DH'ers do remember climbing, don't you?) it tired me out pretty badly as I'm out of shape these days or maybe it was just a tired kind of day like you boys had up north.
No matter, I climbed and climbed until I was beat, stopped for a minute or two and then kept going. Got passed once but who cares? I wasn't out to race anyone, just enjoy myself and go at whatever pace my legs felt like going.
I should have gone right where I went left and ended up hitting the water tanks from a different direction, I think it was Red Hill Trail or something like that. And for the first time, there was not a single person at the tanks, one hiker coming down from the left trail but that was it. I'd considered stopping and powering up with some go-gel (was packing a lovely caffienated strawberry-banana power gel) but instead just kept on up and up and up.
A few more miscues and I crossed over Empire Grade Rd. and dropped into the top end of Wilder Ranch, officially Grey Whale State Park or something like that. I'd been on Chinquapin for a bit and tried to stay on it until I entered the real Wilder Ranch where I could head back into town and take some of the super high speed wide track or head right and further out into the park. Wilder Ridge Trail it was, the mileage was higher anyway and I was starting to feel pretty good, if thoroughly sweated through but my big old hydro pack was holding up well.
(Okay, back again with a yummy Skyy and Odwalla Fresh OJ!, gotta get those carbs back, right?)
Had some fun running the wide trails for a while, passing people on downhills like they were standing still. I have mentioned before that the Ibis is a very, very fast bike even with those big 2.1's on. At one point on a downhill I glanced at the 'puter and saw I was topping out at just about 30 miles per which is damned quick on the washboard crap that was out there. I could used some full suspension at that point as cornering at those speeds on chatter box ripples is sketchy at best and I nearly stacked it up but good several times. So yeah, I was cooking it up pretty good for a while and pretty thankful I'd taken a few extra potassium supplements to try and stave off the calf cramps.
Now, one problem with Wilder is if you're not careful, you can end up above the city landfill which is a very nasty stinky place. So as I neared where I knew not to go I started looking for ways to double back. There was a nice little single track (it looked nice at least) which I took and soon learned that this was more of a gopher revenge track than anything else, it was so damned choppy. But I buzzed it anyway and caught up to a group of riders who were putt-putting through the fields. After watching a cutie's nice ass bob along in front of me for a half mile or so she pulled up, flashed a smile and let me skate through, just as the rest of the group had pulled over to wait for her. A fun descent through some slippery sand and I was off and buzzing again, rejuvenated by her bum as much as the slow pace.
I got to the top of the final descent and bombed it, not wanting to take my eyes off the trail I have no idea how fast I was going but it was pretty quick. Around one corner I put on the power slide and launched a huge rooster tail as I passed some climbers, I'll never know if they were pissed or not as I was gone.
There's a walking part at the bottom of Wilder which I always obey as its a farm. Today was a very good idea because they were having a memorial service just inside the grounds. There's a decent climb but nothing serious and I was on my way home.
Nothing too adventurous but I did take the opportunity to "educate" some morons who were riding on the wrong side of the bike path.
All in all, twenty some miles, almost an hour and 45 minutes of constant motion and a tired grin on my face as I rolled back home. I'll have to put in some tuning work on My Blue tomorrow but it was well worth to tear it up.

Well the link got all screwed up so here it goes again. Northstar Pictures

Northstar Pictures!

Well, you asked for them, so here they are. Jay & Chris hit Northstar today. We hooked up with Ryan from pleasanton. Very cool guy and a good rider too! We were all just friggin tired from the get go today. Not sure if it was the nasty air or just one of those tired days. I was all over the place, rolled off into the manzanita bushes, also stacked off the teeter totter. Chris took a fairly nasty tumble over the bars, it was a slow motion wreck that you could just see what was happening - he's all good though. He is definitely getting his money out of that Dianese armour! So at about 2PM we were done! I decided to ride down a huge set of steps just for grins! Enjoy.

Friday, August 16, 2002

-24-Hours of Tahoe Mountain Bike Race-

For the past four years, Northstar-at-Tahoe has been hosting this incredible test of endurance for mountain bike riders. Individuals and teams will be awake all night for this hard-core adventure race that highlights teamwork, sportsmanship and most of all, fun. This year's 24-Hours of Tahoe race will be August 24th-25th.

For those of you who are not familiar with this race, let me explain. The race begins at noon, with riders beginning to tackle the grueling terrain of Northstar's mountain. The goal is to complete as many lapsin 24 hours. Last year's solo winner, Rishi Grewal, put in a whopping14 laps on his way to victory.

Registration for this event can be done at www.grannygear.com until August23rd. Want to volunteer? There are four different shifts you can work. All volunteers receive a cool race T-shirt, meal ticket and commemorative coffee cup. To volunteer, just call (530) 562-3830 and pick a shift.

Join us at Northstar this Saturday!!!

We (Jay & Chris) are heading up to Northstar this Saturday 8/17/02. We plan on getting there early so join us if you can. It will be a blast as usual.

Chris - are these the Intense DH Tire Levers you are referring to?

And the Cambria Bike Outfitters odyssey continues. Mounted the cool new Panaracer XC Fires last night, back tire was no problem. Well, not no problem but it went on without serious incident. The front tire to remove was an incredible bitch to pop off, wire beads on a Sun Rim QLite are insanely tight. Lots of fun to pop that bastard.

But I got it off and then spent twenty minutes getting the Fire on, another ridiculous pain in the ass but it worked out and I started to pump the tire up. I noticed that part of the sidewall was coming up over the lip of the rim. Deflate, resettle and try pumping again. Same thing. Deflate, try again. Same thing. So I deflated the tire the whole way and inspected it. The stinking side wall was sliced clean through and that's why it kept coming up and over the side. So basically a half hour of tire removal and installation was wasted and I had to do the hassle the other way to get my old Ritchey Zed 2.1 on. Now my bike looks a little strange with the high profile Fire in the back with its brand new nubbies sticking out all over the place, the slim red line of the anti-snake bike side walls under the blue stripe and the Ritchey up front.

Just got off the phone with Cambria Bike and they have a new one on the way, charging my card right now and will refund my cash for the other tire when they get it back. Upside is that I'll have a brand new tire tomorrow, downside is that I'll have to repeat my swearing session of last night. And then I'll have a fresh set of sneaks for my bike which'll be good because I'm planning on some riding this weekend.

Hey Jay, want to come down and explore the Lexington Reservoir? Or the Demo Forest? Or Wilder? Might try to get a little ride thing going on now that the hump day is behind us. And what a day it was! Up at 4 yesterday morning, raced up to the city on Therapy (my SV650S), got a stupid parking ticket, dealt with LinuxWorld geeks and then another good high speed run punctuated by bouts of heavy traffic (remember SF traffic, Jay?). And 17 was a virtual parking lot for the first couple of miles, luckily I had no requirement to sit and fester, I split lanes and made it fun. When someone was being a jerk, I'd get around them anyway and then waggle my bike and ass at them as I sped away! Hehehe.

Erik, it would be somewhat of a biggie for me to service a SID fork. But that's only because I try not to get sh*t on my hands ;) Actually I'd guess it's not bad. I've done my share on Marzocchi's, and futzed with old Rock Shox Mag 20 and 21 series and Judy's, but that's the last time I've used an RS fork.

I don't think I'll be doing any riding after work this week. The air quality up here is just sickening right now....

Came across this site, MTB.LIVE.COM - "The Internet's Mountain Bike Park" during my evening surf. Looks to have some cool links and trails for us NorCaler's along with, well, everywhere else.

Might just become a perma-link on the site. They really do have a tremendous amount of content to wafe through.

And one note about Cambria Bike Outfitters. Don't pay the extra few bucks for 3 day shipping. UPS ground is actually faster than Fed Ex for those of us living within 3 hours of the place. Stupid of me because I'm still waiting for my new tires and pump. Sucks because I've got to be in SF for the next couple of days and won't get any riding in, LinuxWorld here I come.

That and I need to service my SID front shock as I've put a bunch of miles on it since its been dealt with. Ought to be interesting and fun as I've never done it before. I'm sure its no biggie for someone like Chris at HeadAngle but I'll likely have to enlist either Duggan or Stella. Oh wait, I should intro Stella because she's certainly one of the biggest bike geeks I've ever met. She can recite tensile strengths of carbon fiber tubes from memory. She's a sales rep at Calfee Design and is an old school roadie racer. She's proof that biking is a healthy lifestyle because she's in incredible condition and can run circles around most other riders I know. Shame she never did get into the off road scene.

This is off subject but I've got to post it anyway. I was at PacBell on Friday night to bear witness to Barry Bonds' 600th career Home Run! It was an incredibly amazing night with the only detraction being that they didn't win. I've posted pics and some more about the game on my other blog, Intellectual Poison.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled NorCal Biker blog.

Rip Blogger Pro

Hey everyone. Things may get a little bit bumpy here for a while. I'm in the process of getting my cash back from Blogger. The system is just not working well enough to pay for. The blog should stay active as there is a free version of Blogger (which, strangely, never gave me any problems whatsoever) but I will be making a move to another web log company in the next couple of weeks. Likely Moveable Type unless someone here feels strongly about another place to go to.

I've tried working with Blogger but they're either understaffed, too busy or just don't care. Whatever the reason, the code they use to run the site is loaded with holes and traps and other garbage (thanks for the code validation site, Jay). Its just not worth the hassle anymore. On the upside, I've learned some basic coding skills now and have a teeny grasp of what it entails. But that's because they're customer support is all but non-existent.

With some luck, the web log shouldn't experience much change during the interim. And eventually I'll have the log set up in a better place.
Thanks for your patience, input and interest.

Hi All!!! I did in fact have a narley tumble this morning. A few scratches on the legs and a nice raspberry on the ____, well, you know where. A former coworker and I drove to Saratoga gap this morning and had a great 2 hour bike ride (I am trying to convince him to join NorCal Bikers, he's a very good rider). I'll start with the negatives of the ride... we woke up at 5:20, enough said. Now to the good parts. Right after my fresh tumble, I caught up to my buddy and he said a Mountain Lion just crossed the trail. So we waited a minute and then took off riding. This portion of the ride was downhill on single track so we had some good speed. Apparently the lion was looking at us only 10 feet from the trail and I totally missed it! Oh well.

The rest of the ride was excellent, mostly single track and the uphill portion was a good work out. This ride is definitely my favorite of the few I have been on (still new to this sport). As a recommendation, don't hit this trail on the weekend, too many walkers and riders, very congested. If you are gonna hit this trail, it's definitely worth riding early in the morning on a weekday. There are plenty of trails to ride on, the views are spectacular, and it's a bunch of fun. Hope to be riding and writing more soon.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Nice mini-Chris pic! I like the added touch! I talked to some of my pals in the neighborhood last night about getting some pics of their bikes so I can post them. And I know where I want to take some pics up on Dela. There's a cool rock waterfall that people can dyno off of but the best part is that I can get down low for some crazy angles.

And welcome Brian to NorCal Bikers, he had his first good get off this morning and is good and scrapped up from it. Not I though, I stayed in bed as absolutely as long as possible. Silly rabbit, Thursdays aren't for bars.

Side note, I went and picked up a pair of the Panaracer Fire XC Pros from Cambria from Jay's last post. The shipping difference between UPS ground and 3 day was $2 so I should have them either tomorrow or Monday. That and a new pump because its just plain stupid to not head out without gear to repair flats.

And totally off subject, if Barry hits number 600 tonight then there will be a fresh pic of it tomorrow. My old boss called me and asked if I wanted to go to the ball game tonight. Club Level, here I come! Heck, I'll be snapping pics anyway but I hope it happens tonight, that would utterly and completely rock!

Steals & Deals

Cambria has the Panaracer Fire XC Pro 2.1 tires on sale for $14 each! What a steal.

http://www.cambriabike.com/SALE/tires_tubes/index.htm

Also Pricepoint has them for $19 each:

http://pricepoint.com/product221.html

or $34 for 2 (red only):

http://pricepoint.com/product721.html

Another Run from the Top of the World

Brian and I blazed out of the office at 5 yesterday and headed up to take a quick run up to the Top of the World at the disc golf course at Delaveaga. Its not a long trail by any means and on any given day can be run up and back in under an hour. But it is some of the most easily accesible great single track I know of in the county. Sure, the Demo Forest has great trails but its a crazy pain in the butt to get there. This is a short two mile ride from work to the trail head, then a couple miles of climbing up the trail, one place where you've got to portage the bike up a rock waterfall (which should be a great photo op one of these days). A few tough technical climbs up rock faces and then you come out to the best view of the Monterey Bay I know of (some of the views from campus are almost as good but the constant patchouli detract a few points). Brian's getting better with every ride, his enthusiasm for the sport makes him a great riding partner and his stamina is coming up too.

We watched some guys toss discs down to the final hole of the disc golf course, saw one guy land his disc about 25 feet from the hole. Which was the best shot I've ever seen from there. And I can't even explain how tough a shot this is. Maybe I'll bring along the camera one of these days so show it off some. Its crazy how far the hole is.

After they headed down, we turned around and started the descent which is always a ton of fun. Its fast, chattery in sections, rocky in others, rooted out in others. Its easy to get launched off the side of the trail if you're not careful. There are some great jumps built into the trail for dyno-ing, nearly ate it into a tree but recovered in a huge cloud of dust and then boogeyed on. The silica tire gets great hook up but is wearing out very quickly, maybe five or ten more rides and its done. I'll have to start looking for a new set of tires soon (put on my slicks this morning to burn down to work, no reason to waste the tires on the bike path).

Right before one of the smaller jumps which is more of a table top, my chain popped off so I had to stop and deal with that for five seconds or so. No biggie but I do want to get a new front derailleur (I can never remember how to spell that correctly, or it doesn't look right when I do) as I do sometimes get screwed when I need it the most. At the road split in the bottom, we veered off the trail again for the mini star wars section, its fast, through the trees and has rolling little hills to blast through right before the final, damned near impossible climb. Its rooted out, covered in loose dirt and sand and steep. I've never made it to the top but I still try everytime. From there its a pretty mellow cruise back into town, to the office and then home along the bike path.

Ah, Dela, you never do me wrong! Just be careful when its wet up there, the roots get crazy slick!

Wednesday night ride summary. Jay, Dave & Joe headed up to Salmon Falls for an after-work session. First we hit the Sweetwater trail which was new to me. Very fun, fast singletrack along Folsom Lake as it narrows down into the South Fork of the American River. Lots of off-camber fast corners where you really have to watch your front tire. There were piles of fallen oak tree leaves which just made some of the corners really loose. Oh, and there was added incentive to stay on this trail as it was just line on both side with Poison Oak. Dave led the pack on the way out and we were flying pretty fast! Then we hit the Salmon Falls aka Darrington Trail and rode it as far as we could until we headed back to avoid darkness. On the way back towards the bridge Joe was leading the pack and again we were just motoring. Saw a couple of hot (or what appeared to be hot) chicks on mountain bikes, which was an unusual site, but cool of course. So we were meandering back on the Sweetwater trail at a fairly mellow pace when all of a sudden my legs decided to kick into overdrive. For whatever reason after I made this one steep little climb my legs just kept going and going and going, kind like the energizer bunny. But seriously, I've never experienced this before. I was just in the groove or whatever you want to call it. I railed every corner hit every climb & descent just perfectly. I felt like I'd ridden that trail a hundred times, yet it was only my first. I hammered it all the way back to the car for a good 20 minutes. I wasn't tired, winded or anything. Dave was tying to catch me but it wasn't happening. I didn't really mean to leave those guys back like that, but I just couldn't stop pedaling. Overall a way fun ride!

Hey, I've got a pal who wants to get a mountain bike in the $600-$1000 range, primarily for dirt riding but some road (of course, how else do you get to the trails?). He's about 5'10" and weighs 140, he's a novice to intermediate level rider. Can anyone make any good recommendations? And no, he doesn't want to buy your old bike.

Jay, Chris & Corey hit the trails in Auburn for an after-work ride last night. The weather was a beautiful 80 degrees. It's a nice change of pace to ride completely in the shade. Down in the American River Canyon that time of day is just awesome. Gotta watch out for the skeeters though. If you stop moving for too long they'll come and get ya! We rode the Manzanita/Stagecoach loop, then hit the Upper Stagecoach to Mossy Rock, then one last climb up to Tinker! I went first down Tinker so I could watch Chris ride this one section that I still haven't attempted. Nice little instructional sessioin on steep switchback with rocks & cliffs coming into play. Next time I'll give it a roll. Tonight we hit the Salmon Falls trail over in the El Dorado Hills / Folsom area. Life is good.

Well I had an interesting short commute into work today. I nearly wiped out in a pool of blood on the bike path above the San Lorenzo river. Not a huge one but enough to tell that someone somewhere is probably sore as hell and licking their wounds today. And I would have been quite peeved to go down because of it.

Also, just added Chris' two bikes from his homepage at HeadAngle so that this home page is starting to gather some momentum. And the page got way more hits yesterday than any day so far so maybe we'll start to get new folks wanting to sign in and join us.

To anyone in the Santa Cruz area, we're starting to put together a regular ride on Friday afternoons from downtown to whatever destination sounds like the most fun that day. Let me know if you're interested in saddling up and joining us one of these days.

So, I did more damage Sunday to my DH bike than I thought. I managed to rip out a spoke - pretty sweet that I didn't notice until now though! If you go to this page, I've put up a picture of my rig taken today, and shots of the spoke and bent saddle rails :) Well, I'd been thinking I should have my wheels checked, guess I gotta do it for real now. Bummer on the seat though, I really liked that one - and the real prob is the seat post, so really I should replace both.

Well it's been 3 business days now since my email to Jenson regarding my botched order and not a peep from them. This is just poor poor poor customer service. Why have a contact section of your website and an email address for Customer Service if nobody is going to respond? I guess it's going to take a phone call to wake these numb nutz up.

I'm getting seriously tired of Blogger's templates being buggered all over the place by the addition of code that has nothing to do with the screw up. I just added the Member Bikes section and now the stupid template has decided that the post headers and archive headers are going to come out all screwy. Drives me nuts dealing with the stupid Blogger tags. The code matches what they post perfectly and yet it does not work properly. Anyone with real HTML skills want to take a whack at it?

That and their response time for customer service leaves MUCH to be desired.

This stupid HTML stuff is making me want to kick puppies, its soooo frustrating. And nope, no response from Blogger yet, two days and counting. It looks like bad customer service is the theme of the day.

Continuing the old skewl fotos... Also, I haven't seen the article in the mag about XTR that Jay mentioned, but one of the absolutely sweetest things I've seen for the new XTR group is the totally new crankset. It's similar in design to a BMX crankset, but what really gets me going is that it's now compact! I used to religiously ride XTR everything. But, when I got my new bike, I knew it was going to be heavier and more slack angled, etc., so I decided to go compact for a little extra help. I'm hooked on compact now, but I still don't think anyone makes a crankset as good as XTR. In hindsight, I'd have skipped the overpriced (IMHO) Race Face cranks, and just gotten XT's to satisfy my compact needs. But next year I should be able to hawk my Next LP (the alu-carbon ones) Race Face cranks and get some new XTR's. Sweetness.

As for the discs, they've done some neat things (such as the hoses, and the screw on discs/rotors are interesting, although I'd have loved to see XTR hubs with six-bolt compatibility - best hubs for the price). But, the discs are definitely XTR XC racing oriented. Light, not the strongest, etc. I can't imagine they'd sway me from Hayes. Hope couldn't, and those are about as chi-chi (sp?) as you can get. But still, it's about time, and good to see they've done more than just a small incremental change.

Saw a cool old classic Proflex F/S bike yesterday downtown, the pic didn't come out as well as I'd thought but its still kind of cool to check it out.

In other news, the Friday rides have gotten another recruit. One of the folks who works upstairs in my building has signed on to join us for our where ever we roll jaunts. It'll take some time to get everyone to approximately the same fitness level but who cares, its all for fun.

And welcome to the new folks! Hey Jay, what's taking Corey so long?

Shimano Unveils an All-New 2003 XTR Group

Just got my latest issue of Mountain Bike Magazine and read the writeup on the new XTR group.

Two things which caught my attention:

1) Shifting is now performed by an integrated one-piece brake lever/shifter pod by moving the brake levers up (with the back of your fingers) to get easier gears, and pushing down to get harder gears. Note: there are optional bolt on levers so you can continue to use thumb shifters. This just seems strange to me. I'd certainly have to try this before buying. The reviewer reports no unwanted shifts during braking.

2) The new rear derailleur is RapidRise (the spring naturally pulls the derailleur to the lowest gear) and RapidRise ONLY! - Chris will like this for sure! and I could get used to it after a few rides.

Everything is lighter of course, a few grams here and there. They also have new XTR disc brakes. Shimano claims only 50 grams more than V-brakes with levers & cables. They seem to be geared for XC use, only single piston not as powerful as XT or Hayes. The coolest feature is that the brake lines are an easy to cut resin hose, unlike the pre-sized braided steel lines on my XTs.

For more info check out page 50 in the September 2002 issue of Mountain Bike.

Holy Smoke Batman - check this out! Guys are now doing backflips on their motos! Go here for all the details & pictures!!

This past Friday was the first Evans Data ride, nothing serious, just a short one to see where people's skills were at. The players were Brian, Hardy and myself and we just buzzed up to Delaveage, went up the trail and then right back down. Fitness levels and bike preparedness varied widely. I told Hardy he was going to flat out because his tires were just shot, the rubber was coming apart really. And yep, he lost it about three quarters of the way back down and had to walk it out. I rarely carry a pump as I normally am riding close enough to home that its not that big a deal to walk out.
So while Hardy walked down, Brian and I tore it up, buzzed back to the office and parted ways. He headed back over the hill and I headed back up to Dela to pick Hardy up in his truck.

Brian's riding a brand new Fisher Big Sur right now as his old Cannondale broke the drop out on the front fork and 1" head tubes are a death sentence for most bikes nowadays. Its a nice little bike with discs and all kinds of other Fisher goodness. I like it but still wouldn't think of trading away My Blue. She's just perfect, especially for bombing singletrack.

But no more riding this weekend, got sidetracked by fun stuff. Its on the other blog, Intellectual Poison because there was very little two wheeling involved.

I hit Northstar solo yesterday. Of course I pretty much found guys to ride with the whole time, which was good since I wrecked hard twice :( I'm banged and bruised this morning. Still lots of fun. I did find out that a 2.7 Intense front tire sucked. It was actually too big! It just swam all over. So, I'm going back to 2.5 Maxxis. Also, for your viewing (laughing?) pleasure, I've put the next retro-revival picture up. This time it's a shot of me racing the Big Bear National in 1991, long live neon!

Good ride up in Auburn this morning. There was supposed to be 4 of us, but some folks (Corey & Dave) decided to drink a bit much Friday night! So Joe & I hit the trails at 8:45AM. First we did the Clementine/Culvert/Confluence loop. We were jammin up the climb pretty well, when 2 guys just blew past us. To make us feel even better, one of them was sporting a single speed... doh! Oh well, let them climb fast. They seem to be into that anyway. I ride up hills only to get to the downhills! It was Joe's first time on these trails and he seemed to be having a blast. Next we did the Stagecoach/Mossy Rock trail. Again, some dude on a single speed just roasted us about halfway up the climb. It seemed to be the day of single speeds. I think we saw a total of 3 out there in a matter of 2 hours. Nuts. Anyways we were ripping down the last fireroad back to the car just before the Foresthill Bridge and Joe got a flat. No biggie, he's got plenty of experience changing tubes so we were rolling again within minutes!

Quick update, fotolog pretty well sucks. It was easy to sign up and get going but it completely refuses to let me upload pics. So fotolog bad. And the search continues.

I am totally in love with this site, Stor.Co.UK, right now. It's just fun to make little weeble wobbles in any config possible. The site to make them is listed on the side of the gif but here it is in case you've got a sore neck or something.

And yet you ask what the two wheel content is? Hmm, I'll have to ponder on that one. But for now it's just for the S&G.

Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I know what the 2 wheel is here.
I was at a party last night and ended up talking to one of my housemate's good friends, Mingo, who also happens to be an Ibis aficionado like myself and Duggan and several others. I asked him for a chance sometime to snap some pics of his numerous Ibis'. So sometime in the next few weeks I'm going to get a bunch of very, very sweet high end bikes to load up here. And I'm test driving fotolog as an alternate to .Mac (iTools) to see if its easier to drop links into the blog. We'll see.

But one other thing from last night. Mingo, mentioned that he's got a timeline for Ibis that I am hopeful he'll allow me to copy and post up here. For those of you who don't know Ibis, check this spot out First Flight Bicycles. They have a superb timeline for Ibis manfacturing up to 2000. If you lika bika lika I lika bika then you should get a kick out of it.

Between seeing this old picture on my wife's bulletin board, and reading about Erik's classic hardtail, I had to scan that pic in and share. I scanned about a half dozen other lovely shots from my racing days from '91 to '95. Neon lycra coming soon...

Well, I suppose, since Chris and Jay have gone into some detail about their bikes and setups (which is cool, I love finding out what's working for other riders). I should talk up my I(bis) some. Don't want her to feel left out of the tail sniffing, as it were.
Much of My Blue is the same as when I got her about 4 months ago but she came pretty well equiped although the crank set is nowhere near up to snuff.
The frame was hand built in Sebastopol (Sonoma County, California) and is made of Ibis' Moron tubing (More on the the ends, get it?). Yep, its steel and it handles better than any other bike I've ever had save my last Ibis (an Avion SS from waaaay back, I'll get a pic scanned).
Stem is Ibis low rise aheadset to a narrow Ibis ti-bar handlebar (19" across, now go measure yours). Brakes are Avid SD - 2.0L. Shifters are SRAM Grip Shifts (forget the model but they work great). I also have a set of Nashbar stubby bar ends with thumb pockets and a Nashbar wireless cyclo-puter so I can satisfy my geek needs while satisfying my cyclo-freak needs. Front fork is a Rock Shox SID XC (not too much travel but it works well for me). Front rim is a Sun Rim Q-Lite with XT hub, front wheel is straight laced and looks killer. Rear rim is a Ritchey OCR Comp with a Ritchey hub and is regular double cross pattern. Crank set is Deore LX (LAME) so that's gotta go. But the rear derailleur's XTR as much of the rest of the bike will be eventually. Thompson super lite seat post, scary light but extra long. With a GT race saddle on top (not comfortable and also on the chopping block). Tires are Michelin Wild Gripper Lite silica green on the back (with crazy hook up in loose conditions) and a Ritchey Zed 2.1 on the front with cool matching blue sidewalls (matches the bike not the silica tire). Oh yeah, Ritchey rear skewer and an XT front skewer and a Tioga headset. Also, unlike most riders, I don't use clip in pedals, I use Wellgo flats with Power Straps on them, they work perfectly and mean I can wear almost whatever shoes I want to. Since I ride into work all the time, this is a very practical solution.

Almost forgot to add the cable housings I've got, I've never seen them before. They're called Flak Jackets and they look like cool braided carbon fiber covers. Don't know if they're any better than whatever those black covers are but I like 'em and that's all that truly matters, correcto?

This is among the few things I own that I truly love and would probably cry if I lost or broke it but I'd bet lots of bikers feel that way about their rides. And that's about it for me for now. Got to get myself back to work.

My other bike's about to go up on Ebay. Probably link the auction here. Its a low end tank but it does work pretty well, just no fun to go up hills on.

FOR SALE:

Six Six One Race Elbow Pads

Size: Large
Condition: Brand New
Price: $29 OBO - including shipping.

I bought them from some guy on mtbr - they are just too big. They have never been worn or crashed, obviously. Click here for a picture. I also have an ad running on mtbr until 8/22/02.

Contact me via email if you're interested.

A followup to Jay's buying experience... That sucks ass. There is just no excuse. It's too bad too, cuz I've had great luck with Jenson - they are usually incredibly fast (ship same day, get it at least as fast as the shipping I paid for, if not faster).

But, one thing I'd suggest, at least for those of us somewhat near Auburn... See if Cambria, I mean Bicycle Emporium, has what you want. Then, if their price isn't the same, print out the internet page with the price and take it in there. I've yet to have them turn me down. They were a bit resistant one time when I took in a sick deal price on XT discs (some blowout that was below cost), but they did it. Of course XT's didn't work on my bike, so I took them back. Heh, I'm sure they loved me for that. Anyway, just a thought. Actually, normally I would only go in to the shop to get it if I needed it that day, or if it is clothing that I haven't bought before - helmets included. But, I'm not sure BE stocks the Bell Bellistics (they do have the Giro Mad Max II that I have though, and the price on those is quite good, but maybe more than a Bellistic?).

Rant of the day/week whatever... So buying bike stuff online is great right? You browse, click, punch in your credit card and shazaaam! a couple days later you have your new gear ready to roll. Usually it's a painless experience for all parties concerned. Well this week I've had my second online buying experience blunder. I'll try not to bash on the shops I purchased from too much, but I will mention their names where appropriate. So my first semi-nightmarish experience was back in February when I decided to upgrade to Shimano XT disc brakes. In a nutshell, they (wheelworld.com) sent me 2 front calipers. You can read the full story here. My next blunder came this week when I ordered a new full face helmet from Jensonusa.com. What I ordered was a 2001 Bell Bellistic Rhythm Pro Size Medium, blue in color. What did I recieve in the box? It's a 1998 size small, with a crazy blue, red & silver color combo, and it's labeled as a BMX helmet. Just slightly off the mark I'd say. All it would take is 2 seconds for the person processing the order to actually open the box and verify that the correct helmet was inside. So now it's time to contact customer service and see how well they respond to their mistake. Sometimes I really feel like buying everything from the LBS but the prices that you can find on the web are just too amazing to pass up. On another note, my bout with the Round Table Pizza is finally over and I'm feeling much better now! I think even well enough to get out and ride tomorrow morning! Bummed I can't make it to Northstar again this weekend though...

HeadAngle.com web guy here. I'm now a member of NorCal Bikers. And, since it seems the theme of the moment is to post up pics of our quiver, here we go. And note, I had the DHi first! ;) My DHi is also a 2001, but size Large with a White Bros DH3 fork and so on. Check out the page and pic for all the details (it's changed since those pics, no more fender and new rear rim). I love this bike. Also, check out my blog entry from Monday to see some video and pictures of us (Jay and I) riding it at Northstar. We had a lot of fun, and I'm planning to be up there again this Sunday.

My other bike is a Titus Quasi Moto. This is my "cross country" bike. It simply rocks. I've yet to ride a better (for me) bike for XC/freeride/enduro. It's not an XC racer, and it's not a Canadian freeride huckster, but it's the ultimate bike for me. Recently I added IRD's MetaWire deraileur cable/housing. It's normally more of a roadie thing, but I thought it was cool. What's similar (but made by Nokon) is the sweet gold cable housing on the Once team's Tour de France bikes (aka the John Player Special bikes for your auto racing fans ;) Enough for now...

Okay, among the things I'd like to get going on the site before too long: perma-links of a bunch of our bikes, links to good bike and motorcycle sites, comments that don't bog systems down, trail links and alot more. Doesn't have to be fancy, in fact, the less fancy the better if it improves access issues for those of challenged bandwidth. Down the road I can see a link to a CafePress WebStore with NorCal Bike Gear, I'd love to make the background static on the page and have the text move over it (hard to explain but very cool looking in action) but only if it doesn't seriously impact load times.
Connects to other bike blogs and other good stuff like that.

Who knows? I'm thinking about adding a HTML Gear Instant Poll and some feedback gear but all of its up in the air. I'd love input on any and all ideas or suggestions. Hell maybe we could have a high and low bandwidth page.

Cool, man! Great idea on the public blog. We just can't give away our secret trails.... he he.

Well here is my DH Sled it's a 2001 GT DHi Race. Size Medium. Pretty much stock except for the Marzocchi Shiver fork (sweeeet) and the fat ole Michelin 2.8" tires (mighty nice for floating through the softies at Northstar!)

This is my XC Rig it's a brand new GT i-Drive 1.0 replacement frame for my cracked 2001 i-Drive 2.0 frame. Upgrades include, Shimano XT Disc Brakes, Easton Monkey Bar, ODI Lock Jaw grips, Tioga Factory DH 2.1 front tire, IRC Mythos XC rear tire, WTB Lazer-V Stealth Saddle.

Oh yeah, just thought I'd throw this in ROUND TABLE PIZZA sucks A$$! I ate 2 pieces at a lunch meeting yesterday and proceeded to puke my guts out all night. I feel like someone punched me square in the back. So I hereby officially boycott ROUND TABLE PIZZA!

HeadAngle is a great blog by a pal of a pal and hopefully a soon to be member of NorCal Bikers.

This is My Blue Heaven, my Ibis Mojo in close to its current configuration. New back tire (green silica Michelin Wild Track) and pedals with power grips Power Straps instead of the 747's. Upcoming upgrades? New drivetrain, seat, front disk brake. stem (perhaps).
My Blue