2 crashes in Malente

2 low-speed crashes in Malente. Though i'd share them with you.

First one is your standard stuff, I stray a bit too far to the left, hit a log, and do a tumble.

Second crash is more interesting. I have no idea how to ride this double drop. Let me explain how its constructed:

This is the point of view you see in the vid:

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This is the setup of the double drop. You drop 1,2m (4 feet)  into plane "A", and just 2m (6.5feet) further ahead is the second drop of 60-70cm(2 feet) into plane "B". So here is my dilemma:

If you ride it too slow, you nose dive as I do in the vid. And crash.
If you ride it too fast (or any other speed than slow) you will scissor the second drop - and crash.

There is no way that you can drop all the way to plane "B", an awkward and short run-in makes sure of that. I...just don't get it. I haven't seen anyone else tackle this drop.

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In the video you clearly see me be undetermined as to how fast to go on the double drop.

HD version HERE

Embedded version:

Spring Roadtrip Day 3/3

Day 3 was riding in 3 interconnected forests; Kollund, Wassersleben and Flensburg. Its mostly xc, but there are more than one opportunity to get a bit technical. What this place lacks in technical flavor, it makes up for it in scenery, this place is beautiful. 

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The forest in Wassersleben had an unfortunate surprise. Some of the drops, and lines where blocked by trees. We did find interesting stuff however, something I will return to, in a separate blog post...

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Kollund forrest is more XC than anything else, there are however a possibility to play around here and there tho' 

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You ain't posting that nekkid' pic on ya blog, you hear me!!

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The end... Or is it? Stick around for the encore; Crashes, an inverted roadgap, and.... a dog.

Spring Roadtrip. Day 2/3

Second day of our roadtrip went to Malente, a small peacefull town in northern Germany. What makes Malente interesting from a mountain bike perspective, is the work put into the FR and DH lines here. There has clearly been a passion behind the work.

There are 3 "official" lines, and probably more if you invest some time into seeking them out. The lines had drops, jumps, tables, a roadgap, wall rides, and berms. Enough for an entire day : )

So..

We met this girl from Hamburg, Alena, on a Propain DH bike. And even tho' it was her first time here as well, she didn't hold back, and blasted through the lines. What appealed to me was her sessioning-mentality, something I can relate to; She found a tricky spot, and just rode the shit out of it, over and over again. I salute the commitment to a challenge.

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Bermsss, I like berms.

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Poor trail bike. Hennning told me, that at one point, he felt the entire frame flex in differnt directions, at some of the landings.

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Malente is a beautiful place bla bla bla, no it actually is.

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Lots of jumps, often to flat, but lots of good berms as well (note some of them behind me in this pic)

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Good times down the lines.

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Another jump to flat, expect to use some travel here. They where oddly enjoyable however!

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I enjoyed this view, while drinking a big german beer and eating a huge Schnitzel...bring it!

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Day 3 comming up shortly.

Spring Roadtrip. Day 1/3

We decided to do a 3 day roadtrip. The initial plan was to do an AM trip to the Harz mountains, but this place was loaded with snow. Next plan was to do Winterberg bikepark, but they announced a week prior to our departure, that they wouldn't open the park....because of snow. Bummer. Last plan was to find some spots where snow wasn't present, and just go ride. Simple. It turned out pretty good actually, we even got 2 days of riding in Germany out of it.

Anyway, day 1 was domestic. We met up with our guide Thomas, and he gave us a good tour of his local trails.

Lets start of with one of my best pics of this year. Got really lucky with the light here, it only lasted for a few minutes, before the gray'ish tone corrupted the scenery again . Henning is standing in the middle of it all, complete unaware that he is posing on (perhaps) the best International Picture of the Year... ; )

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Thomas showed us this "secret spot", a line that had doubles, drops, jumps, and a really cool stepup-to-berm feature. Not particularly long, but good fun. Here you see Thomas taking the chicken line next to a jump, on my bike.

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The official trail was xc. But it actually had a few good features and segments here and there.

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Some dude snapped his collar bone on the trail, Henning to the rescue, thank god we got a medic on our team! : D

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It started with evaluation. Then refusal. Then re-evaluation. Followed by reflection...letters got written, speeches where hold, the day passed..

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...then just before my camera died out due to low-batt, he finally went for it : )

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Stay tuned for Day 2, where we took off to Germany, does "Malente" ring a bell for anyone?

Preview: FiveTen Freerider VXi

The VXi has been delayed for an entire year, and now I finally got myself a pair. The VXi is the first lovechild between FiveTen and the Adidas engineers, and its definitely an interesting shoe:

The VXi has an incorporated hard toe cap, even harder than the "old" Freerider Pro. This is a welcome upgrade. The ankle support has gotten stiffer as well, adding support and protection. The outer material is more tough, but has less ventilation, so I wonder how it fares during those warm summer days.

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The bottom of the outsole is where the VXi really differs from everything else we have seen from FiveTen. There is no pattern in the middle of the shoe, making every foot position equal in grip. The sole itself is stiffer as well, compared to the classic Freerider.

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Weight:

Original Freerider is 960g

Freerider PRO is 880g

Freerider VXi is 855g

The Freerider series has been on a continued diet, and added more and more protection along the way, a winning formula?

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Initially not as comfortable as the Freerider or Freerider Pro. I hope its due to the bed in time. Time will tell. Overall quality is solid tho'. The grip is nothing short of amazing.

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So how will the VXi perform on the long term? Is the slick sole a good thing? Will the shoe fry my foot in the summer? How will the new material hold up? Stick around and find out in the comming review, right here at All Mountain Next.

Recent random pics

A few random shots for you pleasure.

The unicorn of shoes! The VXi has been delayed for an entire year, and now I finally got myself a pair. The VXi is the first lovechild between FiveTen and the Adidas engineers, and its definitely an interesting shoe. Note the grip pattern at the bottom of the outsole. I hope to do a preview soon.

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 On my way to the trail gap.

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 Christian out of a jump.

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Got my 36 back from TF tuned, with the PUSH upgrade installed. The small bump sensitivity has definitely been improved, and the fork feels slightly more linear towards the end travel. These where my two main gripes with the fork. You would think I would be happy right? I'm not. The improvements are there, but its sorta old wine in new bottles, I want even more small bump sensitivity, a way more linear mid-travel curve, that blends into a linear end-travel with the capability to use all travel available. I wish there was a boxxer inside of my 36..

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Back in buisness

The snow is gone, weather is good, and spirits are high again.

We started out by hitting a brand new jump, oh did we session that sucker this day. 

21 sec. Raw edit. No sound.

Mystery solved?

As mentioned at the bottom of this post, my Cane Creek Double Barrel Air had a failure. I got the shock back from service, and have some interesting bits of info regarding the fail.

So this is what TF Tuned wrote back to me:

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At first, I didn't have a clue to what could have caused the shock to be pulled out of line. But after some brainstorming, I remembered that I snapped a shock mount bolt, a week before the shock failure. It twisted my shock upon compression, I know that for a fact.

Snapped shock bolt.
  (btw, why do I constantly, snap, break, shatter or bend stuff? all I do is ride xc)

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So is it a coincident? Or are these two things related? I think its highly plausible that the two incidents are indeed related. Anyway, the shock is back in working order, so is my 36 RC2 with a PUSH upgrade.

Oldie but Goldie #4

"Oldie but Goldie" series will be my tribute to the "old days". When 640mm bars where considered wide, carbon was fragile, and adjustable seatposts didn't exist. And I'm doing it, for the fun of it.

Peter rocking a 29'er before you even heard of them.

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tihS tahT kcuF

This is how it looks(ish) when I peek out of my window. I sincerely feel robbed.

And this is my current setup. My DB AIR is on its way back from TF TUNED, and you might have noticed a missing fork in the pic, well its at TF TUNED as well, for servicing, and a PUSH upgrade!

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That's it, I'm officially out of mountainbiking as long as the snow is present. tihS tahT kcuF.

Small update

Small update on whats been going on lately. Some whine this time.

So my Cane Creek Double Barrel had a meltdown, as some of you know. I gotta say, I'm disappointed, after just a month+ of testing, really?

Ian from TF Tuned wrote to me that "It sounds like your shock has got emulsified oil" I wonder how it got emulsified in the first place? I think that the (re)serviced shock should be in my hands again within 2 weeks. I should have a review ready for you guys in May, score will reflect reliability as well. And you know that I like my reliability served cold.

So while the DB Air is being serviced. I slapped on my RockShox VIVID R2C. Great performance, fun to use, and RELIABLE. I do suffer a bit on the climbs tho'.

So while I do go a bit apeshit on my CaneCreek fail, its nothing compared to the current weather situation. Its downright depressing! I heard one news station call it Winter-March. Man this suck big time, we had such a sweet thing going for us in the beginning of march, with great weather, trailgaps, and all round good times. Whyy??

 

Recent riding

Some recent shots. The weather has (shortly) been awesome, that resulted in a whole lot of riding. No frost.

Obviously the new trailgap has been sessioned. Alot. Here you see Hennning on his 3rd or 4th try. 

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Being a guinea pig on a new feature, such as the trail gap, is interesting in so many ways. There is an anticipation in the air, and a lot of questions are left unanswered until the first hit. How is the landing, the lip, what entry speed is needed, is it trickable? There is no one to answer, you have to find out for yourself. Here we stand after the few first hits, oblivious of the camera, and discuss exactly these things. Good times, that I've come to appreciate.

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Kim brought his new ride. A 2012 Norco Sight. Revelation up front, fox in the rear, Reverb post among the highlights. Its a nice and capable trailbike.

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Kim goes in between the trees. He had an actual fear that the bike would snap at the trail gap, obviously no such thing happened. We all know that only carbon snaps ; )

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Inspecting bikes.

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I blew my CC DB AIR. While riding, the shock suddenly began to make suction/slurping sounds for about 10 minutes, the sound went away, but the ride felt weird, I shortly after concluded that the Low Speed Rebound adjustment was completely ineffective. There is no difference between fully opened and fully closed! I assume it has something to do with air being somewhere it shouldn't be? *facepalm*

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The trail gap

Hitting it. The trail gap that is.

The exit speed is just INSANE.

Watch in HD HERE

Low Res embedded version:

No Sound. Simple edit. 13sec.

..wait a minute.

..the local trail builders are up to something. There has been talk of a trail gap for AGES, and now it finally looks like its coming together. Interesting indeed.

Transition is where the camelbak is at.

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Stay tuned.

First run on A-Line, Whistler Bikepark.

All this hard drive searching for old pics and vids, made me stumble upon my massive Whistler folder. 8 gigs of footage - way more than I care to filter. But on the other hand, its a shame to let it collect dust. So I managed to at least render some of it, namely my first run on the legendary A-Line.

A-Line is ridiculously fast, has big tables all over, and the flow is just legendary, so much so that pretty much every bike park out there tries to mimic the "A-Line Feel" to some degree.

So whats in the vid?

First of, I met with freeride legend Brett Tippie. Such a cool character!
I go on and hit A-Line with Paul and Ian. Paul was a local rider, and an absolute RIPPER!

I'm sort of glad that I didn't die at 4:49, that shit was TIGHT : )

At 5:19 I hit the GLC drop, It was definitely less terrifying than I thought it would be.

Remember, this is my first run on A-Line on a rental bike I wasn't familiar with, I case some tables, I'm not that fast, and I cut a few berms here and there. Otherwise, I think I did just fine. Enjoy.

Watch in HD HERE

crappy embedded version: