Summer Trip

So it's been a while that ive been Riding. The last time was this summer, we went on a bike trip to Morzine (France) to ride the Passe Portes du Soleil. This was a blast! At time it was pretty hard, escpecially the longer uphills.. After the event, we stayed in the area for abot a week. 

We had several runs on the Morzine DH track, and visited the Chatel Bikepark.

It was a good trip, and next summer we definately going to visit that area again.

Ride Free!

Go Ride or stay at home?

That was the question sunday morning, as i opened my eyes i heard the rain already falling on the roof. A rushed down to look on the forum wether we would go or not. Luckily everyone agreed to go. I packed my gear, an got on the road for a hour long drive to Malmedy, A nice spot in Belgium.

During the ride, i had to stop to check on the new bike rack on the back of the car. Luckily everything was OK.
I was a bit late on the parking lot were i met with my fellow biking friends.
We head off on a long climb to get on the top of the trails. At the first descent, a rider went down face first on the wet ground. Luckily he was ok and could continu riding.

Then there was another nice trail pointing down, with a lot of wet roots, pretty sketchy since some were a bit off camber. a the end of the trail we had to walk up a slippery slingle track. at the top we rode a single track wich was going up and down, with a scary deep on the left side.
We rode several other trails wich were not so exciting because there was lots of mud. The last trail we rode, was a trail were some locals build some nice turns and small jumps and drops.
The run in of the first jump was a bit slippery, but Roel decided to give it a go, and shortly after that the rest was convinced the jump could be cleared.

We did this trail a few times. And then dicided to call it a day and got to our last decent to the parking lot. This trail started with some tight switchbacks, wich were pretty hard to clear!
At the parking, it started to rain... There was a small shelter were we all waited for the rain to pass by. I took this oppertunaty to clear my bike from some excess mud.
After all it was a great day, and i was glad i went.

Thanks!

Sunny wake up

Sunday noon i opened the window and looked outside and saw the sun! I didn't take long before i was already packing my gear and got to the Filthy Trails. A more or less local Freeride Park, located 20 minutes by car from my home.

There are many different obstacles, form North Shore structures and skinnies to gap jumps. And also a beginner practise trail. All togheter making a nice day of Freeride Mountainbiking.

I've been there more than once, but every time i learn new things. So it's great for developing skills.

Of course i was not alone

I walked up the hill to start from top. You have three different drops to choose form, i took the middle one. I haven't tried the highest one.

I'm trying to ride faster in the run in so that i can have a little more air time. This worked pretty well today.

I also rode some north shore:

Rest of the day was pretty mellow, talking to fellow riders. And some more riding!

Props to the builder:

Sunday, Bike day ofcourse!

When i arrived today at the parking lot, there were already some fellow bikers unpacking and gearing up for the ride. The group of riders was pretty large today, about 15! There were some bikers from the other side of the country!


After everyone was ready, we hit the first trail. Since the parking lot is fairly uphill, it was directly a relativly short downhill single trail. After this, we had to climb quit a long time on rooty singletrack and fire roads. The we arrived at the Railroad trail. This single track is very root infested with enough small drop off's to keep you focus.There were some new things build, a small double jump and a 4ft drop of to a skecthy flat landing. I didn't feel like trying today so i will keep that one for next time. Unfortunatly there was lots of mud on the trail, what made it hard to gain some speed.


After this trail we had to go uphill on mainly Fire road to get to the so called Toblerone Freeride Trail. Because of the expected mud we've skipped the upper part of the trail and start half way at the roadgap.

Me @ roadgap

We did the trail several times top to bottom. It has several small stunts like a bombhole were you can jump out of, some sketchy steeps with roots point out, and some small kicker style jumps over fallen trees. The soil was muddy at some place what made it hard to hold speed. Also the root were slippery what made pretty skecthy some times. Maybe i should buy some larger tires!

Gabstar getting airborne

When the sky got darker and darker we decided to head back to the parking lot, since we had to climb up the hill to get there, the rain just began to fall when we arrived.

After packing the gear, we sat down and talked about the day. Everyone agreed it was a great day of riding.




Thanks for the ride!