Sunday, December 31, 2017

Bucket Lists: Peru Biking and Mexico Enduros!!

Racing and Travel
I ended a great race season with an amazing October-December. Well an amazing year really, I won the Big Mountain Enduro Season Opener in Santa Fe and my final two 3-day races in Mexico.

Oct 7th: 3rd in Final Angel Fire Fire 5 DH race
Oct 15th: NICA Highschool Skills Clinics in Phoenix, AZ for 20 kids
Oct 19th: Flew to Peru to ride for 8 days with PeruBiking.com. I can't wait to put a crew together to go back! A Peru tour with skills clinics would be sweet!

Peru Biking Video I rode all these trails and then some. The guys went back out after I left and put this video together.


Peru Biking guides are dialed, they picked me up from the airport and provided housing at their guide house. Their drivers shuttled us on ~3 trails a day. We rode from 14000+ feet to the Sacred and Southern Valleys (~9000ft) never riding the same route twice. One day we rode the Inca Avalanche course, it's a really tame trail when it isn't a mass-start race in the snow. There were other trails where I was worried; wet, mossy, and steep free-riding. It's an amazing area! There were no mountain biking purpose-built trails, no trail maps or signage; we rode old Inca trails and those used by the Andes people today. It definitely required a guide.

  
Hike-a-bike at 14,000 feet









"That's what we rode down this morning"



   



MEXICO

Oct 30th: Flew to Oaxaca Mexico to meet up with other racers


My roommate for the first night, Leigh Bowe

Nov2-4th: 3-day blind Enduro race http://www.transierranorte.com/


Loading up bikes and luggage every morning. 



Racers had bunk style accommodations, moving to a new location every night. Some of the staff slept in very cold tents.


Poor buses


1st! This was a rough one, I dislocated my front brake finger by 100 degrees or more at the lowest knuckle on day one. Mind over matter wasn't enough, I had to race taped up and on painkillers. These trails are ROUGH, no holding onto the bars and breaking with the middle finger here.

Nov 6th: 4-day road-trip to Mascota with other racers and Oaxaca guides including a volcano ride





Such a fun crew to travel with.

Huge thanks to guides Mauricio and Santiago De Avila for the trip and amazing housing!
https://www.bym.mx

Nov 10-12th: Raced what was essentially a 3-day blind enduro since the road trip crew arrived with no time to pre-ride.



1st!

I was really happy to win this race!! Marco won the pro men's category and we all had a great party.

Nov 15th: Flew back to the USA after a couple days at the beach in Sayulita
Nov 21-26: First-ever White Rim trip with an amazing crew and Thanksgiving dinner at one of the campsites



December was full, engineering contract work in Durango and I spent a lot of time with family in NM, CO, and TN