Minneapolis Mystery Clue

Ask yourself...what do these things have in common.
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Good luck.

Tales from the 2010 Urban Assault Ride season

After every event, there are always folks that come up and say "Do you travel around with the Urban Assault Ride? That has to be the coolest jobs ever! How did you get into this?"

Well - yes indeed - it has to be one of the coolest jobs. But - it is a crazy amount of work - most of which folks don't see. Here's a couple stories that we experience behind the scenes:

1. After party hijinks... we all enjoy the New Belgium beer at the after parties. Some more than others. In Fort Collins this year, we had just about 500 riders. We went through about 17 kegs. There are 120 beers in a keg. That means 2040 beers. That works out to an average of over 4 beers/rider. Now - we all know that not everybody had 4 beers - some had way more than their fair share. How do we know? Well...we were informed that as riders were leaving, they decided it was appropriate to take a souvenir UAR 3' x 8' vinyl banner with them. I had to approach a shirtless, jean short, and mulleted rider with a banner under his arm. I said, "Hey man - I noticed that you cut down one of our banners and have it under your arm." His response..."oh yeah...um...well...I saw a trash can over by the banner so I thought it was trash." The said banner was attached by 6 zip ties to a steel fence and neatly framed the entrance to our venue. I said, "well actually we use those banners at all the UARs across the country. If you'd like to take that one with you it will cost us $160 to replace it. Would you like to buy one?" To which replied, "Naw man - that's cool - you can have it back." Silly rabbit. I suppose that it's flattering that he tried to steal the banner of the UAR since he had such a good time. Or maybe he had plans to repurpose it and make it into a tote bag. One can hope, right?

2. Speaking of thieves... Last year in Chicago, following our checkpoint manager meeting, we returned to the UAR truck to find the window broken out. After some quick investigation, we found that the thief stole our GPS, camera (a cool waterproof Olympus)...and my personal Timbuk 2 Checkpoint. I was not really too upset until I realized they stole my personal luggage. Luckily they left 3 messenger bags - each with a laptop in it.
The next day, I was thinking...they probably won't want my clothes and they'll just toss the bag. So, we went back to the scene of the crime, split up and walked down some alleys. Sure enough...we found it. They left pretty much everything (toiletries -including my glasses, shoes,and almost all of my clothes). BUT - they took one outfit: a Swobo wool collared polo, my favorite pair of Chrome knickers, and a pair of UAR socks. Somewhere in Chicago, there's a stylin' dude who has some good cycling fashion sense. Keep an eye out. A couple of lessons learned:
1. if you have a GPS, clean the ring on the window from the suction cup - this is what they apparantly look for.
2. If your insurance offers a glass break coverage - get it. This has no deductible and it was fixed the next morning.

And speaking of cycling fashion sense - here's a Honda commercial form down under:


Been doing some hikes with the doggies


Also getting in some solid rides lately. I hit the Jamestown trails with Boups today. It was hot and fun and we rode new trails. Good times.

Ok - that's all for now. Best of rides, y'all!

What I did yesterday...

Put on a bike race....


Saw many years of work captured in ink on a fan's shoulder


A good day indeed.

Check out more photos of the Ft Collins New Belgium Urban Assault Ride here.

Thanks so much to all the riders, sponsors, and volunteers that made such a killer event possible!!!!

scenes from the bike

In between putting on bike races and pecking away at the computer, we like to ride bikes.

Here are some things we've seen from the bike this week....

Found some new trails in Boulder county. Old mining roads out of Jamestown. Pretty fun to ride on a weekend and see nobody on the trail. We did climb for 3 hours though.

Here's an old miner's shack, these days nothing but rat droppings and beer cans. I can just imagine some dudes sitting around looking at gold nuggets - back in the day



this is a Columbine flower - the state flower of Colorado. Also the name of an infamous school. I like the flower better

In case you didn't hear, Jackie (the UAR Race Director) is pregnant. Here's here happy belly






Mr Ben May - haven't ridden a MTB with this fellow since college in 1995.
Here he is learning how rewarding the downhills are - after realizing how altitude effects das lungs.

Austin mystery clue

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Charlotte Mystery Clue....

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Super Ned and Butterflies

There's a little town above Boulder called Nederland. It's got a few coffee shops, a great Nepalese restaurant....and some of the best mountain biking in the front range. It's nice and tight single track that weaves through Aspen groves and past abandoned gold mines. I usually ride it each year a couple times and I got a jonesin' for Ned this week.
Usually, we drive up and hit the trails for a few hours. There's also a bus that leaves Boulder that'll take your bike up with you. It's only $2 and this was my plan. However, the plan was foiled as I missed the bus. So, it was time to ride up 3000' and 20 miles to the trail. When you ride out and back to a trail in Boulder, the locals like to call it "Super" - like "Super Walker". So this must have been "Super Ned" Not too many people do this though - it took over 2 hours just to hit the trails.
I took the Boulder Creek bike path until it ended around Betasso preserve (another fun trail). Then I made a turn on Sugarloaf, up some steep switchbacks, up, and up, and up some more. There's plenty of things to look at - like Boulder creek.

After a lemonade and some iced coffee, I hit the West Mag trails. This is Aspen Alley.














Here's some of the tight twisty singletrack. It doesn't get much narrower than this. There were plenty of spots that had handlebar marks on the trees.

On the way home, I rode Magnolia Rd. A fun dirt/paved route back into town. I passed this ranch that looked so peaceful. I'd love to have a little cabin like the one in the center of this photo. All said and done, it was a 4 1/2 hour ride - with plenty of dirt roads, trails, and snow capped mountains. No wonder Outside Magazine recently listed Nederland as one of the best weekend escapes.
Then when I got back, Jackie told me that the butterflies were hatching! I got her this cool gift where you order butterfly larvae, then watch them develop in this incubator. We saw then go from worm to pupa to butterfly. On this picture you can see a couple of them still in the pupa stage.

Here's one drying out its wings













Then it was time to set our new friends free. Kinda sad they only live for two weeks! We made sure no birds were around 1st. I love the photo of the butterfly on the tree. Click it to make it bigger - it looks so proud doesn't it?

Anyway - I hope you're getting out there enjoying nature. It's such a beautiful time of year. Oh yeah - drink some good beer too!