The Wade Simmons Freeride Experience — Day V

Posted on August 23, 2005 by Smoke

***We now pick up with our heroes from over a month ago. Sorry, but everyone wants to ride with me these days. (Sigh) … the price of popularity..**

I am….enigma. I am….mystery….. I am…..Blaine.

Yer a tosser, mate. Sorry Luke, I had to do it. Anyway, back to the riding. HEEEEYUUUUGGGE day at Gilliard today. If you’re going to pick a place to step it up, this is the one.

Wade crossing it up over the fence. Jim was in make or break mode. He mad a lot more than he broke, like this drop on KerPlop.

I’m really stoked on this next shot. Not that it’s that pretty for light or anything, it’s just that you can almost taste the anticipation of Luke as he’s about to drop in right behind wade (who’s clearly enjoying this one).

Harley, waiting for a second run. Hurry up, eh?

Little, girl…big rock face. Give’r Barb.

Sto on some random skinny parts.

OK, this is the one that broke Jim. Have a good look, cause you know he wants retribution on that one. Just a little bit short, but that was it for the shoulder. Luckily it was more of a strain than anything serious, but still a bummer.

Gary picked up the torch and ran with it. Yer’ killin it this trip, buddy.

The Old Man of the Trails shows us how to navigate the skinny stuff.

See what sort of riff-raff I get to deal with?

German Freeride — Day VI

Posted on August 16, 2005 by Smoke

A grey day today, but still pretty nice riding weather. The Okanagan gets kind of dusty otherwise. So, we’re at Outbound Cycle this morning and I ran into an old acquaintance from hanging around the race scene from time to time.

Karey Watanabe, Canadian born Japanese DH legend just strolled on up, so we made a plan to go hit the trails.

She’s the one wearing the skirt. Anyway, we did a warmup lap on Powers Creek to get the ball rolling, then headed on over to Gilliard tp try out some of the trails I haven’t hit yet.

They’re pretty good. Nice skirt, by the way.

Skinnyman had to give ‘er a go too. I missed David’s air, as he pretty much jumped over me. Freakin kids these days…..

At any rate, that Cat’s Ass, Fist First run is pretty sweet. Then we went to Boss Hog for a session.

The Kid hit’s the step-up, of course. What you won’t see for a while is Skinnyman accidentally nose manualing the same move…since it’s on video and I don’t feel like editing right now. Hey, I got it, and it’s pretty funny.

Wallride…and we’re out.

Return of the Jedi Council — Part IV

Posted on July 17, 2005 by Smoke

Today was another day of popped cherries for all of us. For some strange reason, I’ve never ridden Gilliard in K-Town before. Today was high time I remedied that situation.

I think you may have seen this gap before. The general consensus was that the landing is just too roached to be practical now, but personally I don’t care how cherry the landing looks. I’m sure that some punk will be hitting tomorrow on a hardtail but whatever. You can have that thing.

Anyway, on to Ker-Plop. Origianlly cut by my man Vince, this trail has gone through an evolution of sorts, especially following the big fires from a few years ago. It’s got a lot of rocky terrain, but also a lot of big linked moves. Like this fence gap.

Barb

Or this series of stepdowns callled the 3 Bears.

Skip

As the trail gets going, there are more and more technical lines like this skinny section that alternate with little gaps and hits.

Barb

There’s also some great constructions. This stepdown is the 8 foot culmination of a long ladder with a four foot stepdown to elelvated landing that crosses a swamp.

Barb

Stouph

The last line on this trail is a combo of several skinny lines that drop you onto a road over another barbwire fence.

Stouph

Jedi

Those little combo moves were just a warmup for the main event. Lick-Her Sore is essentially one big continous linked stunt. It starts pretty mellow, with some nice skinny to skinny lines….

Jedi

…that go into ladder ramps…..

Paul

…that kick you to tranny…

Several more brain twisting stunts later it gets a bit bigger. Get over a couple of rocks, ride a sick high skinny….

Stu

…step down 10+ feet to a step up wooden lip gap, then rail the wooden berm to another 10 foot stepdown to wood lander.

Panama

I shit you not. After that, it’s constant skinny line to tranny to skinny line, etc. You need your speed from the previous landing to line up the next move, every time. Finish off with a serious tetter across a gully and take a deep breath.

Stu

Now there’s some uphill to be had. Short though, as Boss Hog is only about 300m up the road. This has been shot to death recently, but no surprise. Step up turtle back stunts are pretty neato.