First Real Climb of the Season

Time to see if all the skiing this winter kept me fresh for the dirt.  I’m waiting on new bikes right now, but some random rep left this carbon thing with big hoops and a scary paint job lying around the shop, so I grabbed that for a ride today.

That paint must have inspired this guy.  Lots of people hanging around out there today.

There’s a new line up to Rock Oven that Jamie Johnson built called shin Skinner that Vance led the charge on today.

It’s tough in spots, but oh so worth it…

…even if Foot was feelin’ it in places he might have forgotten about over the winter.

Winter, meet summer.

OK, now pull back really fast for a huge rush.

And Jens gets some exposure. 

As usual these days, not much stopping on the descent.  We did the climb in a little over an hour, and the descent in about 20 minutes.

Plus another hour or so of hanging out with beers.  Another great Sunday ride in the books.

Rainbow is Open!

Thursday night shop ride time again with Freedom Bike Shop.  As is the tradition at this time of year, we drove up as far as we could until we hit snow to see if we could get in at the reservoir.

Close enough…

There were a few trees to move out of the way, but overall not too bad.  This is our version of a flag raising.

It’s still a bit early for full light all the way down but there’s enough to see by, even with with taking a bunch of extra time to push up through the snow and clearing deadfall.

We managed to just make sunset at Dead Horse.  Well, just about…

Hard As…

Yesterday’s private session went so well, I decided to introduce Ryan to some of the locals.

I think this was a good call, as the plan was to hit up Trout Creek Canyon on the XC bikes.  With the crew feeling like winter has been hanging on too long, the pace got a bit out of hand.  Feeling that climb, Ryan?

Travis in particular was charging like a man that’s been cooped up with the wife and kids a lot lately.

The later part of this lap was a battle between mashing pedals and hanging on to Don’s back wheel or trying to take in the view without hitting a tree.  I  opted for views over hammering as much as possible.

I even managed to snag this over the shoulder action shot of Jens in the lower meadows.  That’s some sweet Okanagan single track for ya right there.

Top it all off with some big cones, and what could be better?

How about some alternating shots with beer?

Yup…better. 

Ryan and I went for another ride in the afternoon, when it got a lot warmer and sunnier, but that lap was all about keeping the pace up.  So no pics of High Pony, but I should be up there again very soon, and the sun is coming back with a vengeance so hopefully I can post up some more epic sunset shots later in the week.