“Still building…

Most of my blog entries have been about building this far, I’m still riding lots though, last week I spent some time with Freeride Ent. (www.freeride-entertainment.com) shooting for Easton Components, and this week I was hard at work with some legends of the sport, Kurt Sorge and Garret Beuhler, along with Rick Schneider, our Excavator operator, and dirt jump surgeon, and built one of the sickest spots on earth. We all sat down and decided we needed a place here in Nelson that has some huge jumps so we could practice the ancient art of “Sending It” without leaving our home town. Nelson is know for it’s abundance of huge trails but the Massive Booter factor hasn’t kept up to speed.

Garret and his Dad came through and donated the land and we all pitched in, got together and gave’r hard for a few days to punch this marvel of mountain bike manufacturing. The craftsmanship is amazing! Rick is hands down the most skilled Excavator operator I have ever seen when it comes to Dirt jumps. Even though we had a small machine, I don’t think it slowed us down at all. the only pain in the ass was getting the 1960- something- school bus operational and running to drive it into place without it tipping over from the massive weight on the roof which is now a dirt dish. Yes it almost happened, Sorge has never seen my eyes so white as I has an instant to either jump out or hang on tight.

Here it is, such a sick zone, hope it all works the way we want it!

Here is a break down:

the big center line – is 30ft step down, to a 35ft double, to a 40ft double, DJ lip style
Left line – 25ft hipper to a 35ft table, 20ft step up to bus, then straight stepdown or hip step down option, last to a trick hipper
right line – 25′ hip double to 4 20ft huge lipped trick jumps.

Top 3 options…

Rick lining it up…

Hoping that the roof won’t collapse…

Planting and watering the Jump Garden…

I don’t think Rick blinked once the whole time.

This gives a good perspective of the size of the gaps.

“eh Line… eh?”

wanted to share with you some progress on ONE of the trails I’m working on in Nelson. I call it “EH Line” and no it’s nothing like “A Line” in Whistler. It’s not finished but I’ve put some cool things on it and have hit all of it so far, super fun. The plan for when it is finished is to preserve the gnarl factor but also make it friendly for most skill levels. lots of alternate lines. I like to call them “Girlfriend Lines”

So far this is the top, but not the start…

Nice berm,

Crosses a creek to another railing berm,

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Trail Building Tips: Making slats by freehand milling

This is a method called freehand milling where you essentially “mill” the wood without a mill and just guide the saw with your eyes and hands. It’s not my favorite method because no matter how skilled you are, you end up wasting more wood than you need to and it’s pretty hard to finish with a perfect cut. with practice you can come out with some decent looking slats and the advantage here is that you can cut some pretty large diameter wood with a smaller saw, rather than packing a huge milling saw around the bush. A guide or mill will help you get the most out of your log and I will show you this in my next article.

Step 1:
Determine how wide you want each slat with some measuring tape and make some guide marks. *USE DEAD FALLEN WOOD ONLY*

Step 2: Make guide cut down each marking you just made to start your initial cuts. These are the lines you are going to have to follow the whole way down so make sure they are straight., and make sure your chain is very sharp or it’s going to take a lot longer. the less time you can spend standing ove a log with a heavy saw in your hand the better. (continue reading…)

This bike is sick, I don’t really need to say much more, so I think I’ll go rip it now..



medium TR450 frame (Freeride setup – higher bb and steeper headtube)
Race Face Guide/Atlas FR Cranks, Lightweight Bash
Easton Havoc DH wheelset, bar, stem, Pedals, seatpost
Elka Rear Shock
Manitou Dorado Pro
Shimano Saint Derailleur, shifters, Brakes
Maxxis Minion tires
40.5 Lbs

Building a jump can be pretty easy and straight forward, if you live in a place that has an endless supply of dirt in a close vicinity, ie: Kamloops or Utah. It’s a simple task of getting a bunch of people, beer and creating a human excavation site around the base of the takeoff and landing, but for many of us, like here in Nelson, BC, dirt is a rare and precious comodity. We have lots of soil, rocks and trees, but to actually get good “Sender” grade dirt is a very hard task without absolutely raping the land of every last inch of soil. Here are some tips on how to get the perfect Cheese Wedge Booter with a limited amount of golden ground.

#1: the non-dirt base Takeoff eh! (continue reading…)

The final installment of STUND Season 2. It’s been a great ride and I hope you all enjoyed watching the show. I know us boys had a blast making it. Getting out there, funding our own project, picking our favorite spots and having a rider owned production is what it’s all about. It is allot to take on for Steve and myself in a summer as we still film with the biggest movies, compete in the big mountain comps and run a full time Pro rider contract. STUND comes from our own hard work and sweat with a target to hit as many viewers as we can from all over the world.

We do this by offering it for free! From the riders for the riders.

Help bring back another season of STUND, speak up and post. Was it everything you expected coming back with Season 2? Would you all watch a season 3? This is your chance to give us feedback and new ideas for next year. But take it easy on us, remember we just ride!

Utah and a trip to Kamloops. These two locations are the holy grail for mountain biking and almost every pro rider visits them once a year. Known for epic scenary, bangin’ light, and big senders, we set out to the desert for a tight 1 week trip to see what could be found. We also added a new rider on the trip that I think will get all of you stoked in more ways then one. After finishing up our last trip as a group there was still one thing left to do before we could send the boys home. If you tuned into episode 3 you know Garret still has a days work cut out for him.

Kamloops was a quick trip for Romo and myself. We decided to throw together a little bonus to this episode. Bringing along up and coming cinematographers Matt Gorveatte from Kelowna and Pete Bailey with Epicmountainvideo.com from Whistler, Steve and I had it in our heads that we wanted to train a big step down line. So we took off to a place historical for this. We went back to the Ord road zone where Steve had filmed legendary gaps from The Collective, Barred for Life, and Drop in t.v. series. Props to Me for following his ass off the thing.

Viewers be sure to post links on your own facebook accounts to come watch the STUND series and help bring back another season!

See you next Sunday for the final Episode!
Kinrade – Big Mountain for life!

Episode 3! USA. After crossing the border we headed south to the Seattle Area where Romo had been filming before with world cup shredder Luke Strobel “Barred for Life”. Its amazing how many mosquitoes get caked to your bike after driving for 10 hours. But we made it down in one piece… Well, almost. We lost a brand new Transition off the roof rack at night on the highway. The bike took it well though and everything was good.. It was the car behind us that got the best of it. Tuff bikes the Transition boys make but not made to take the impact of an SUV.

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Stund 2 – Episode 2 – Kelowna Check it out!

Kelowna B.C. Livin’ the dream and in Romo’s hometown. We got in some lift access days staying at his place up on Silver Star Mountain Resort. Then off to Kelowna for the Center of Gravity. Steve put this mountain bike show on last year and was happy to bring it back. Him and his partner Scott also added new events like Wakeboarding and next year we are bringing in Reegan for moto shows. It is a chance for some of the local rippers to get into the limelight and just a straight up good time. The event is just a Jam/Show format, but some great talent and prizes. The bike even got handed out to a kid in the crowd.

Too bad Steve sprained his knee, and I had a horrible crash. Weeks of work in without the reward of riding was ruff! Nevertheless the event once again was a wicked time with over 10,000 people showing up to drink beer and enjoy the music, events and shows. From there, things move into a ride down an all natural trail named “HSB” and cap it off with a little freestyle moto to throw in the mix. I think episode 2 will leave you wanting to get in on the Kelowna summer action. See you guys next Sunday. If you missed Episode 1 – Watch it here

Stund 2 – Episode 1 – Williams lake.

Check it out!!!

Redneck lifestyle is the way of the puddle. Possibly where the term ‘get er done’ was first used. But the talent does not stop with ranching it up or playing hockey. There is a tight group of locals that have been shredding mountain bikes since the early years. This is where James Dorfling resides and grew up feeding his mountain biking skills with unique zones like Farwell Canyon and pinning it on trails like Aflo.

Its hard to appreciate the big mountain slope lines we did out in Farwell, footage does little justice and to get to these lines was a grueling sandy hike; a bike worth 2 hours of your life for a 20 second descent! After spending some time in the puddle it became clear to me how James has become such an all round shredder. Check out his hometown and favorite spots here in episode 1 as the crew rolls out to Williams lake. See you guys next Sunday for Romo’s hometown episode in Kelowna! Kinrade out.