Bicycle Cafe June Team Update

For the first time this season I am looking back on the month and not feeling that it zoomed by at a ridiculous pace. It appears as though the spring craziness has taken a back seat to the opening of chair lifts and hot summer weather. Despite the month rolling by at a much more relaxed pace there has still been a lot of action going on for us. I started off the month by setting up a team meeting to catch up on each others agenda’s. With a group of nine riders ranging from 16 to 29 years of age it is easy to stray in different directions. Re-grouping to discuss both individual and group plans proved to be a good way to keep things on the high-road into summer.

Our racers did an awesome job this month. (continue reading…)

This weekend was the Europeans, but the bad weather was there and the UCI commissaries canceled the race and took the qualification times as final results. I had a bad run in qualification and ended up 8th…looking forward to better weather next time!

The Phat Wednesdays are finally here!!!  I love Phat Wednesdays ie. the beer league. It was cold and wet all day yesterday but that didn’t keep the racers away…something like 170 racers paid their two bucks for a run and a beer. The first Phat Wednesday is always B-Line…tradition, kinda. The cool kids ride chainless so I had to try and be a cool kid too and so I rode chainless too. ha. Adam Billinghurt ie. the Bermanator is the King of B-Line so everyone was on a mission to take him down…he is pretty much undefeated on B-Line.

Well Billinghurst got a front flat. Yah so everyone had their run and my homedog Mr. Curtis Keene came out on top. Billinghurst was given a second run and edged out Keene by like a tenth of a second but it was his second run and as some people say, racing is racing….anyway, the boys had to fight it out boy style.It was nice. They chugged beers and then arm wrestled for the dinero. Keene crushed the Bermanator and that was that. I pulled through a ‘W’ on the ladies side…beat the chain and chainless girls so that was sweet….until the next morning. You are not allowed to keep the money if you win a Phat Wednesday so between Keene and I we had like $340 bucks to spend at the bar. Everyone got to see the money in liquid form…ha. Classic night. I love Whistler.

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BC Bike Race

Today was officially day Zero of the 2009 BC Bike Race. Mark and I are riding as team Bear Back Biking and made our way to Vancouver to get our sign in sorted and our swag picked up.
There was a pretty good buz at the hotel with around 360 riders in attendance for the rider briefing.
Darren and Kelli, friends over at Endless Biking are looking after day one. Just a short days racing at 30kms but some pretty good ups.. and some pretty full on downs!
The course includes Severed Dick and Pipeline.. should be interesting on our pinner Scott Spark carbon XC race bikes and in lycra (spandex is probably rarely seen on the shore)
This is billed as the most technical stage race on the planet with 70% of the riding on signature BC style singletrack trails!
I made the descision to swap out the Fox F100 for a 32 Talas up front and threw a CrankBrothers Joplin remote seatpost out back… Still on 2.1 race tyres but all set to get stuck into the next 7 days.

So, for the next week, we’ll be ‘working’ away from the office but happy to leave the day to day operations of the business in our more than capable and superb staff! Thanks guys!

After 4 challenging years of Med school, my wife Lisa graduated at the end of May and we decided to celebrate with a road trip of singletrack epicness! My Dad has a sweet 1995 Ford camper van so we loaded it up and hit the road with our all-mtn bikes, destination: Sun Valley, Idaho. How could ya go wrong?

We cruised west across B.C. and headed into the States just west of Grand Forks, pinned it down through Spokane and then West to Missoula, Montana. At Missoula we cranked right and pointed it south down the Bitterroot valley. Wow!! It was my first time seeing this country and it was spectacular! Cowboys and Indian stuff: big wide valley with snow-capped peaks on either side and buffalo roaming in the middle…no joke. Well 200 years earlier for sure. (continue reading…)

I was out riding with a buddy the other night and we came across this sweet spot in New Westminster. Has some really good potential for some steezy street moves. If you have some serious street skills I suggest finding this spot and going to town!

Lately I’ve been focused on riding. A little too much. Hanging with friends and sharing the good times in the Kootenays and all the amazing trails in my area. The other day I realized it had been some time since I put some time back into the trails. The other day I took my saw out of hibernation and started making some beautiful slats for Nelson’s new MTB park (soon to be built) I Love the look of fresh new cedar slats. Don’t worry the wood was all dead fall and I had a permit.

The start

I got a call from my friend James ‘Hot Lycra’ Wilson, owner of Obsession Bikes and event producer of the North Shore Bike Fest. He didn’t think I would want to come on his ride because it was going to be an XC lung buster covering the North Shore Bike Fest Marathon XC course to be held this Saturday May 23. My first reaction was there is no XC on the Shore so I’m in. Four hours after we started I realized I was wrong. (continue reading…)

So this morning I woke up to the most perfect weather for shooting, so I gave my buddy Cam Pasternak a call. He was feeling sick but still decided to come out, didnt even hear him complain once! It started to rain just as we finished, going to be a slick weekend, time for the wet screams! So heres what we came up with, all photos by Cam Pasternak

The new John Henry Bikes race kits!

Cam just hanging out.

Thanks for all the great photos Cam! Looks like its going to be a burly weekend at the Ardum challenge in Mission, B.C. Going to get greasy with lots of crashes! Full armour for this one!

Have a good one.-Cam

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