McLaren Bike Park

The McLaren Bike Park is an exciting prospect for us NorCal riders. Somewhere to play and practice in anticipation of hitting Northstar, Whistler and the like. It's a great project so me and Chris decided to bung them a couple of quids and become founders. You can do the same HERE ..... Go on, do it for the kids!

Bloodshed

The first night ride of 2012 was something we'd been looking forward to all week. Me, Zach, Dave and Paul met at the usual spot, gave eachother manly welcoming hugs, and headed up Iron Springs road to the familiar Tamarancho loop. After an epic shred session at Annadel the previous Sunday I was pumped to hit the dirt. Mother nature had other plans though. For some reason things didn't feel quite right. Maybe my lights were slightly off kilter, or my tires were too pumped after a recent tune up... or I just wasn't in the zone. Either way, as I lined up 'rancho's infamous Serpentine drop in my beam, I suddenly washed out and dropped like a sack of shite. I'd neglected to sport my awesome Fox knee pads but managed to christen my brand new riding jacket with some nice jagged rips down the arm. Joy. A little ways down the trail Dave hit the drop before careening into a rut and going arse over teakettle into the shrub. Bloodied and bruised, we decided to call it a night and headed back into Fairfax for a beer. We'll try again next week....

New Year Revolutions

Started my third year of Californian riding adventures with a couple of gut busting rides around cherished local haunts. A jetlag induced sleep coma put paid to any plans I had for alcohol fueled NYE revelry. So, having escaped a hangover, I met up with Aaron for a spin around China Camp. I couldn't escape the effects of my three week Chrimbo binge though. Jeezus it was tough. Mind you, we did do a much longer ride than normal. The lack of funding has left China' ranger lite, so the "secret" trails are becoming more apparent as bold folk start to more obviously branch them from existing routes. We checked some of them out, adding a good few miles of nail bitingly narrow descents (so narrow I feckin walked more than rode) and some fun, steep swoopy stuff.

Holiday Monday and my fat kid at the back status was established once again (clearly evident in the Strava shizzle over on the right there.) Me, Aaron (stoked to have taken delivery of a lush new carbon Stumpy so is riding everyday like a grinning fool) and Zach met up for an extended Rancho loop. Riding from Greenbrae to five corners on Tam, we then descended to Deer Park onto the usual Rancho loop. I suffered the whole ride with shattered, abused quads and a few extra pounds of xmas sludge hanging around my middle. But we had a great ride. The first of many for, what will hopefully be, another awesome year of NorCal shredding!