It has been a wonderful season for me so with only fumes left in my tank and pennies in my bank I was able to make one last trip to Texas for the Holidaze Marathon. This was stop number two of the TMBRA marathon series and took place at Camp Eagle, an amazing venue just a couple hours west of San Antonio. As we rolled in under sunny skies, I could tell this was going to be a great event as the place was beautiful and everyone had a smile with early holiday cheer in their eye. Read more »

This weekend I was back on the Luvjet–this time to Amarillo, Texas to check out the first race of the TMBRA marathon series. As I flew in, I wondered where the mountains were since Amarillo is located up north in the panhandle flatlands and known more for ranching not mountain biking. Charlie, a local racer on Team Kordestani (promoters of the event) picked me up and delivered me to the race site. Palo Duro Canyon is known as the “Grand Canyon” of Texas for good reason. After a half hour drive from the airport the grasslands fell away into a huge canyon that appeared to stretch on for miles or at least as far as the eye could see! Read more »

On September 23, my teammate Ryan Eisele and I dusted off our mtorbikes and headed to the Dick Jagow Memorial Grand Prix. The race is held at Washougal Motocross Park. I purchased a new Yamaha YZ450F in mid-August, so I started practicing 45 minute motos again on my mx track. The last mx race I had done was in 2008 and I knew I would be rusty even with a month of preparation. The Dick Jagow race used the whole Washougal mx track and surrounding fields and single track. It was similar to the 6hr mountain bike race that was held there in June–minus the mud!

I decided to race in the 30 amateur class. After a recent tailbone injury and not as much time on the moto, Ryan rode in the Sportsman category. The Sportsman class rides with the Women’s class so he offered to lend my wife a hand if she needed it as she was racing too. The grand prix began with a dead engine start and lasted hour and 45 minutes with the course being about 5 miles per lap. I got off to a slow start and most of the single track trails were extremely dusty which made trying to close any kind of gap on a rider ahead almost impossible. Read more »

A couple weeks ago the newest, youngest, and likely brightest member of our team came down to race some short track and spend a day riding trails here in the home range. Ian is a senior at Rex Putnam High School in Portland and has a great passion for MTB as well as photography and video production. Thank goodness he brought some of his toys along so we could document a great summer evening on bikes!

This was the first ever self-proclaimed 6hr World Championships (isn’t this how SSWC and SSCXWC started and continue today???) in Capitol Forest near Olympia Washington. Also known otherwise as “6Hrs of Capitol Punishment”. After a day or two of summer, Junuary started again the night before this event with steady rain continuing through most of the race. I chose to ride single speed again–why bother with silly gears if they aren’t going to work after a couple laps anyway?! Read more »

Some of you may remember posts in previous years about the Test of Endurance race. Several years ago this event started as a two lap 50 mile race that is held outside the tiny village of Blodgett, Oregon on the way from Corvallis to Newport. Corvallis (home of the Beavers) is also home to Barry “WicknastyB” Wicks and has a storied history of mountain bike events and sweet trails dating back to the 80′s. Mike Ripley, owner extraordinaire of Mudslinger Events, has threatened to add a 100 mile version for several years but there has never been much interest in a four lap 100 mile race.
This year he planned to make the hundy a reality by starting in Corvallis and riding to Blogett then completing the customary laps there before returning to town for the finish. I was pretty stoked about that and since I am two time TOE50 winner, I decided to come back for MORE after not attending the TOE for a couple years. Unfortunately we had a late winter with numerous snow events down to the valley floor in March followed by very wet and warm storms. This provided near record flooding in some areas and ended up washing out a bridge crucial to the Corvallis-Blodgett loop.

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