Tomorrow I wake up, roll out of bed, and head directly to the airport - do not pass go, do not collect $200 (although that would be nice...).
Mr. Bryden and I are vamoosing to Hawaii for almost 2 weeks of sunshine and summery wonderfulness! Feels like Christmas to me! And so that we don't have to be sans bikes for 2 weeks, we're taking our road bikes along and are going to do some exploring that way.
We've been planning this all winter, so I'm pretty excited that the time has finally come! The last couple of months have been a pretty steady diet of working, spinning on the trainer indoors at 5:30am while watching an episode of "Lost" (totally hooked!), running, and riding mountain bikes on weekends. The time has actually flown by, and by the time we're back from Hawaii it will be officially spring and race season will be just around the corner!
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
Monday, January 25, 2010
A Poof of Fun
What a weekend - fun filled from start to finish! We had a sunny start on Friday which was perfect weather for Bryden and I on our little hike up the Grouse Grind. For some reason I really enjoy the Grind. It gets the heart rate max'd right out for quite a while, and always feels good once you're done.
Saturday was a full day of riding on Cypress. Aaah how I love Cypress! We started right from the upper trails and didn't see a speck of snow. Perfect riding conditions in the middle of January... I'm spoiled.
We did a few laps, including some new to me bits which were awesome!
A fun log ride to drop off the to the right...
...from another angle:
Sunday we headed to the Sunshine Coast with the ever growing Velocity Cycles crew. Last time it was 9, this time it was 13! And of those 13, 5 were girls!
I had so much fun! Fast, flowy, smooth trails... hard to find those on the Shore so it was a treat for sure! One of the trails was called Cunning Stunts and was pretty much all skinnies, so I got a bit of balance practice in as well.
The problem with having so much fun is that the time disappears before your eyes. The weekend flew by! Time to start dreaming of my next ride...
Saturday was a full day of riding on Cypress. Aaah how I love Cypress! We started right from the upper trails and didn't see a speck of snow. Perfect riding conditions in the middle of January... I'm spoiled.
We did a few laps, including some new to me bits which were awesome!
A fun log ride to drop off the to the right...
...from another angle:
Sunday we headed to the Sunshine Coast with the ever growing Velocity Cycles crew. Last time it was 9, this time it was 13! And of those 13, 5 were girls!
I had so much fun! Fast, flowy, smooth trails... hard to find those on the Shore so it was a treat for sure! One of the trails was called Cunning Stunts and was pretty much all skinnies, so I got a bit of balance practice in as well.
The problem with having so much fun is that the time disappears before your eyes. The weekend flew by! Time to start dreaming of my next ride...Monday, December 21, 2009
Oooh La La
2010 brings with it some exciting news - the Canadian DH Girls, previously consisting of Katrina Strand and Claire Buchar, has expanded to 6 members: Miranda Miller, Rebecca McQueen, Micayla Gatto, and myself are now also members of the team!
The new Canadian DH Girls website is up and running and will be updated on a regular basis, so should be pretty interesting to keep up with.
I also wrote a little more in depth article for CCN about this at
The new Canadian DH Girls website is up and running and will be updated on a regular basis, so should be pretty interesting to keep up with.
I also wrote a little more in depth article for CCN about this at
Mid December?
Hard to believe it's almost Christmas and the trails are almost completely snow free! Bryden and I went out for a couple of laps on Cypress this past weekend - first lap on Wild Cherry, second lap on Mystery DH. It wasn't too cold, it wasn't too wet, and it most certainly did not feel like winter.
Above is Bryden checking out the "cherry bomb". In my opinion it's one of the coolest rocks on Cypress - a fairly short but very steep rock roll. I always like to stop and look at it before riding it, and always think it looks almost too steep to ride... it gives me a bit a nice little adrenaline rush every time!
And there's B riding it, just a blur of orange.
That's all the pics I have from that ride. I planned on taking way more but the act of having to stop riding to take a picture is sometimes quite difficult to do! It was an awesome ride! Thanks James for shuttling us!!!
Above is Bryden checking out the "cherry bomb". In my opinion it's one of the coolest rocks on Cypress - a fairly short but very steep rock roll. I always like to stop and look at it before riding it, and always think it looks almost too steep to ride... it gives me a bit a nice little adrenaline rush every time!
And there's B riding it, just a blur of orange.
That's all the pics I have from that ride. I planned on taking way more but the act of having to stop riding to take a picture is sometimes quite difficult to do! It was an awesome ride! Thanks James for shuttling us!!!Sunday, December 13, 2009
Christmas Came Early!
I'm so excited!! Next season I'll be racing on an Intense 951 and it just arrived! It felt like Christmas, tearing off the plastic and unwrapping it... a brand spankin' new green 951 DH bike frame. A lean, mean green speed machine!
I have never had my race bike so early - the last couple of years it was late spring so this is quite the treat. It means I can leisurely get my bike put together and hopefully avoid all that last minute rush before the season starts. A HUGE thank you to Travis from Velocity Cycles in Langley for making this green dream a reality!
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Cypress Hill
Cypress is my favourite local mountain. It has some of the steepest, gnarliest, technical riding around and has more natural stunts over man-made structures. It can be a bit of a humbling experience to ride there, but I enjoy the challenge. The adrenaline rush and high that follows a good ride on Cypress is hard to beat!
Mid-November B and I got out for 3 amazing laps on Cypress. There's been a lot of snowfall on the mountains lately, and it'd come down to a little ways below the start of the trails.
We started with a lap down Paul Hogans and into what's left of Family Guy. James picked us up at the bottom and shuttled up for our next 2 laps, first of which was Fifth Horsemen. In my opinion this is one of the most fun and difficult trails up there. We took a few minutes to enjoy our first snowfall of the year before we made our way down.
There is a lot of rock on Fifth, and a lot of steep. Combining the two is what makes it so challenging. You really have to pick your lines all the way down and finesse that braking.
And of all the sections on the trail, this is the steepest. It's like riding down a very steep staircase, where the steps are huge and uneven and covered in roots and mud. And you have to ride down it at an angle. And there's no side rail. And it's a long ways down! Oh it's fun!
Bryden pulled out the racer line - straight and fast... and smooth as always.
It's hard to capture the steepness on film, but it's there.
B checking out one of the rock faces.
Our final lap was a run down every racer's favourite on that mountain: Mystery DH. It's by far the fastest and smoothest trails on Cypress, and a great way to finish off an awesome day of riding! It starts higher than most trails so it had the most snow of the day. Riding in snow is almost like riding in the wet, but magnified. You really have to stay loose and not fight the constant slipping around that your tires do. Easier said than done of course...
Mid-November B and I got out for 3 amazing laps on Cypress. There's been a lot of snowfall on the mountains lately, and it'd come down to a little ways below the start of the trails.
We started with a lap down Paul Hogans and into what's left of Family Guy. James picked us up at the bottom and shuttled up for our next 2 laps, first of which was Fifth Horsemen. In my opinion this is one of the most fun and difficult trails up there. We took a few minutes to enjoy our first snowfall of the year before we made our way down.
There is a lot of rock on Fifth, and a lot of steep. Combining the two is what makes it so challenging. You really have to pick your lines all the way down and finesse that braking.
And of all the sections on the trail, this is the steepest. It's like riding down a very steep staircase, where the steps are huge and uneven and covered in roots and mud. And you have to ride down it at an angle. And there's no side rail. And it's a long ways down! Oh it's fun!
Bryden pulled out the racer line - straight and fast... and smooth as always.
It's hard to capture the steepness on film, but it's there.
B checking out one of the rock faces.
Our final lap was a run down every racer's favourite on that mountain: Mystery DH. It's by far the fastest and smoothest trails on Cypress, and a great way to finish off an awesome day of riding! It starts higher than most trails so it had the most snow of the day. Riding in snow is almost like riding in the wet, but magnified. You really have to stay loose and not fight the constant slipping around that your tires do. Easier said than done of course...
Island Times
At the beginning of November Bryden and I went on a weekend trip to Vancouver Island to visit some family and do some Island riding.
By early afternoon we found ourselves on the DH race course in Port Alberni. Bryden's dad shuttled us up to the top of the lookout for our first lap, and then we pushed up for our second.
It was a wet day, but the trail was fast! The last time we'd ridden that trail was when we raced it as part of the Island Cup series in the middle of the summer. The deep dust of the summer had turned to deep mud puddles...
Sunday morning we met up with a few of Bryden's friends who took us out on some good pedaly loops out by Sproat Lake. We were a little out of place on our big DH rigs. Let's just call that "training".
We also went and checked out where Bryden spent his first few years growing up. There wasn't much left but some remnants of where his house had been.
And the final little excursion before hopping back on the ferry was a trip to Stamp Falls.
The trail started just behind the closed sign.
I've gone to the island several times now this year and am finding out how beautiful it is there. Nothing like a relaxing weekend get-away to prepare you for another week.
And the final little excursion before hopping back on the ferry was a trip to Stamp Falls.
The trail started just behind the closed sign.
I've gone to the island several times now this year and am finding out how beautiful it is there. Nothing like a relaxing weekend get-away to prepare you for another week.
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