Norco is big out here on the west coast of British Columbia, partly because it’s a homegrown company but also because its bikes have generally proven to be solid rides that give great value to consumers. And, while the company doesn’t introduce re-vamped models every year or two like many of the other manufacturers in the industry, Norco spends a good amount of time tweaking and revising its bikes each season. For 2007, Norco continues down a well trodden path, cranking out a bike lineup that looks set to give fans plenty of ways to make it up and down the mountain (and to rip along the road, if that suits your fancy).
Now that I’ve got the cheesy introduction out of the way, let’s have a look at some of the Norco bikes that’ll be out there next year.
Note: I’ll get some time on a number of these bikes as next season progresses, so you’ll likely get some feedback on their real-world performance. Read the rest »
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Dean sends us some helmet cam footage of one of the North Shore’s classic trails: Upper Oilcan. The rub with this one is that the footage was shot at night. For any of you who’ve ridden this trail in the daylight, you’ll understand that riding it in the dark is an acquired talent.
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CLEVELAND ROCKS IS BACK
That’s right folks, Cleveland Rocks is back for a third year!
The first bus trip of the season from St. Catharines, Ontario to Ray’s Indoor Mountain Bike Park in Cleveland, Ohio has been scheduled for Nov. 25.
Registration is now open on the official trip site located here.
The trips this year will be organized through the TheBikingHub.com, so be sure to check back here often for updates and trip reports.
The trip can only happen if we get 35 people on board, so register at the Cleveland Rocks website as soon as possible. Registration will be $5 cheaper if you sign up and pay before Nov. 1.
And watch for a complete “What did you ride today” review on Ray’s Indoor Mountain Bike Park, which now has something for everyone with box jumps, north shore stunts, a foam pit, cross country courses, a skatepark-style area and more!
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Floyd Landis has taken his defence of the doping allegations against him public.
The 2006 Tour de France winner who was alleged to have an illegal testosterone ratio during the race, posted documents and presentations on his website which he plans to use to fight the United States Anti-Doping Agency’s disciplinary process against him. Read the rest »
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Interbike Wrapup
Well, I’m back from Vegas and after resting for a week or so I can finally get back to the grind here. Once again the show was incredible with literally thousands of new products from hundreds of companies.
Every year there seems to be some sort of theme that emerges from the. Last year was the year of carbon, where every manufacturer seemed the need to make multiple items out of the weave. This year there seems to be a few emerging trends which was quickly evident by walking around a few booths. The first is sort of a continuation of a theme from last year, which is 29” mountain bikes. More manufacturers have added 29” bikes to their lineups, but many have started playing with the mix from going to a single-speed model to using the 69-er style, which is a 26” wheel on the back and a 29” wheel up front.
The second theme is cyclocross. With the road bike segment starting to cool off a little bit, it seems retailers are spreading their buying dollars around. Cyclocross is a growing segment and the options at Interbike range from basic models with alloy frames and low-end groupsets to full carbon fibre frames with SRAM Force and Shimano Dura-Ace grouppos.
Here are some of the bigger companies with some interesting new products to show. In the next few weeks, we’ll have a few reviews of some of the funkier new products that were on display. Read the rest »
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The Cut crew visits LA Hospital
For sometimes obvious reasons, freeride and downhill mountain bikers sometimes get the reputation as being party animals who care more about themselves than anyone else.
That’s why it’s nice to hear some riders are trying to change that opinion by doing something nice to make the lives of other people better.
Cannondale’s team riders known as The Cut headed to the Childrens Hospital of Los Angeles Monday where they visited with the kids and put on a riding demonstration. Read the rest »
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The 29 inch wheeled bike segment may be typified by the single speed hard tail right now, but if a few forward thinking individuals get their way, that won’t be what you think of in the future. There is a growing movement in the 29″er mountain biking world and it is a gravity fed one.
A Quick history of 29′er DH/FR
Early on the 29″er bicycle met with much resistance and one of the most vociferous groups was the All mountain/ Freeride crowd. They were quite sure that the larger wheel size would never see action on their trails due to the “inherent” lack of strength and the total lack of suitable equipment to ride with. It’s now looking as if these obstacles are being swept aside and that a new era in mountain biking might just be around the corner.
Strong words? Perhaps you haven’t heard of Lenz Cycles, a company out of Colorado steeped in downhill and freeride tradition. Company head, Devin Lenz took up the challenge to build a durable, workable 29″er trail bike early on and created the Leviathan. In the beginning, it was only a three inch travel frame, which matched most closely with the forks available at the time. Now with the addition of four inch travel White Brothers forks to the 29″er arsenal, Lenz has stepped up and produced the Behemoth, a five inch travel frame and increased the travel on his Lenz Leviathans to four inches. Read the rest »
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Went out for a quick rip yesterday morning on the Red Mountain cross country course in Mission, BC. The trail conditions on the mountain are really influenced by the weather, but since it’s been sunny and cool for the past five or six days, the trail is really dialled.
The xc course on Red isn’t that demanding, but it does have a couple of spots that keep you on your toes.
Sorry for the relative lack of photos, but we didn’t spend a whole lot of time snoozing on the side of the trail.
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There are three seasons in a cyclist’s calendar – riding season, off-season and trade show season. There are hundreds of bike shows across North America each year, but only a handful register on the radars of nearly every rider out there.
With Eurobike already out of the way and Interbike less than two weeks away, the Canadian cycling industry held its annual ExpoCycle trade show in Montreal Sept. 10-12. Most of the 3,000 bike shops across the country sent some sort of representation to the show, which gives dealers and media the chance to see some of the new products that will be on the market for the upcoming riding season. I had a chance to cover the show once again for Pedal Magazine (see the stories at www.pedalmag.com) and it was as bling-blingy and fun as ever.
Where the 2005 shows seemed to be the year of the all-carbon-all-the-time attitude, 2006 seems to have manufacturers classing up their use of carbon with more dramatic and artistic molding, more paint-covered designs and mixing the weave with exotic materials such as carbon and magnesium.
The show this year also showed the increased popularity in triathlons, with dozens of manufacturers making components, bikes or clothing specifically designed for tri events. Triathlons are a fun alternative to just biking, and you’ll read more about these here on TheBikingHub in the future.
Anyway, after hours and hours of walking around the ExpoCycle show at Place Bonaventure in downtown Montreal, I’ve come up with a list of companies with products that really blew me away. Here’s my top 10 list of favourite items found at this year’s show. Read the rest »
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I don’t spend too much ride time on Vancouver’s North Shore but, a couple of times per year, I throw my bike on my car and make the 45 minute drive to one of the Shore’s main mountain bike destinations (Seymour, Fromme, or Cypress). On a whim, I headed out to Fromme this morning to ride Seventh Secret, a technical singletrack line that winds its way through some pretty steep, rooty terrain.
The day was blessed with classic Shore weather — light rain and low cloud — and I passed a bunch of riders on the way up who were looking for the same type of day as me. After I got over the fact that my Crank Bros. Egg Beaters and my shoes didn’t get along, and there wasn’t much I could do about it (the wet rubber on the soles of my shoes squeaked every which way but loose whenever they were in contact with the spindles on the Egg Beaters), I settled into the 35ish minute climb up to Seventh. Read the rest »
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