Recent Ride Containment Thread - Post Your Recent Journeys Here

[voodoo320]

Yes. Timberland area. I just miss the climb there as here in China everything is a flat boring road.

[SportingGoods]

No pretty photo (I'll share later my GPS trace) but I'm happy to share my first MTB ride in USA
I went to a short trail ride over lunch today. I brought all my gear (helmet, pedals, shoes, backpack, etc...) and a colleague found a bike for me to use. Pretty cool!

It was there, in Missouri:
http://gorctrails.com/trails/forest-city

EDIT: here is the GPS trace. You can see it was a slow, extremely twisty ride. Very different from the Alps. But it is still fun to ride a bike while traveling for business.

[Patrick C.]

Some pics from my ride today- Cochran Mill Park in Chattahooche Hills GA.  This is my favorite 'local' trail- it's second closest to my house, about a 30 minute drive.  It's also only 18 miles from the Atlanta airport.  This area has (or had, at least until recently) very little development despite being so close to the airport, and is a bit of a mecca for road riders.  The park has been here for years and had several trails and roads, but in the last few years they allowed a local group to build new trails which are much better for biking. 

If you're a fan of The Walking Dead, part of the episode "Chupacabra" was filmed in the park- the scene where Daryl's horse gets spooked by a snake, and he falls down the hill into a creek and stabs himself with a crossbow bolt.  That's on one of the older trails (just a road, really) which isn't much fun on the bike. 

This is on the Yellow trail.  Lots of granite and roots and some decent climbs, but nothing super steep or long.  Mostly lots of up and down, sweeping turns, and a lot of fun.  There are big rocks/small boulders sticking up from the soil everywhere, and the trail runs next to and over several.  Most of them can be used for ramps if you're up to it.  There are some larger rock formations, especially on one of the hills, but I didn't get any good pics.






The park area used to have four or five old mills.  None of the buildings remain, but there are two dams and several waterfalls. There's not usually a ford or crossing here, but the creek is down a bit and it would be easy to jump across in one spot.




This is another one of the falls, on a branch of the creek a few miles upstream.  The pic is from back in the spring- a bit more water then.

[Carbon_Dude]

I really like the pictures with the water.

[karstenhorn]

The last few days I have had the chance to go on a few longer XC rides on my 036 here in Poland on vacation. Yet again did the bike perform flawlessly. Tracks here are with lots of loose sand, big roots and steep but short climbs. Today I completed the Bydgoszcz MTB marathon route that er some 48 km long. I'm sure some youngsters will do it quite a bit faster than my 3 hours but it was a tough ride for my 53 years old body - Here is a few pictures of todays ride:















Karsten
 

[Sitar_Ned]

Just some random ride pics from today. Was rainy so not the best lighting, but oh well. Haven't ridden in the rain in a long time.. it was fun!

[Carbon_Dude]

The wire mesh looks like a good idea for extra traction on the bridge.  I will need to take a few pics on my next ride and post.

[Patrick C.]

Ned, what trails are those?  They look similar to the rocks and roots here in GA.

More from Cochran Mill park, near the ATL airport. 

What do you mean, that IS the easy line?

[Sitar_Ned]

I'm here in Hot Springs, Arkansas, so I bet it's pretty similar to Georgian terrain. Beautiful here, and we have a great trail system that has regular maintenance and is always being expanded. Pretty lucky to have it in my back yard. And on my way to the trail, I can stop at the natural hot springs fountain and fill up my camelbak with the most delicious water. The only water I prefer to drink hot.. it tastes like hot tea or something. I'm a bit of a fanatic about the water here!

[trekcarbonboy]

Green Lane Park, Pennsylvania.

[SportingGoods]

Hi guys, this is not a proper ride report but it's about bike and journey 
I've just spent 10 days in Greece (no bike  ) and ran into 2 wood bikes. The first one in Athens, the second one in Nafplio. I thought I should share here even if no Chinese product is involved! I like those, and would fancy to built one, but my wife would get confirmation that I'm crazy

[Carbon_Dude]

Wooden bikes are interesting.

[cmh]

Hi guys, this is not a proper ride report but it's about bike and journey 
I've just spent 10 days in Greece (no bike  ) and ran into 2 wood bikes. The first one in Athens, the second one in Nafplio. I thought I should share here even if no Chinese product is involved! I like those, and would fancy to built one, but my wife would get confirmation that I'm crazy

Whoa - those are DAMN cool, although I question the structure of the second. Still... damn cool.

[SportingGoods]

Hi everyone,
I get a real ride report to share this time 

A friend who tests bikes for a MTB magazine got a Santa Cruz Tallboy in my hands. I managed to ride it twice, including my 9km test loop that I use to benchmark any change I make. First I want to mention that this is the high range of the Tallboy: 27.5+ (Enve rims, DT Swiss hubs, what else ), CC frame (the best carbon version), Eagle, Fox 34 (140 mm). That's one very expensive bike!!
http://www.santacruzbicycles.com/node/1491


In a nutshell, my bike outperformed the Santa Cruz, if you just look at the time. Even a top range Full-sus (12kg w/o pedals) is no match to a very good hard tail when there are serious climbs. In term of fun... it's a close match. The DH sections were real fun on the Santa Cruz, and I felt a lot safer with perfect control. I really enjoyed both technical descents and non-technical descents where you can just sit on the saddle and pedal, something I can never do on my hard tail (I have to stand up). But that joy down hill is compensated by the additional pain going up.
All in all, would I trade my bike for the Tallboy CC? Maybe not. And we talk about a bike that probably costs 3x mine. Only the price tag would get me to trade it, but if you ask me what I want to ride everyday, then that's my CS-496.

This tests tells me that the CS-M04 could well be my perfect frame. Now that I have made the switch to Eagle drive train and Boost hubs the switch would be pretty simple and cheap. End of next year at the earliest. Sooner would be beyond my WAF.

[Carbon_Dude]

Thanks for the write up on the Santa Cruz Tallboy.  It's one of the only bikes that I would like to test ride and compare to my Spec SJ6F.  The picture you posted is the one with the Shimano 2x10 drivetrain.  Like you, I prefer the SRAM Eagle over a 2x10.  I also like that the bike is available in that bright yellow color.  The one thing that I like about my SJ6F is the price I paid, Specialized reduced the price by $1500 a few months back so a $4500 carbon FS plus bike became $3000, which fit my budget much better.

I rode a SC Hightower and was not happy with it, just too much of a DH bike feel to me, but the Tallboy 3 might be a better choice for me if I were looking for something new.