Phrao to Chiang Rai: Paying For It

We were warned by Damian at Crank Adventures in Chiang Mai that the route from Phrao to Wiang Pa Pao was one that was best avoided. I did not remember this until about thirty or forty minutes into the first hill of the day.

I was reminded of a conversation I have had many times about earning your downhill. I knew that for every kilometre of uphill I would be rewarded with a downhill. In the long run we all end up paying for a decent downhill ride. We pay for the chair lift, we buy our buddies a case of beer for shuttling or we work for it and pedal up. Yesterday we paid for 25 kilometres of downhill with 25 kilometres of some of the steepest mountain roads that I have ever seen.

(horrible climb up, the views and the ride down were worth it)

If I had a choice I would have taken the chair lift up or bought someone a keg of beer to get me to the top. Pulling the Xtracycle with all of our stuff up those hills was some of the hardest pedalling I have ever done.

It was not a shock that there was too much weight on my bike for me to keep pulling it up the mountain. Sooner or later I was going to burn out and someone else would have to take the load. Which I am sure they both were not looking forward to. James started riding ahead of me walking or jogging back and pushing me up the steeper hills. Shortly after Morgan joined in and it got a lot better for me after that.

Every time I turned a corner I prayed for the crest of the hill, when I saw another climb ahead I cursed under my breathe. But all it took was looking to my right or left to make the pain I was in worth it. The higher we got into the mountains the more breathe taking the scenery was.

We stopped at a small village on the top of a mountain. We stopped and spoke with the locals who all spoke Chinese. The people we spoke with told us that their parents had left China during civil unrest and settled in the hills of Northern Thailand. Many of the older Chinese people there do not have legal documents. Most of their children who are now adults were born in the mountains and have lived their whole lives there. They also told us some good news, that we had rode through the worst of it and the rest would be mostly downhill.

 

The downhill was pretty crazy with the extra weight on the rear of my bike. Trying to lean into corners my bike would wobble and shake. It was a pretty big adrenaline rush though, riding down steep mountain roads going as fast as I could go. If someone would drive me to the top I would ride down again in a heart beat. But I am not sure I am willing to pay for it again by riding up.

 

The hills flattened out and we rode into Wiang Pa Pao after a long hard day of riding. We were pretty worn out and a little bit sun burnt. Our goal was to make it to Chiang Rai that day but we could not decide whether or not to spend the night in Wiang Pa Pao. We waited on the side of the road for a bus only to miss it. We waited for another hour and got our bikes into the back of a bus.

We are going to hang out today in Chiang Rai and then we are going to head farther north. Keep riding and keep paying for your downhills in which ever way that you want. I think yesterdays payment was enough for a whole year of downhill rides.

Bye from Thailand

Rob, James and Morgan

 

Mythic Rune in Shortlist magazine

Shortlist is the UK's leading men's magazine with average weekly circulation of 510,000 copies per issue

I wrote a piece for their "Expert Shortlist" section on All-Mountain Bikes, after being asked to recommend bikes to suit 4 different price points between £1500 and £3500



The Mythic Rune is shown with our entry level build (GBP £2379.99) which includes a Shimano Deore groupset, Avid Elixir R brakes, Hope Pro II hubs / Mavic rims, Rockshox Lyric fork and mix of Easton and DMR finishing kit

cheers!

Rob C
Mythic Bikes

Days Ride - Alan Hepburn

Chiang Mai to Phrao

Two of my brothers and I are in Thailand right now. Our plan is to ride from Chiang Mai to the Laos border and then spend a week or two riding through Laos. Jay hooked us up with three Vientos for the trip and I bought a FreeRadical from Xtracycle and had it shipped to Bangkok. If you have never heard of Xtracycle you should check them out. With the help of the FreeRadical my Viento has been turned into a hauling machine.

(Lop Buri Train Station)

We packed our bikes into a train in Bangkok and headed north to Lop Buri. We spent a day in Lop Buri before heading north to Chiang Mai.

(bikes in the cargo car)

(hanging out in Chiang Mai)

(riding around some temples in Chiang Mai)

We woke up before dawn for our first day of riding. We were not sure how far we would be able to ride in a day and did not want to kill ourselves. The road started out pretty flat and easy but it was not long before we were riding on mountain roads. We stopped for lunch in a national park and found some cool waterfalls. We set up our tent and spent the day there.

  

(outside of Chiang Mai, early morning)

(riding down a nature trail near a waterfall, after walking up the waterfall James suggested that I try to ride down it. with a free ride bike or a bigger set of balls I could have rode the whole thing.)

I am now sitting at a guest house 3 Km outside of Phrao. I am pretty tired from waking up so early and pedalling a bicycle with three guys belongings on it. These are just some of the pictures that have been taken so far. When I have some more time (like when I am home) I will go through them all and post the best ones here and have a link to the rest. I can honestly say I do not think I am much of a touring guy. But a couple more weeks of this and I will be in pretty good shape. Maybe I should move back to Canada for the summer and race, this would be good winter training.

I will leave you with two artistic shots that my brother Morgan took. I think the guys from Spank will appreciate the second one.

  

Leave some comments let me know what you think. Let me know if you want more details of the touring.

From Thailand,

Rob

Did you check out Sicklines lately??

http://www.sicklines.com/2010/01/19/2010-banshee-legend-mk-ii-first-pictures/

Australian National Dirt Jump comp.

The first ever Australian National Dirt Jump comp was held last weekend in conjunction with the National DH championships.There was a good turn out with all the top riders from sydney and melbourne making the trip to Adelaide to ride there hearts out. The format was a 30 minute jam and a 15min best trick session, a good crowd turned up and the riders were pumped to throw it down.

It was also good to see a lot of people that I haven't seen in awhile, and to see what level Australia's riding is at. Theres definitely been some progression in the last few years and there a plenty of riders coming up through the ranks.

The jam started of with a bang, with plenty of riders going for it, I had a few unlucky crashes at the start that didn't help, but got a few good runs done later on. The weather was playing a little roll too with the wind not being the best for us to ride but when you have to ride you have to ride. I got 2nd in the jam with local rider elliot getting 1st, it was a very tight decision, but elliot rode very well through out the whole 30mins so it was well deserved.

Next up was best trick and it had some bangers. HHmm where to start , there were plenty flip whip attempts, a couple riders were getting very close but there was a strict rule that it had to be to pedals for it to count. There was also a frontflip tailwhip attempts by benny, as crazy as it sounds on a mtb he actually got really really close and it was pretty amazing to see. I through down some flip superman indys and a 3 inward which tied for 1st against a frontflip.

So overall i was pretty happy with the weekend with a 2nd and tied 1st. Big props to Darren from Barspin imports (Banshee Australia) for sponsoring and making the event happen. Its a first for Australia and is a great step for Aussie riders.

Alan,

Fogelsode #11: Steep Trails and Rainy Dirt Jumps

We got some rain early this week, making for some nice trails!  The crew rolled out to Santa Cruz to do some runs and we ended up seshing a cool trail with a whole bunch of ladders!  There were tons of loamy berms, wooden drops, step-downs, and a big wallride, making for a good time!  Towards the end of the ride, we headed over to a new drop that we’ve been working on.  Cob and Clayton finished clearing out the landing and Iggy was the guinea pig.  It was super dark but he hit it like it was nothing.  Epic day for sure!

We got more rain that night, and decided to check out Cob’s jumps the next day!  They looked good, with no puddles!  We swept the leaves off, did some touch-ups on the lips and landings, carpeted the newly redone second lip, and brought out the bikes!  Matt showed up to help out and the sesh was on!  Right when we started riding, it started to rain, but very lightly.  We just planned on jumping until it got too wet, but it never did.  The rain was just on and off through the day, and the jumps stayed awesome!  It’s not very common to dirt jump in the rain, so it was cool to get a chance to do it!  Everyone killed it; Matt threw some big tucks and one-footed tables, and Cob opened up a can of 100% Grade A Concentrated Steeze.  I was having fun 3ing the second jump, and did my first topside-whip on the fourth hip!  I started downside canning that hip, and tried throwing a table in there.  It felt crazy, but worked out and started to feel pretty cool!  Overall it was an awesome sesh, just having fun riding in the rain while learning a couple new tricks!  It started to get dark, so Cob did some patching while Matt and I covered up the lips and berm with carpet.  There’s supposed to be a huge storm this week, so hopefully that protects them a little bit haha!

Enjoy!

 

Oh and those 2010 bikes are looking sooooo dialed!  You guys rule!

 

-Jack

New Banshee Website ... in process

Now I realize this is probably the first time ever somebody has posted the link to an unfinished bike website but I thought you guys might find it cool to watch how it comes together.
Its kinda like how we design our bikes too so heck might as well do it with our site to so you can follow along and see the process.
I did sneek the link in an earlier bike post but figured a lot of you guys didn't see it so here it is again. http://www.intangible-logic.com/banshee/
have FUN

Rampants and a question

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Ok and now for the question.

If i was to add a limited run color to the rampant what would you think would be cool?

Just go to the comments and put your thoughts… I will be reading them.

 

Technorati Tags: Banshee,Rampant

Legend MkII ... update

Sorry Darren for posting so close after you.

We'll got the links and the Legend back from polished so thought I'd share.
We're masking it now for the paint now and tomorrow I should be able to assemble it.
This is the last post on the Legend until I have Studio quality shots to show you.
Here you go for now