Point A to Point B
Bikes roll over things. This is due to the roundness of their wheels.
Early in the mountain biking days the bikes were simple and versatile. Suspension had not yet been invented. Technical skills were required for negotiating trails strewn with rocks or roots. As time went on mountain bikes became more specialized. They got better at going fast, they got more comfortable, they handled better. Along the way though both on and off road bikes seem to have gotten more discipline specific. If you want to go road biking you take your aero road bike, if you want to shuttle fast dirt descents you take your long travel full suspension bike. This is all great. But I think there is a style of riding that has become lost due to specialization: The Point A to Point B ride. Road, dirt, trails, paths, singletrack, doubletrack, bushwacking. The point A to point B ride is fundamentally about compromise. There is no perfect tire for covering all manner of terrain. There is no perfect geometry for both road and trail riding. Point A to Point B rides require a certain degree of adaptation and even discomfort from those who undertake them. On the other side of that coin though there is a reward: On these sorts of rides your route is limitless, your terrain variable, and your challenges constantly shifting.
Unspeakable.
Words: Phil Elsasser
Images: Lliam Dunn and Stephen Fitzgerald
Scared. I haven’t been scared about doing something on a bike since, well, probably 2009 when I got the chance to do my first NRC stage race at Cascade Classic. Lining up against guys that you have held in awe while watching pro races for years can be at the least, a tiny bit intimidating. So to be scared the night before a bike ride, with a few local guys in the mountains seemed silly. But when you looked at the stats of the ride, maybe it was worth being scared. 175 miles, 17,000 feet of climbing across a mixture of single track, gravel, and plenty of pavement for good measure.
Trail Donkey 2.0: My First Ride In The Wild
[Ed. Note: Barry is a former Denverite who now is part of our east-coast Rodeo contingent. This was an unsolicited review for which he received no compensation. Actually, I still own him for the Burrito he bought me on our last ride.]
Like many of you, I’ve been watching the Trail Donkey evolve over the last year and have been eagerly awaiting the chance to actually ride one in person. So when Twinkie offered me the chance to ride a near-production Trail Donkey on my last trip to Denver, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity. I expected it to be a fun bike, which it certainly was, but in many ways it exceeded my expectations.
I arrived in town early on a Tuesday and immediately drove over to Rodeo World Headquarters. After a short tour and a visit with Rodeo Wife & Rodeo Kids, Twinkie unveiled the goods: a 54 cm Donkey 2.0, built with a simple-yet-reliable 10-speed Force Hydro kit and a smattering of colorful yet functional parts. As a bonus I’d be the first one to try the Donkey with an alternate wheel configuration: a set of SRAM/WTB 650b wheels shod with WTB’s newest Horizon 47c slicks. Not quite your average build, but then again the Donkey is not your average bike!
Traildonkey vs. MTB race = Win
A few weeks back I lined up for the Battle Of The Bear endurance XC MTB race in Morrison, Colorado. I was using the race as a way to get 3-4 difficult hours of training in for the leadup to Dirty Kanza, not so much with any specific race goals in sight. Bear Creek State Park is a flast, flowy, and often smooth XC race so I thought it would be a perfect opportunity to try something new on Traildonkey 2.0.
Photo Essay: The Unspeakable Ride
Some rides haunt you. You see a peak or a road out of the corner of your eye and you know that you must go and find where it goes. Until you do there will be no rest and yet when you decide to go there is also no rest. Fear creeps in, and doubt. Is it do-able? Can you do it? These are the scary rides with unknown outcomes. Yet these are the rides we most love.
At Rodeo failure IS an option. It’s OK to turn around and go home if necessary. But if you manage to press on and push through you accomplish something special. Something outside of the measurements of distance, power, calories, and altitude gained.
Rodeo Rally: Stoney Pass
It has been three months since we rallied at Stoney Pass. Despite being one of those all time days not much has been written about it. Documenting our adventures is at the core of what we do around here, but documenting takes time. Time is always against us as cyclists. Time is in short supply. We all have real lives. We all have work, friends, families, significant others, other passions, and the like.
Evening climbing vibes
I’ve been putting in some great miles on the Traildonkey 2.0 prototype so far this year. I’ve only done three actual rides but they have all been big and up high. Treating the Donkey like a road bike is a good series of tests. Does it feel stable, stiff, and planted on climbs and descents? Yes, yes it does.
It isn’t a race road bike, but it has done really well on tarmac, gravel, ice, and snow alike.
Bonus: When road racing season arrives I’ll probably be that much stronger from pushing around a bike that has a few more pounds on it than the average road racing thoroughbred. When I race a lighter bike it’ll feel like lightning.
30 miles of white… knuckles
Yesterday was sketchy. Not “this is fun!” sketchy, more like shaking-when-I-got home sketchy. There was something unusual about the snow that fell in Denver this week. I think the combination of quantity and the consistently frigid temperatures combined to make it more treacherous than I’ve ever seen. It was extremely dry snow but simultaneously as slick as snot. After a hand full tense slides and maneuvers of I probably should have turned around at mile 10 and cut my losses, but the allure of Cherry Creek State Park when it is covered in a layer of white perfection baited me on.
Cowboy Cross
Cowboy Cross at the Western Stockyard Complex. The smiles won’t soon fade.
In my opinion it is the best CX race and best atmosphere of any race in the Front Range. The labyrinth course in, through, under, and around the stockyards is SO. MUCH. FUN.