Whole Enichilada - Moab, UT

We headed over to Moab for the first time since spring as the weather good and the temperatures cool enough. On the Agenda was the Whole Enchilada - a route that only has a short season to do it it's entirety due to the fact you start up above the tree line at around 11,500' and end in the desert. I have done it once before two years ago and thought it about the best ride I had ever done, but physically really tough with hard climbs at altitude and lots of mileage over technical terrain. All in all - a mega classic.

We convince our friends Jason and Lana that it would be good times and that they should come as well so they joined us for the fun. Here is the camp site to start the day.

Unloading the bikes at the trail head up in the mountains. We had two vehicles so we left our here and would return (much) later in Jason's truck. Self Shuttling saves a bunch of money but does add some overhead on a ride like this with nearly a 30 mile shuttle involved.

The ride starts with a brutal climb up to Burro Pass. Steep (really steep) grades see pretty much every but the strongest walking many sections of this part of the ride. This section is one of the flatter sections where you can actually sit down and pedal.

The ride starts above tree line and then descends steeply into an evergreen section for a few miles before exiting into an Aspen section.

There are a few creek crossings that really make you forget that you are out in Moab and will soon be down in open desert terrain.

We didn't get any photos of the Hazard or Kokopelli sections as they are simply too much fun to stop and bust out a camera. High speed flow with turns, berms and hops are par for the course.

Once you enter the UPS section you have a selection of fun technical sections that again are pretty hard to stop and take photos on. This is one move in a sequence of great flow and fun.

Lana pedaling along the rim. By this point we had been in the saddles for close to 3 hours so fatigue was definitely a consideration. Luckily as the ride goes on the last part gets fun and fast again which has a tendency to wash away fatigue.

Cruising across Porcupine proper. The variety of terrain you will encounter is non-stop smile inducing.

Excellent views and excellent weather!

Steeper than it looks.

Have I mentioned how scenic it is on this trail? In one of the last sections of the lower single track portion of the ride.

Almost finished!

We wrapped the ride up in just over 6 hours with only 2 flat tires in the group and close to 30miles of terrain covered. Physical and on the must do rides on the planet.

The next day did a much shorter version of it and dropped in at Kokopelli and turn out down the Porcupine climb to end at the water tanks for a great 85minute blast of some of the best parts of the Whole Enchilada.

Sadly driving home pointed out that the window to enjoy the higher trails at Moab was fast coming to a close with the Colorado Rockies getting snow again.

Closing weekend at Winter Park

Closing weekend at Winter Park. After a long season of racing we had taken a couple of weeks of from big bikes and rode at Crested Butte on our Trail Bikes. We had intended on doing Monarch Crest this weekend but everything conspired to encourage us to do one last lift weekend and head to Winter Park for Closing weekend. Really glad we did!


On Saturday the lift lines were reminiscent of Whistler. It was actually kinda fun for closing weekend to have long lines as you got to chat with people between runs instead of just jump straight back on the lift for another run. Even Ollie lift had lift lines which is never the case!


Amber had and awesome weekend and hit a bunch of features for the first time, getting better and better as the weekend went on. This is the first drop on No Quarter.


She also had one last race to do just for fun. It was the Conference Collegiate Championships. The collegiate series is super laid back but surprisingly well attended for the women with Amber's category (A) having 10 competitors.


The trail crew continues to work on and improve this mountain. The really tough rock double to exit Trestle DH has been upgraded to an elevated step down that you can hit almost as fast as humanly possible or hit at a more comfortable speed. Amber hits it here.


The first rock blob up on Trestle.


On Sunday we did some runs with friends who had never DH'd before. This is Meatball doing the Rock Garden on Double Jeopardy. We also rode with Mike Glicksman who was enjoying the evils of a bike not intended for uphill peddling as a break from his Cross Country and Cyclecross racing endeavors. They both had a blast!


A great weekend to close out an excellent summer! We will be on trail bikes for a while now until winter arrives in it's fullness.

DH days so far in 2010.

DH Days - 2010

• January - 6 shuttle days out of 5 weekends
• February - 3 shuttle days out of 4 weekends
• March - 2 shuttle days out of 4 weekends
• April - 2 shuttle days, 6 trail bike days in Moab out of 4 weekends, Amber also had 4 days racing at Sea Otter
• May - 8 DH shuttle days, 3 days lift assist out of 5 weekends
• June - 3 DH shuttle days, 10 days lift assist (2 races) out of 4 weekends
• July - 17 lift assist days (2 races, 5 days whistler) out of 4 weekends
• August - 10 lift assist days (3 races) out of 4 weekends
• September - 5 lift assist days (1 race), 4 trail bike days in Crested Butte out of 4 weekends

Total so far:
69 DH days

• 45 Lift assisted
• 24 Other
• 8 race weekends (10 for Amber)

Month	Weekends	DH Days	Shuttles	Lift assisted	Races	Trail Bike Days
Total		69	24	45	10	10
Jan	5	6	6	0	0
Feb	4	3	3	0	0
Mar	4	2	2	0	0
Apr	4	2	2	0	1	6
May	5	11	8	3	0
Jun	4	13	3	10	2
Jul	4	17	0	17	2
Aug	4	10	0	10	3
Sep	4	5	0	5	2	4

Taylor Canyon Doctor Park Shuttle Ride 9/18/2010

Amber exiting Doctor Park near Taylor Canyon.



Second shuttle of the day...two chain mechanicals and brake mechanicals, but managed to finish riding down...



Moab waiting for Sean to come down on his second shuttle...he had a flat tire :(



Moab and Bishop being buddies and walking around the trail together.



Yay! Sean made it ---flat tire fixed and all :)



Sean exiting around a corner and through some trees.



Sean exiting towards Taylor River.



Day two of riding got nixed due to Amber's brake failure that wouldn't fix even after Sean's efforts of bleeding the brakes several times....

Sedona, December 24th 2008

The next day we decided to go and try another area that had a few local knowledge trails that I had read about on MTBR. We started up a trail called Munds Wagon Trail or something like that. The riding was still good but it was decidedly looser with baby heads floating around many trail sections.


Amber coming down a rocky section that is steeper than it looks.


We ended up turning around here as the trail was just a little loose for our tastes after this. But there was still nice slick rock to be had.


Amber taking an alternate line across a steep slick rock section.


The trail criss-crossed a creek many times which I imaging if there was water flowing could be quite problematic.


Back in the parking lot.

We decided to head down to Phoenix the next day and see how the riding on South Mountain was. It hosted a trail called the National Trail which in the rock climbing world would be on a 50 most crowded list - but for good reason...

Sedona, December 23rd 2008

I had never been to Sedona before and despite hearing a lot about it and that it was a great riding destination we had just never even thought to come here until now. The weather in Moab forced us south and I am glad it did. Sedona is a beautiful place with rock all over the place. It is a big tourist destination so being able to be happy in traffic and crowds is a necessary thing for a visit here. Fortunately there is plenty of free camping on both sides of town.

We popped into a local bike store to find a guide or a map. The second store we wandered into was Mountain Bike Heaven and the guy in the store was amazingly helpful suggest a nice link of of trails that we could ride to straight out of the store.


As soon as we hit dirt we realized that the riding out here was going to be fun. The trails were single track with rock everywhere but not loose rock. It was also very scenic. We started by heading up to Teacup and then on the advice from the store took a turn of the main trail and headed higher with the plan to be to drop down some gullies and rejoin the trail.


The trail section going down the gully was excellent with a few steep rollers and nice flow in between.


Still in the gully area.


We exited the gully soon after this and re-joined Teacup. The first section of Teacup we rejoined was fast smooth riding with some great corners.


It then started to climb across some more exposed slick rock and the riding was now fun, more technical riding where strength and body english were both needed.


Oh, and you had some decent views as well.


This is near the end, but there was a bunch of great riding before this as we had climbed up a jeep road to pick up some single track on a trail called Soldiers Pass. After this sink hole we decided to try and join across to another area called "The Secret Trails" - there was some great riding, but mostly we just got lost in the area until we popped out near the main road. At that point we road up a creek bed that the locals call Second Coming. It seemed that the creek bed would be blast coming down it and large sections of it were fun to ride up, but it was pretty technical and we pushed a fair bit it.

Vacation! 2 weeks on the road. First stop - Moab.

So my work has a mandatory Christmas holiday week so we decided to tack an extra week on and hit the road for a 2 week road trip to warmer areas. Denver has had some absolutely brutal winter conditions leading into the new year so both Amber and I were antsy to get some decent time on our bikes again.

We decided to sign up for a camp with Gene Hamilton (www.betterride.net) in Bootleg Canyon, Nevada on the weekend of New Year so we planned on heading to Moab and riding there for as long as possible before drving to Nevada.

First day in Moab was amazing. The sun was out and temperatures got as high as 45 degrees. We decided to do an old favorite - Gold Bar.


Bishop has become quite the bike dog. She is still learning how to behave on trails but is getting there. At the moment her biggest issue is when bikes come from the other direction and I still need to train her properly in those situations.

Moab has a decent covering of snow on most of the area but Gold Bar is largely wide expanses of Slick Rock and is southerly facing so the trail itself was perfect to ride on.


Amber avoiding snow.


Fresh tracks!


Scenic background and one happy dog.


Amber in the middle of a great little section of the trail. I love this section in both directions as you have to keep momentum and flow to clean it on the climb and the more smooth you ride it on the decent the bigger your smile.


About to exit the section.


Things started to cool down later in the day, but the riding was still good times.


Playing around on a little thing in the sun.


Amber on the same.



Weather came in that night and we awoke to a world of white so we opted to pack up and head south. Weather and condition reports said that St George was just as bad so we decided to head to Arizona as reports were that Sedona and Phoenix were perfect for riding.