more MOMBAT(ok ok cowbell too)

the MOMBAT story has appeared a few more places, some are just the press release and some have interviewed us to add a little more to the story like Dirt Rag

Team Dicky
http://teamdicky.blog.com/4415328/

DIRT RAG
http://www.dirtragmag.com/blogarific/museum-of-mountain-bike-art-and-technology- opening/

BICYCLE RETAILER
http://www.bicycleretailer.com/news/newsDetail/2179.html

Dog sitting

Savannah and I have been dog sitting for her mother while she is away on a vacation. We have had Cherry since Christmas Eve, since then, she and Pony have chased and nibbled at each other a good bit. I am taking them out in the morning for a walk in the woods to meet with Sean about some ideas for a kids playground area at some proposed trail and then we will head to the shop for more inventory.

This has been our daily routine, chasing more chasing, Cherry is the one on the leash

Trail Work Reminder

Just a reminder that the work day is coming up this Wednesday at Signal Hill, what a great way to work up your thirst for the night festivities.

Meet at 8am in the parking lot ready to go, we will be working till 2ish. See you out there

I like my 29er

Rick brought my Route 29 back and I really wanted to take it out so Thursday Darrell and I headed out to Signal Hill to see how it has been holding up to the rain we have received lately. The trail was in really good shape and it was great to be on the 29er SS. The bike handles extremely well, almost like my geared Route 29...imagine that!

anyways here is a pic from the ride



We will also be out at Signal Hill for another work day on the 31st since the shop will be closed. Come out and give us some help on more of our planned re-routes to make the trail better. Bring your bike to ride afterward as well to ride what you build, its a great feeling.

MOMBAT on Bike Radar

Bike Radar just posted a notice about MOMBAT. We have a couple of other lines on stories about the museum on the burner as well.

http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/mountain-bike-museum-opens-in-north-carolina-19726

holiday hours

Just wanted to give a quick yell to let everyone know our store hours during the holidays

Dec 24th 10am - Noon
Dec 25th CLOSED
Dec 31st CLOSED, we will be working on bike trails, come work with us!
Jan 1st CLOSED

we hope that everyone has a great time over the holidays, we will be here regular hours all other days so swing by and say hey.
wESd

^%@$#^ the rain

Building the new trial Sunday all Sean and I could talk about was how bad we couldnt wait to ride it on Tuesday and hoped the rain would hold off. I was gonna ride on Monday night but Darrell said he had an extra ticket to the MNF game and well you gotta go cheer your Panthers on now dont ya?




I figured that since we won that good mojo was coming my way and that the rain would hold off today so when I got to the shop this morning I checked with weather dot com and they said that we would have no rain till 9pm...WOOHOO we get to ride the new stuff and the rest of the trail before the rain gets to us......WRONG. 15 minutes before the ride it barely starts misting. We look at the weather map online and it says we got nothing (grammatically correct eh?) coming our way so we get ready and hop on the bikes. 25 yards from the trail the rain starts in on us so we decide that we would ride the new stuff to try it out. Well on top of the new stuff being great we decide that a fast greenway ride back to the shop would be good to get some more riding but nothing that would leave us absolutely drenched. On the ride back the rain of course stopped half a mile from the shop but we just headed back anyways to hang out a bit before going home. Maybe, just maybe the rain will go away for Thursday.!?

today we did trail work

I met Sean out at Signal Hill at 8am this morning and we started up where Darrell and I had finished on Wednesday. Darrell and I had finished the one reroute but Sean Darrell and I had talked about another reroute right after it on the trial and we decided that today was a good day for it. The reroute takes us out of a section that starts fun with the big hump to send you downhill but as soon as you start downhill you are sent into an open turn and then a really un-fun climb(yes they all are, Jeff). the new trail put us back into the woods and through some really nice dips and then starts a tough tight climb that will be much much much(add a couple more) better. Sean and I took a snack break for some nabs and the immediate energy kick made us want to work on a few other projects. We cleared a way behind the "grateful shed" which will be connected soon to another re-route but allows us access easier till we can get the middle section that leads to that, then we headed down to do another section that combines two sections of trail that used to be ridden about a mile apart but will now make a loop together and just easier to get in and out....makes sense dont it?

anyways here a few pics of the day

pony up on the hill


ride the newest hump


down this



along this(notice tight 'turn')


after the turn you go though a dip and climb the hill(both in this pic)


Pony double checking Sean's work at the top of the hill while Sean works in the background




Dont forget that Saturday the 13th is a big work day at Lake Norman State Park

Jefftook the young 'uns out today and spent a couple of hours getting ready for the weekend. bOb did get the Laurel section very roughly machine cut so that will cut down on some of the hand work. There is well over a mile of machine cut trail so there will be plenty to do!!

Everyone should really like the new layout. There is one ravine a good 8' deep where we cross and bOb cut in a really sweet banked turn. The portion of trail that goes through the Laurel has a really stunning water view and there are a couple of nice rock outcroppings along the water. There is also a nice 3' drop option and a cool "V" tree that we go through. The general layout winds quite a bit more so it will definitely be slower than the current trail.

Night rides, trail work and more shop remodeling

Last night on the night ride, Sean Darrell and I headed out to Signal Hill from the shop via the greenway, since there is not a bridge to allow us to cross the creek we use a good ole pipe and as always, take a break to...as Darrell says "Warm the Cockawls"


We ended up only riding about a mile of trail opting to do some scouting to a few of my ideas and one or two that we didn't know about yet. One that we did not know about will be a minor extension of a turn but it will take us down to some old concrete structures and of course we had to play around on them a little.

Here I am coming out of one



and here is Sean spelunking down into another....pretty quick trip



Today, Darrell took a vacation day and I was off from the shop so we headed out to build one of the many re-routes still needed/planned. This re-route keeps us out of a 400 foot open area that always gets really tall with grass and puts us into woods and should gain us some length.

One of the bench sections coming up a hill, the hill had an old telephone pole in it and some wire from a line, all gone now.



looking farther back though a really cool bit that has lots of humps(see Darrell back there?)


I am gonna go out on Friday and walk the entire trail as I have it in my head and GPS the whole thing so we can put it up with the old map and show the differences.

Back at the FFB, we have continued on finishing the pergola, by fabricating some "flower boxes" to hold water bottles and some shorts holders. We are working on the jersey displays on the wall, we currently have one up but might rework it a little to make it work better.




and a final parting shot of packing tape, I put up a full case(8 rolls)that we use for shipping of parts and bikes sold from the web site.