TransAlp Invitational

So the first ever Independent Fabrication Owners’ Club in association with rothar.com invitational is fully booked. Organised in conjunction with the wonderful Mary Kirkbride from Ride the Alps, riders Jed Southwood, Nige Harris and Jam Price will be joining me and a handful of other people for a summer epic in the high alps next summer Chamonix to Zermatt over a week in a fully supported epic adventure. It’s going to be great and then there’s the extra riding we want to fit in too. So all we need to do now is persuade Jed to get an IF so he doesn’t fit left out…

One person who’s not feeling left out is Wee Ben, who’s riding like a bit of a legend up north of the border.

From: Benjammin
Subject: Westcoast100

ey up,

Hows it going?

I’m doing pretty good, fitting into country life pretty well, enjoying the more relaxing slow pace – its all good.

Got myself a litlle van (m reg renault extra) which is sweet, you can get two downhill bikes in it easy (with the wheels in – bonus for bolt through owners), so i’ve kinda been jetting about in that since i got it. First up was checking out my mates trails in inverness (glen urquhart bike park), which are dope, the bike park is well good with a whistler style jump box, a little road gap thing and loads of north shore skinny’s. There’s also a secret trail if you’re in the know – which is such good fun, steep, rooty, rocky and slidy. And it boasts (i kid not i’ve seen it) a 30 foot gully gap (gap being easily 25 foot down onto rocks), which i didn’t do. Nae chance.

check out pinkbike put ‘glen urquhart‘ into location, i think, on the photo page and its mostly there.

Went to the fort bill world cup too which was great fun, saw my old mate rich, aka cunny, (see the newest dirt – he’s the ugly one doing the road trip) and saw peaty win which was pretty special, he was the last man on the hill and the crowd went nuts.

Anyway, we’re off to innerleithen in about a week for the next uplift, soooo looking forward to that new dh course it looks like fun.

Any way i’ll get some photo’s up soon (the site doesnt like mac’s, and my pc’s dead), you’ll have to bare with me though.

laters dude

Anyway there were a few who wanted to be involved but couldn’t quite make it, so I’m proposing a multi day Trans-Wales Epic sometime around Easter next year. The usual suspects are all invited. More details soon, but it’ll probably be a variation on the IMBA UK route.

Loads of mountain bike stuff out at the shows, including lots of carbontastic stuff from Specialized and a new Trek ~~Madone~~ Mountain Bike, the 9.9 Hardtail. So all those people who said the hardtail was dead a few years ago will be gutted to hear that if anything the hardtail is definitely still alive and now fighting the substantial full suspension market with the latest composite materials, but they’re far from the do everything bikes of ten years ago. These latest bikes from the big players are 100% cross country racers – you’ll not find the downhillers racing these bikes. If you want something that’s an evolution of bikes from back in the day check out the Surly Pugsly. 10 Psi tyre pressures anyone?

So here’s a great bit of PR, but for who? Not all news is good news that’s for sure. Finally, do you know anyone from Northern Ireland?