South Mountain Hot Summer Night Rides Begin

Andy and I took our first of soon to be many night rides out at South Mountain last night. Started at the warpaint parking area, headed out on DC to Telegraph, turned around and did the goat hike up the backside of the helipad. We stopped and took a break, took some photos and continued our shred down that sweet ridgeline trail. It’s so much fun, especially by headlamp. We headed back to DC and found our way up to secret, ripped that one at 20+mph, continued the loop back to warpaint. 13 miles, 85 degress, no other bikers and only one scorpion seen. Great night out on the hills. Heres some pics and vid.

Latedropbob.com now with video!!!

Here’s some video of the last few weeks…

One Year Anniversary Wed. Mornin’ Shuttle from latedropbob on Vimeo.

National Run Wed. Mornin’ Shuttle 5.6.09 from latedropbob on Vimeo.

Pinal Shred Fest!!! 5-1-09 from latedropbob on Vimeo.

All video shot with GoPro Hero Cam…

Wed. Mornin’ Shuttle Ride report 4/1/09 and 4/8/09

Sorry for the delay on the post from last week…busy. Anyways the April Fools day shuttle was a very foolish day indeed. We had a grip of people show up for the 6am start. Two trucks full to be exact! First a Geronimo run and then a holbert run. Lots of gnar on both, some got a little too gnar. Sorry Jeanie, hope the shoulder heals up quick. Mr. Mikey Dropped the double drop in the holbert pit, I hate him… Then we all head back up for some more shreddage down natty, about half way down to be exact. We get roll the top half smooth, a couple fellas tried the super spine at the waterfall. Then we head down in to hidden valley, I mean broken off valley… See vid.

That was stu playing lawn dart for us. He landed on his right shoulder and wasn’t feeling so hot so we wrapped him up good with a tube/kneepad sling and hiked his butt back to buena vista, the others took his bike down 24th st. (that musta been fun) We get stu to the urgent care and the loving arms of his girlfriend. So Steve and I grab a little lunch, and ask ourselves w.w.s.d.? (what would stu do?) We headed back to the top for an honorary run down natty, mormon, and a trail on the north side of the hill that is fun to ride. It was nice ripping in the evening light, thats right evening… We spent all day shredding, hiking, hospitalling, grubbing, and some more shredding. Boy did my dog have to pee when I got home. All in all, a good day on the hill for the rest of us, not so good for mr. stu. It turns out he broke his collar bone in 4 places and broke his scapula. It didn’t even look that bad in the video. Everyone keep stu in your thoughts and send him healing vibes to get him back on the bike asap.
Gallery Here!!!
Wed. Mornin’ Shuttle 4/8/09

On to today… Another great morning starting at 5:45am, these AZ DHr’s are ready to rock like Slayer!!! 6 riders at 6am. First on the shuttle up, a dude on a Harley passes us by the gate and hucks his bike going 50mph off one of the speed bumps, it’s gonna be a good day! Up to geronimo, down, Birthday Boy Brett and wifey Jeani and maia dog meet us for a lift up to a natty, mormon, run. Uneventful except for Mikey shredding his front deraliur cable on his first run, Pasch pinch flatting in the truck on the shuttle up, and Brennan almost rolling down the waterfall. We kept up a race pace, giving us a great idea…TBDL (to be discussed later). Rolled down to the bottom and back to the truck to start the bday bash. I warmed up the frying pan for bobs famous bfast burritos. Jeani took the rest of the clan plus two w.m.s. newbies, steve and trent (soon to be pinners with the right gear) up to geronimo for another run. They met Tank and other Park Rangers improving our favorite DH trail. Thanks crew!!! It wouldn’t be a w.m.s. without Brennan blowing not one, but two tubes on the way down. Crimson took a nice trip o.t.b. After everyone made it back to the bottom, we enjoy some good food and bevy’s. Crimson even brought the meat for the non “vagatarians”. After filling our bellies to the brim we headed back up for a bday run ala brett, I guess cause he’s so far away from 24 now he wanted to ride 24th st. It’s been a while for me and others on that trail, and it showed. I gotta run that one more, lots of gnar topped with some whipped gnar and gnar sprinkles.

24th Channel train from latedropbob on Vimeo.
After we survived that we headed to holebretto for a quickie. Some more shredding down that, with Pasch dropping the uber sick line that’s not even the trail(wish I’d a had the video going for that one) some more crashes but nothing serious. We all survive the trail to get to the bottom to see Pish Pasch drop the dollar bill drop in the Holbert Pit. See Vid.

Dollar Bill Drop from latedropbob on Vimeo.
We all load up and hit the road. On the way out of the lot we notice some sweet dh bikes we’ve never seen before and some new riders, we give a honk and a wave on our way by. Paschy knocks on the windo from the back and goes “Was that Andrew Shandro?” We flip a bitch and it was!!! He is out here with the Trek crew doing some desert testing. So being true pro hoes we got a group picture to end the day. Happy Bday Brett!!! Another successful shuttle day!!!

Gallery Here!

Vimeo vids uploading now. please check back soon for vids.

Wed. March 11, 2009 Shuttle

So this was the biggest wed. mornin’ shuttle we’ve had yet this year. I don’t know what happened but everyone showed up. Gref, Crimson, Nannerb, Ktroopa, Jeanie, Meegan, Sixty, Superstition, and meself. We rolled some real fun stuff on south mountain. Dropped into National and Mormon and 32nd st. Meegan dropped the waterfall for the first time. Jeani the second. Great JoB!!!  The rest of us were just feeding off of eachother and shredding our hearts out.  Some shredded their tires off… No hikers to be seen at all! Thats why we ride on Wed. mornin’s:)  Then when we got to the bottom, someone who will remain nameless forgot their keys in the truck at the top, so brett was nice enough to drive us to the top so brennan and I could get a geronimo run while the rest of the group waited for the keys and played on the construction drops. We got the group together, and piled into meegan’s truck, yup 8 of us with bikes and gear piled into the back of her tacoma. “That’s cheating” replied a roadie as we rolled by… We headed to the top of holbert for some more fun. I’m falling in love with that trail finally after a few years.  It’s almost fun…  Dropped in the top section and just as we were about to have some real fun crimson had big blow out. Took a few minutes to fix the flat and on we rolled.  Everyone was flowing down that trail, some for the first time.  No carnage to be had except for a dented top tube on meegan’s bike. I almost feel sorry for the flogging that trek was recieving that day, but it took everybit meegan dished out.  Brett and Jeani were breaking in their Perps thouroughly.  Rich, aka Superstition dropped a good drop at the holbert pit.  Then he was nice enough to drive us all back to the top where the group split up, some of us ripped geronimo again and some split for work and other for the bar.  That was one of the funnest wed. I’ve had in a while… Good times!  See you all next week.

That guy on a 20″ Folding Bike is kicking our A$$!!!

So andy and I were out at south mountain doing a little desert classic rip and we ran into this guy on a little folding bike. I rolled by him and said “cute bike”. We continued down the trail to get to that big up hill section by trail post fiftey, I look back and this guy is passing andy and catching up to me on this “mini” bike. We meet him at the top and start b.s.ing a little. We learn that he’s riding this Dahon Folding full suspension mountain bike. It has 3″ of travel on the front and 2″ in the rear. The plushness supplied by air shock. He was running a FSA/SRAM 1×9x3 drivetrain. 1 big ring, 9 out the back and a 3 speed hub. Now thats what I call sick. It was built super sturdy and weighed about 28lbs. He was running 20″ wheels with avid mechanical discs and maxxis tires. Here’s a video of him ripping down the valley up towards the helipad.

He cleaned most of both up hills, on flats with 5.10’s!!! Him and his wife Deb live in an RV full time and have been for some time. Both of them just travel around with their Dahon mountain bikes riding where they want when they want. They were just in moab and are heading to Tucson for some fun. Check out their website at www.debcar.com. All in all it was a great 10 mile evening with an incredible sunset and moonrise. Good to meet you Carey! Hope to roll with you again someday.