A few months ago The Moe took a dive during a DH practice run at Fontana. He took a jump, landed but his bike bucked him off and OTB he went. Little did he know that his fall actually resulted in a REALLY messed up shoulder. He knew it hurt but he didn’t know the extent of the injury since he kept DH racing. Months later the pain got to The Moe. He finally went in and the doctor said that he tore his labral or something like that. That meant surgery, a few screws and orders that he stay off the bike for months.

Well its been a long few months and the Doc gave him the ok to start riding again. When The Moe told me that he wanted to ride the Fullerton Loop, I assembled a Welcome Back Ride with a few Trail Thugs to help him ease back into the joy of riding.

The Moe

Randall Robinson. He has a nick name of “Full Squish.” But that was sooo 2008. I’m assigning him a new name. Randall “Radical” Robinson.

Priscilla “hawtness” Policar

The Dr. is in! Gabe “Dr. Thunda” Preda

I actually forgot his name, so for now, his name is “This Guy.”

Cameron “Mac” McMackin. That’s one cool last name! Can you imagine all the ways you can use that? “McLovin’”, “MacDaddy”, “Daddy Mac”, “Snackin On Da Mackin”, “Mac Attack”, “Mac Mac”…the possibilities are endless.

Andrew “GoGo” Gomez

The Moe felt pretty good during the ride. Though there were times he had to walk some of the hills, he was back in his groove on the descents.

Have you ever heard of that saying, “your bike will go where you’re looking?” Well sure enough, The Moe was trying to avoid the mud pit and look where he ended up.

hmm…I guess 29ers don’t really roll over everything.

By the end of it all, we had an awesome time. No injuries, no mechanicals, just pure fun. We’re glad to see The Moe Back on the trails. Who knows, you may see him at the next DH Race.

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For the past few years, we’ve been hosting an annual New Year’s Day Ride at the Fullerton Loop. We usually keep the pace at a very mild and easy tone in which we’ve dubbed it a “relaxed vibe.” We keep it mellow to be sensitive to the party goers from the night before.

Earlier this week I announced that we were having our ride through our Facebook Fan Page and through my weekend ride mailing list. This ride in particular is the hardest to get rsvp’s for. Not too many people want to wake up early to go riding. However, this year we started at 9am, which allowed riders to get some coffee to wake up from their hangovers.

At one point, we had about 11 riders in our group. Some of the folks with us just happen to tag along since they needed a tour guide. Being Filipino, it is in my blood to eat dogs and to bring a camera every where I go. Today was no exception, however, the Asian food store ran out of dog meat…but I did bring the camera today and took some pics of our ride.

The first climb of the Loop seems to always get a few people to dismount. It’s short and steep, and on some days its even sandy. But since we had some rain a few days ago, the ground was in perfect condition.

From left to right, Cameron, Andrew,Mike, Khoa(center),Priscilla, Robert and The Thunda (Gabe).

Towards the end of our ride, we came across this memorial. There was death a few weeks back of a young man who was found in the stream after a few days of hard rain. Pretty sad.

Weird thing was, there was another death at the Loop just this morning. As we were riding through the rail road tracks, Fullerton PD just started taking down the Police yellow tape. Word has it, there was an 18 year old male found dead on the tracks…creepy.

Khoa hasn’t been on the bike since the day light savings time change. He’s been focused entirely on snow boarding, so seeing him on the trail was pretty cool. He won’t admit it, but I think he likes biking better the boarding.

Cameron and Priscilla

Gabe was yelling at me, “I can’t believe its not butter!”

Here’s Mike before. I say before because he had a bit of an accident at the very end of the ride. He went OTB, got hurt pretty bad. Priscilla and I had to rush him to the ER. Turns out he had what they call a AC Separation. Kinda odd to see because part of his collar bone was protruding. But it wasn’t broken or anything. The good news, no surgery needed. They drugged up Mike with some heavy narcotics and was picked up by his family to rest at home. Get well soon Mike!

Before all that happened with Mike, we met up with David from Felt Bicycles. He was riding this ultra bad ass beast of a bike. It’s called the Felt Redemption 2, its not quite available in the US, but he let us take turns riding it.

Priscilla, Khoa, Andrew and I took turns riding it. Oh man this thing is amazing. It weighs nearly 40lbs, but it feels like you’re pedaling a XC bike. But the 40mm stanchions clearly gave an indication that this bike was meant for greater things than the Loop. David actually has plans on racing the Winter Series with this bike. I’m sure he’ll do really well, that thing is awesome!

In closing, our annual post party ride was great. The Fullerton Loop may not be the best, and most technical trail out there. But it sure has helped bring on some great memories over the years. For those of you that didn’t make it this year, just make sure you don’t party too hard next new year’s eve so you can make it to the 2011 ride.

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A small crack commando group from the MtnBikeRiders Crew assembled a relaxed vibe ride that consisted of a fantastic lap around the Fullerton Loop. This ride was to be followed by an Easter Egg Hunt at the trail head. Invites were sent and our fab-O-luscious friend, Vince Rodarte (KHS Sideways Sales Manager), and his two awesome kids, Dylan and Erin joined us for the ride. We were also graced by the presence of our two great friends Dan and Khoa.

Man now that I think about it, I didn’t take a pictures of the ride, only videos. Forgive me if I’ve used this song before.

Watch the little guy wearing the FreeAgent jersey and helmet (Dylan R.). The fella rode about 8 miles of the Loop on a BMX bike!

By the way, I have to mention that Priscilla rode her single speed and she was on FIRE!

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Gary Fisher Roscoe III

Round number 2 was on the Gary Fisher Roscoe. I had to wait a little while for this one as some dude drove from Vegas to test ride it. That’d be 4 plus hours of driving each way!

Before we get going on the review, I have to preface my thoughts on the Gary Fisher Roscoe with this statement: My riding style is not the one that is being targeted by the Roscoe. I am definitely more of a XC/Trail type rider while the Roscoe with its five and a half inches of travel is definitely shooting for the All Mountain crowd. I have ridden AM type bikes but I am just too timid to really get the best out of them, the Roscoe included. Also, the Fullerton Loop is not an AM type trail so I’d definitely read my thoughts with this information in mind.

Wide hydroformed top tube makes for a much stiffer frame

On our second run, we hooked up with John from Jax Fullerton. He jumped on the Superfly I was riding while Full Squish Randall got on HiFi 29er and I got some seat time on the Roscoe. John, by the way, is a great mechanic and happens to be a very good road racer as well.

My first thought when I got on the Roscoe is that this baby is stout. The hydroformed tubing is thick. The first tube you notice is the top tube which is much wider than any other top tube I’ve ridden. This definitely lent a bit of stiffness to the whole bike that I’m sure is useful when you’re hucking off 6 foot drops. You really can’t tell the thickness in the pictures on Gary Fisher’s website but the top & down tube are wide. The tapered headtube is also different going from 1 1/8 inch to 1 1/2 inch at the crown of the fork. This design is supposed to increase the strength between the headtube and fork, but nothing on the loop was gnarly enough to test this.

Proprietary Dual Rate Control Valve (DRCV) shock made things plush

Coming off the hardtail Superfly I also immediately noticed how plush the suspension travel was. It was almost like night and day and rightfully so going from the racey Superfly to the AM Roscoe. The proprietary Dual Rate Control Valve (DRCV) was smooth and felt good on all the extra credit stuff I threw at it. I also got some time on the HiFi 29er later on and the 4 inches of travel on the HiFi doesn’t have nearly the plushness of the Roscoe’s DRCV shock. Not even close.

The Roscoe does not like for the rider to stand up and hammer out climbs. Every time I tried to stand and climb I immediately felt like the Roscoe telling me to sit back down. The bike is definitely more of a spin, spin, spin type climber which I think is fine and lends itself well to this style of mountain biking.

White bikes with white forks always look good to me. The beefy tires were a bit too aired up for excellent grip

The steering was not as slack as I remember other AM rigs I’ve ridden. The last time I rode an AM rig I distinctly remember that the steering was very slow which is great on the descents as it made things a bit more stable. The flipside to this is that it slowed things down too much for me on the switchbacks and tricky sections that require more finesse and less of a plow through mentality. The G2 steering on the Roscoe, however, seemed to give the best of both worlds as it still had some pep through the tight stuff but retained its stability for the downhill.

As you can probably tell I am a little high on the Roscoe. I think this is mainly because 1. the bike is really good and 2. the 10 mile Fullerton Loop is too short to shake out the bike entirely. More time on the bike is definitely needed to draw definitive conclusions.

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This past weekend, my friend Full Squish Randall & I went out and rode some bikes at the Trek Demo in Fullerton. First off, I got to give props to Matt Gfell of Jax Fullerton. Matt got us started on a couple of matching Gary Fisher Superflys. Full Squish Randall & I were like twin clydes on our Superfly demos!

Matt Gfell, General Manager extraordinaire at Jax Fullerton

This was Full Squish Randall’s first ride on a 29er and the Superfly did not disappoint. I heard many random 29” wheel comments from him including how he had better traction on the climbs than he did on his 26” bikes and of course the whole “momentum” thing. He also made a point to mention how the 29” wheels really do roll over trail stuff better than the 26” bike would.

I sat on “RL”

So we know the 29” wheels rock but how was the Superfly? Well, what I can tell you is that on our ride I really dug the Superfly.

The Superfly is the top of the line 29er hardtail produced by Gary Fisher. It is geared toward racing or just riding REALLY fast. The monocoque carbon frame comes equipped with a very good, but not all top of the line level build kit. Thankfully, the component specs does not take away from the bike. Rather the X0 shifters mated to the X9 front and X0 rear derailleurs made me reconsider just how much of a step down an all X9 drivetrain really is compared to the Superfly’s setup. But these are just little things. What about the frame, geometry and fork?

Superfly, I’m not crazy about the new graphics… I prefer the originals understated-ness

Well, the bike absolutely flies and I’m becoming more convinced of the G2 steering. The last time I was at the Trek Demo was about a year and a half ago when G2 had just come out. I was not fully convinced of the benefits of the G2 steering. I’m not sure as to why, but this year I am more of a convert.

Where the Superfly shines is fast swoopy singletrack. Oh me oh my! I was grinning like a mad man after railing through the beginning singletrack of the Fullerton Loop. This area is by no means technical but it is fast and it can be very fun if you’re on the right steed and the Superfly was the right steed. What makes it so much fun was really one thing: steering. The G2 geometry allowed me to rip through the singletrack section and steer with my hips rather than with my arms which then translated to riding much faster. I felt like I take more speed into the flowy turns, lower the bike and really rail the singletrack. It felt really nice.

Full Squish Randall getting some air… I took the picture too early, but I’m pretty sure Full Squish’s rear wheel comes off the ground shortly thereafter

The pedal power transfer is almost instantaneous as expected with the rebranded DT Swiss hubs. Climbing was much more fun, first because the bike is lighter than just about any other bike I’ve ridden save my SS and secondly because the bike transfers power so well. There is no loss of power in the frame or the hubs. Turn the cranks and the Superfly feels almost like it is squirting out from underneath you! This is definitely a plus for those climbing aficionados.

The last thing I really noticed on the Superfly is that I never felt as though I had to really push back off the saddle when going downhill. The Fullerton Loop has no particularly technical descents. There are some slightly more technical “extra credit” sections such as a couple of short offshoot sections that are steeper than the trail’s normal section. I hit as many of these extra credit sections and came away impressed that I really didn’t have to push back off the saddle as much as I normally would. I’m not sure why this I but I’m pretty sure it has to do with the geometry. It did make me feel more confident to take even more technical terrain with the Superfly knowing that the bike can probably do more than my skills allow.

All in all, a great fast, light bike. At an MSRP of over $4,000 it is too steep price wise for my wallet and I can do without the graphics but this little hardtail has got me thinking of Fisher’s G2 29er hardtails again… making me want to consider getting one down the line.

Check back in soon for my thoughts on the Roscoe III, the 2nd bike I got to ride at the Trek Demo.

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Just got an email from our friend Matt G of Jax Fullerton about Trek’s Demo Day:

Many of you may already know this but Jax is having a Demo day march 7th (this Saturady) at the Fullerton loop from 8am-2pm. the 09′ Trek and Fisher mountain bikes as well as road bike will availible. I will also have the Woman Specfic Design trailer there as well. So if any one wants to bring there better half please do so. Call me, email me, or come into the store if you have any questions.

From the Trek website, they’ll have: Trek Madones, Six-Niners, Top Fuels, EX’s, Remedy’s, Sessions plus Gary Fisher HiFi 26″/29″, Superflys and Roscoes.

If you’re interested, click here for more info.

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Yesterday morning I decided to go on a “relaxed vibe” ride.  Being that my industry was also affected by the economy, I have some time on my hands.

I headed out to the ever so popular Fullerton Loop.  Accompanying me was my 1.5 yr old son, Jake.  The only time I’ve pulled him on the trailer was on city streets by our house; I’ve never taken him through any trails.  This ride will be a challenge.  Although we will be going on a slow pace, I’ll still have to climb with the trailer.  Also I wasn’t sure what to expect as far as his mood (cause small kids can change at a drop of a dime). 

Cruising through the Loop, I opted to skip the singletracks and the technical sections for the obvious reasons.  I stayed on the flat roads.  Along the way I made several stops to let Jake out and get acquainted with the surroundings.  I also stopped to make sure he was situated correctly on the trailer.  Our last stop was at Laguna Lake to watch the ducks. 

My riding partner was great!  He actually enjoyed being outdoors and didn’t make a fuss.  I wasn’t looking to go for a long ride however we managed to ride just shy of 8 miles… not bad.

Yesterday was totally relaxing.  The ride reminded me of my first rides here.  I made so many stops that I felt like a “newbie”.   I agree that we’ll have to plan “relax vibe” ride soon, without the pressures of training. 

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As many of you know, we recently added the Sette Razzo frame to our lineup of bikes here at mtnbikeriders.com WCH. The Sette Razzo was built up as a SS. I have to admit, I was, and still am, very tentative about riding a single speed. I probably got that way due to all the Moe & RL puke stories. I, like many of you, are not a fan of puking.

SS can be quite a workout, especially if you go rigid

I decided to hit my local test loop, the Fully loop, for my first ride on the Razzo SS. The loop starts off for almost flat with just a twinge of an incline. I immediately felt the desire to shift gears and go faster, so much so that my right thumb twitched. Of course, there was no gear to change into so I ended up spinning really fast here and there. But I wasn’t used to all the spinning and my legs quickly got tired of it. I’m going to have to work on that part of SS riding.

What I was really afraid of were the climbs. None of the loop climbs are particularly long, about the only thing the loop is missing, but some are on the steeper side. The first short quick steep after crossing Euclid was conquered without any issues. Rolling along the street after the climb was a bit annoying because again I couldn’t get my legs to spin up fast enough. But ahead lay the climbs and as much as I was annoyed by all the spinning out I was cognizant that the lower gearing would be greatly beneficial on the climbs.

Redline Mono 9 has 9 gears. This helped get me ready for Single Speed riding

The climb that really got me antsy begins with a mild fireroad ascent. It then rolls along a little before hitting a short rooty section followed by a short steeper section. The end of this is a little past the halfway point of the loop. No puking on this climb. I was close… but I held it down. One more climb which is made difficult with railroad ties was up next and only my pride plus the presence of a couple of hikers stopped me from letting it flow.

What I came to realize over my SS ride was that my body had built up a bit of a familiarity to sustained standing climbs which is really your only other “gear” when you’re riding a SS. The familiarity was achieved when I began riding the Redline Mono 9, a 1×9 geared 29er. Before the 1×9, I would sit and spin my way up but when I rode the 1×9 consistently I realized that if I sat and spun all the hills, I’d quickly run out of gears.

So I adopted a different approach to climbing that included a mixture of spinning for a while then climbing while staying in the same gear. For example, if I was in gear 4 on a seated climb and I felt I wanted to change gears, instead of choosing to shift I’d stand up and climb for a bit. This essentially doubled the number of “gears” I had available to me from 9 to 18 and also eased my transition from 27 gears down to one.

Being comfortable with sustained standing climbs turned out to be a great help when I rode the single speed. I truly believe that if I went straight from 27 gears to just one, I probably would have joined RL & Moe with puke stories of my own.

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For the past few years, I’ve made it a point to do a ride on New Year’s Day. Honestly its really hard to get a group ride going after a night full of partying. But luckily this year’s ride had a good turn out. We were joined by our newest riding buddy, David Sanderson as well as Eric “The Animal” Hunner. Priscilla, Moe and I met up with everyone this morning at 9:30am and rode the Loop at an easy pace.

Through out the ride, I was actually surprised by everyone’s performance. For the most part you wouldn’t think that any of them had hangovers…David recently purchased a new Redline Monocog 26 Single Speed and he was on fire.

Even though the rest of the crew did well riding, I was still recovering from being tired and fat. David and I actually rode Aliso Woods yesterday for a few hours. So if I include that ride, a long night trying to celebrate New Years, then my overall condition for riding was pretty sad…I was down right messed up. Luckily there’s this hot young thing that was kind enough to keep me company as I grinded my way through the trail…

David and Eric

The Moe

At one of the rest stops, we met up with our friend Christine. The last time we rode with her, she broke her derailleur hanger and chain. It took her shop a full month to get the hanger ordered and installed.

After the ride, we decided to eat at our favorite venue, Farmer Boys. Man that places has some great French Toast!
Moe, Eric, David, Christine and Priscilla. I was taking the photo.

As usual, we like to take short little videos of our adventures.

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This weekend was the 5th Annual Le Tour de Tryptophan at the world famous Fullerton Loop. I met Moe & RL at the court house parking lot Friday afternoon. This event runs from Friday noon to Saturday noon (24hrs). I had every intentions of camping out with the guys however plans changed unexpectedly on Thanksgiving that I could only stay until the evening. Below is a brief description of the event:

Ride and Donate to the Fifth Annual Tour de Tryptophan/24 Hours of the Fullerton Loop.
Help Save Kids From Boredom and Protect the Future of Mountain Biking With High School Cycling Programs.

Fullerton, CA – November 25, 2008 – - If you’re in Southern California this Friday after Thanksgiving, come burn your Turkey off for a good cause at the Fifth Annual Tour de Tryptophan/24 Hours of the Fullerton Loop.

Presented by no one, this fund-raiser commences at noon on Friday and finishes at noon on Saturday. As it is a fun ride with no rules, you can start or finish at any time. Do one lap, go home for the evening and do another in the morning. Or ride your brains out for 24 Hours. Seventeen laps seems to be the reigning record.

The Fullerton Loop is an 11-mile network of suburban trails that pass through city parks, horse trails, hidden pathways and creekside wilderness. Originally pieced together by Richard Cunningham of Mantis Bikes and Mountain Bike Action fame in 1983, hundreds of people ride and train on the famed loop every week. This 24 Hour event was conceived as a celebration of the Loop, an excuse to burn off Thanksgiving dinner, and an opportunity to support a good cause. This year’s proceeds will benefit the SoCal High School Cycling League, which will bring cycling to Southern California High Schools in 2009. Former beneficiaries of the Tour de Tryp have included the Tara Llanes Recovery Fund, CHOC Hospitals, and various other charities.

The SoCal High School Cycling League is not even aware that they are the recipient of upcoming proceeds, so therefore are responsible in no way for this event.
The ride will start and end in the upper parking lot of the Courthouse in Fullerton at Harbor and Berkeley. You can show up at any time to donate $30 and receive the Ramones-inspired T-Shirt while supplies last.

As described above, this is more of a fun event; there were no pressure to do more laps than the next guy (unless you wanted to). There was a big turn out by the time I arrived at the parking lot. Moe had brought his pop-up trailer and RL had set-up the Team’s Redline tent. After signing up, we went out for our first lap. RL was pulling his daughter on a trailer while Moe and I followed. On the way to Gus Grissom Park, we were passed by Mountain Bike Action’s Richard “R.C.” Cunningham (see video). As mentioned above, R.C. was the man who made Fullerton Loop possible. In the past I’ve had several chats with R.C. where he shared stories on putting the Loop together in the 80s. Truly an honor to meet the man who created the trail that is shared by hundreds of riders on a weekly basis.

                                        Base Camp.  Not sure what Moe is doing back there…

Approximately 4 miles into the Loop, RL experienced mechanicals with trailer where the attachment was rubbing against his rear rotors. He tried several adjustments and it just wasn’t working out. He decided to head back to the parking lot and Moe and I continued on. From here Moe and I decided to switch bikes. Fortunately we were both using Crank Bros pedals so our cleats were compatible. I have never ridden on a 29er before so I was pretty stoked to try it. Also after reading Moe’s review of the Flagstaff 29er I couldn’t wait to ride it. In turn Moe rode my Intense 5.5. We had a very casual ride for the remainder of the Loop. First lap done!

When we returned to the parking lot, Priscilla had already arrived and will be joining us. Moe and I rested for a bit then the three of us would go for a second lap. RL was staying behind with their daughter. It was another casual ride however at a faster pace as we were losing light.

Making it back to the parking lot, we were greeted by Eric “the Animal” Hunner on a unicycle (see video) while RL was manning the bbq grill. By now it was dark and many participants were taking their breaks and also cooking dinner. There were also some riders heading out for more laps. After having dinner and a beer, I was too full to do another lap. At the same time it was getting cold and my helmet was wet (sweat) from the previous rides. Not so comfortable wearing a wet helmet… I decided to call it the night and return in the morning.

On Saturday I returned for the end of the event. The current record for the most laps is 17. This year the top rider would only complete 15 laps. Still a lot considering one lap is 11 miles. the next rider did 13 laps. The Moe checked in with 5 laps and RL with 3. Awesome job guys!

                 MtnBikeRiders.com with MBA’s Richard Cunningham

This was truly a fun event – I look forward to next year’s Le Tour de Tryptophan!

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