Pinkbike: The Ultimate Pumptrack Challenge - Chrystal Viper Five Cinco de Die-O

Last Thursday night Crankworx hosted the Ultimate Pumptrack Challenge and crowned a new Queen and King; Caroline Buchanan and Barry Nobles. Adam Billinghurst and Kenny Smith make up half of the team that has built the track for the last five years. Possibly suffering a little with hangovers and definitely having spent too much time together over the years, Kenny makes a good Statler to Adam’s Waldorf. 

Within an hour I had learned everything I needed to know about kangaroo hunting, Kenny had been fired twice, and I had stopped the interview when I started to learn a little too much about the twosome. 

How many years have you two been working together on this?

Adam:

 Too many. And by the way you’re fired. 

Kenny:

 Good. 

Adam:

 We’ve done it every year together. It has been me, Kenny, and Gunner, Chester has been there for four years now. 

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Pinkbike: The Purple Haze of Provincials

After a few dry, but chilly, days of practice the sun finally came out and scorched us on Sunday at the Western Open/Provincials this past weekend. While flesh obsessed black flies that swarmed like repellant was a pheromone, the Dunbar Cycles crew taped the course on Thursday morning. By Friday racers were slowly arriving for practice laps and the camping areas filled up while the lift lines began to stretch as far as five people deep. Tippie's voice rang out across the land, or at least over the mic for Saturday, and it really started to feel like a race weekend!

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Pinkbike: The Road to Provincials

The week between the Silver Star BC Cup and The Western Open (Provincials) has become a bit of a road trip tradition full of bad ideas, riding, and general shenanigans. No one has ever died, but this year we narrowly escaped serious injury from flying go-kart tires, excessive amounts of sushi, falling trees and lightning strikes. We competed in the Summer Championships which are totally made-up, have nothing to do with bikes, are very official (completely unofficial) and extremely competitive. Only one could win but many would eat giant balls of wasabi for randomly assigned points. The winner had to show prowess at go-kart racing, mini golf, and bowling. Bonus points were allocated for consumption small green balls of death at all you can eat sushi and the reward came in the form of a much sought after and forever cherished plastic gold medal and the sweet satisfaction of earned bragging rights. 

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Pinkbike: Keeping the Momentum

The last time we all assembled at Silver Star Resort was for FrostBike back in March, when we headed to the mountain on Saturday morning the temperatures didn't feel all that much different. After driving through a hot and smoke filled Kelowna where the city was desperately fighting forest fires on Friday, the torrential downpour the next day was a welcome relief for everyone but the racers. Most found that the course was slippery with some tackiness in surprising areas, however paying attention to the wet lines while dialling in their practice runs that morning had little value as the sun was out by noon and the course was nearly dry by the end of the day. Unfortunately the weather was as unpredictable as Britney Spears during her head shaving years, and the wind came up; course tape billowed, trees threatened to fall, and only part way through the timed practice runs the mountain had to shut the lift down.

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Pinkbike: Endless Biking - Kids These Days

This could be a story about how mountain biking saved Eric (Lornny) Lawrenuk from a life of professional rollerblading, but instead it is the story of someone who found mountain biking at an early age and has used it to shape his path in life. 

If you have ever met Eric it is clear from the start that he has the right mix to be successful at anything he sets his mind to. Dedication and skills are only half the equation of being great; it is equally as much about who you are as what you can do. And it is clear that Eric has a strongly developed sense of self. Following in his older brother’s footsteps he experimented with hockey, skateboarding and rollerblading before finding mountain biking. Biking is where he stopped following and set out in a direction that would define his individuality.

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Pinkbike: Machetes, Chickens, and Bike Checks

Barra de Potosi is a small Mexican fishing village tucked into a nook where an expansive lagoon meets the Pacific Ocean. As with any area dependent on the commerce generated by fishing, there have been years of financial struggle for the people who live there. The Red Cross rebuilt the village after a Tsunami all but wiped it out in 1985. Since then, the community has proven resilient against international developers, global warming, pollution and many other threats to their way of life. 

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Pinkbike: A Wolf Amongst the Sheep

Some names have been changed to protect the innocent and unfortunately not-so-innocent.

Last month local police executed a warrant for a home in a middle class neighborhood in Vancouver; they were searching for stolen bikes. The house belonged to a businessman, his wife and children - your average nuclear family. Nothing stood out about the property, a well kept house with a nice car parked in the driveway, that would alert you to any wrongdoing within. Next to his kids' pedal bikes in the garage hung the owner's mountain bike, next to that police found roughly $20,000 of suspected stolen bike parts.

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Pinkbike: Endless Biking - Mother Huckers

No matter how passionate you are about riding, having a child changes your world. It changes how you do things, how long it takes you to do things, and most importantly, how much you do for yourself. 

At one time in your life you may have looked outside to a sunny day, grabbed your bike and headed off for hours of riding without a care in the world. Days like that feel like a distant memory when you are trying to get out the door and your child is having a meltdown. You are almost always late by the time you make ten trips out to the car, are confident that you have everything, the tears are dried, the pouting has subsided and a suitable distraction found. Technical climbs and rocky descents used to be the hardest part of the ride, but now simply exiting the house leaves you exhausted. 

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The B-Side: Death and Tacos

I spent much of last year with my head deep in bikes. I rode bikes, photographed races, organized the BC Bike Race, and wrote a column for Bike Mag; it was an amazing year where a biblical 

Crankwor and an Apocalypse Now-esque Red Bull Rampage, on behalf of Pinkbike, were just two of the many highlights. Over the years, my social circle has become very two-wheel oriented; when I was not out riding with friends, I was making plans to go, or meeting new people with the same passion. Mountain biking has slowly infiltrated every part of my life, even to the extent that my work and personal time blend together around events, parties and contracts. But then suddenly, it was all gone. 

It would be three months before I finally pulled my bike out of storage and started to think about my new column with Pinkbike again; now 90 days overdue. The only problem? I would not know if I liked riding bikes anymore. 

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Pinkbike: Endless Biking - The Roots

Endless Biking is celebrating 10 years of building riders, as part of their celebration they are sponsoring ten articles that revolve around the fundamentals of their business; bikes, community and learning. 

The roots of Endless Biking push back beyond their inaugural camps in 2004 to the early 90’s and days of riding in hiking boots and chasing buffalo on borrowed bikes. Raised in non-mountain biking families, Kelli and Darren, owners and operators of Endless Biking, both still remember the moment that riding came into their lives and the profound change it brought with it. 

In Nelson, British Columbia, Kelli remembers a purposeful adventure on borrowed bikes into the mountains that made her both want to puke – on the climb – and feel the spark of addiction – on the singletrack. Immediately she began to dream about the feeling of being a kid again and it was not long after that she got her very first bank loan and purchased her very first mountain bike. 

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Pinkbike: Race Report: FrostBike Finals 2014

Racers woke up yesterday to a powder day, loose track and freezing temperatures. Despite a frozen generator for timing and the course markings obscured by the new snowfall, the event started on time and ran smoothly. Standing at the start line, racers looked like they were dropping into a snow globe as the flurries of new snow continued all day. Most came in hot to the first berm during practice, kicking up snow as they got a foot out in time or didn't. Resort staff skied down the track in intervals to pack down the snow and by the time the race started everyone was used to the new conditions and the times were fast with some racers even boasting clean runs!

True to a grassroots event there was nothing but fun with crowd approved grandstanding, good-natured heckling and plenty of Tippie jokes. Even mechanicals and crashes that often warrant angry adult tantrums at the more serious races where embraced here with laughter and head shakes. More that anything, FrostBike gave us the chance to get in some pre-season practice, see our long lost racing friends and drink beer. 

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Pinkbike: Practice Makes Perfect, Right? FrostBike 2014

With temperatures low enough to make Farley Mowatt proud, this year's FrostBike course is a little faster and a little less treacherous (only a little) than the inaugural event last year. The crew at SilverStar Resort worked hard to prep a course this year that has not only provided a little extra challenge and fun in snow, but with below freezing temperature, has kept the ruts to a minimum, speeds high, and with some smoothing out overnight, the berms feeling luge-worthy. 

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The Bakery: My Road to Rampage

My road to Rampage started in Moab when I drunkenly arranged to become a stowaway in the Fox van. For more than six hours on the Monday before the event I stared out the window as the terrain changed like channels with scenes from “Indiana Jones” to the sand people from “Star Wars.” Each time the van braked, I expected to see a cartoon roadrunner being chased down by a coyote. I focused on being a good passenger, tried not to think about how much I had to pee and giggled quietly as we passed through Beaver, Utah.

Pinkbike: Scars

Scars and tattoos are often compared, however while tattoos are used to purposely decorate, commemorate or remind us why we don't drink tequila, scars are usually forced upon us. I got my first scar when I was eight, I went over the handle bars of my bike and landed on the jagged end of a stump. Your first scar in life gives you much freedom, like the first time you scratch the paint on a new bike or drop your $600 helmet, it's game on after that. Years later a friend's mom looked at me and exclaimed "Look at your legs! If you were my daughter you would be grounded!" If I had worried about preserving my legs my whole life, I would be boring as hell!

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The Bakery: My Mom's New Bike

At the beginning of the summer my mom asked me to help her pick out a new bike. Currently she has a sweet pink cruiser that was meant to be a typical mom bike; I thought that maybe she would add a basket and ride it to the fruit stand down the beach from her Mexican villa on Sundays. Nope.

Averaging about 12 miles a day, my mom has spent three years turning her cruiser into a mean performance machine. Every year when I visit something else has been changed; the seat has gotten wider and skinnier, harder and softer, taller and lower and at one point exploded into a multitude of parts, probably an expression of protest over its many adjustments.

Pinkbike: 2013 Red Bull Rampage: THE DRAFT



This morning was reminiscent of Apocalypse Now as we drove along the rutted and beat down dirt road that winds into the canyon, the filming heli rose up from behind the ridge and ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ rattled in the back of our minds. The basecamp was quiet as racer awaited news about whether or not they would be heading into battle this morning; winds threatened to ruin the show as decisions that balanced risk and investment were made. 

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Pinkbike: 2013 Red Bull Rampage: The Oakley Sender



The Oakely Sender has a life of its own at Red Bull Rampage, it is more than just a slopestyle-esque feature in a big mountain world, it is a labor of love for all of the many hands that have touched it since its inception. Born in 2010, the structure was originally the brainchild of Steve Blick and Todd Barber, the idea was sparked in an attempt to help Cedric Gracia with his run after his return to the event from an injury. On the way to the original construction Steve’s son, Tyler, went in the hospital, they would later find out that he had leukemia, and in an attempt to keep his spirits high, the original design took shape after his favourite movie, Indiana Jones. As Tylers’s illness continued, the Oakley Sender would become a project of solace for Steve, and a personal creative endeavor for many more. 

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Pinkbike: 2013 Red Bull Rampage: Profile - Vanderham



Thomas is a quiet and humble soul, the type of guy who makes you feel like you are yelling because he is so soft spoken. He is also the only rider to have placed in the top ten in every Rampage, but who is counting? He certainly isn’t. This will be his eighth Rampage, he will be running plate number eight and you will never guess what his lucky number is. The stars are aligning for Thomas this year. With practice cancelled, I found him doing nearly nothing on a rainy day in Utah. 

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Pinkbike: 2013 Red Bull Rampage: Profile - Norbraten



Red Bull Rampage is one of those opportunities you want to take advantage of and want to be a part of. For Kyle it has always been the style of riding that he enjoys the most, and a style that you do not get a lot of opportunities to do; flowing big lines and linking together things like big step-downs on this kind of terrain. The feeling of putting down a run and the excitement of just being around the event are what draws some of the athletes in. There are not a lot of riders in the big mountain scene, but it is a challenging area to grow with the venues being hard to access. 

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