Mountain biking: crazy bike trail

that is the funnest thing ive seen in a long time, scary? they put fences where you might die.

that aint scurry...

I don't believe for a minute you could do that trail at those speeds, but it's easy to talk tough on the internet. <shrug>

Hmm, my feelings are somewhat in the middle of you two. I would tend to say its more of a 'scary' trail then it is a 'tough' trail. It doesn't look too technical, but is very fast, with alot of cliffs to fall off of.

Its hard to tell speed and steepness in a video, but they are going pretty fast. At about 2 minutes in, you see the guy purposely get his back tire loose, so that he can do a controlled drift around the corner. That's tough.

I'm a very skilled rider, but not this type of stuff. I would love to do the trail, but I would do it at about a quarter of the speed (or less). I'd much rather be doing trials then singletrack, that's just my style. Although singletrack is 1000 times better then a paved trail.

I found some pictures of the trail I used to ride in San Diego:
http://nickashley.123hosting.com/slideshow/?g=bike

The 3rd picture in, is the closest I've come to falling off a cliff. I tried to slow up on the wood, but my tires had mud on them, so they just slid. I could tell I was going too fast to make the turn given the amount of traction I had. So I let off the brakes, and steered off the ramp, smacking into the side of the landing. I threw my weight to the right to prevent and endo, and landed on the downward ramp.

Then I got off, brushed myself off, and took a picture of where my bike landed. Worst part was, my water tasted like dirt for the rest the day

If I remember, I'll snap some pics of the trail I ride in Omaha next time I go. It doesn't look nearly as impressive, but I like the trail better. The california trail was pretty steep going down in a few spots, and I didn't have the power to get back up, so I was walking my bike alot. I can ride the whole trail in Omaha.

Cool pics, Nick. I didn't know you where a mountain biker . We do a lot of riding at Daley Rach and Mission Trails. This place looks familiar but I can't place it. Where were the pictures taken? Is it Elfin Forest?

I've seen you on a bike, if you would do it at quarter speed I'd have both feet firmly planted on the ground and be trying to walk the bike down.

What impressed me the most is the speed they are doing it at (everyone else seems to be fighting the downgrade but they seem to be pushing it) and how they are passing up riders on that narrow trail at those speeds.

Yeah, the passing people part was insane. They weren't even announcing their presence, either ("on your left...")

Yeah, I would have been one of the guys on the side of the trail they passed, hehe.

The guy in the back sounded like he'd whistle an alert every now and then, and sometimes yell "passing" but it usually meant he was actually passing at the moment. I think I remember him saying "on the left" once though.



Same here, if the trail isn't scary enough crawling down at the speeds most of the others were taking it there's nothing like madmen flying by you to spice things up.

My memory is horrible, and its been awhile.

I never saw a name for the place, and don't think I ever knew what it was called. Some friends took me there once, and I rode by myself after that (it was too tough for them). It wasn't too popular of a spot, I don't think.

All I remember is it was in or near Carlsbad, and I entered the trail at the parking lot of a fire station. There was also a skate park at the same parking lot. I just looked around in google maps, and found the spot:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&q=skate+park&sll=33.137848,-117.291498&sspn=0.004986,0.011373&ie=UTF8&ll=33.136846,-117.26459&spn=0.002385,0.005686&t=h&z=18

Basically you rode down into the valley, where the stream and stuff was. It seemed to kinda dead end for me, and then I would just turn around and ride back (and walk it up some parts). There were a couple splits that might have looped around better, but I was always by myself and didn't want to get lost, so always went with the "take every left" rule.

Hmm, let's see if this works. . .

Another first person downhill trail:

i guess...

i doubt its very hard.

i used to do mountain biking, with a haro lol.

the street kind. fun stuff, buty yeah these days im not the ol 100 pound skinny person anymore.

By all means post a better video of yourself then.

i accept your challenge.

Oh NO!

Robert and Onion are Mountain Bike Fighting!

That makes the toughest of our trails look like a jogging track.

No way, as Nick can attest I have a bad sense of balance and I can't do anything like that. But neither can ogionik, and there's always these guys saying "that's nothing" and turning their nose up at what others have done. The overwhelming majority of the time they couldn't in their wildest dreams do any better, or even know of something they find truly impressive to compare it to and it's just about being dismissive of what others can do.

So if ogionik can do better than those guys did, I want to see it. If he's not being unimpressed for the sake of it then we'll get an frickin' awesome video.

Maybe something like this one: http://able2know.org/topic/121655-1

My neck hurts from watching that video...

Unbelievable! The French guy obviously has been doing this for quite some
time, he knew the way quite well. Never in a million years would I attempt
such an adventure.

I had enough driving the narrow serpentines in Europe.

Yes, I was the one that had to gently break the news to him that although he has good hand eye coordination, he has no balance.

I have a home-made indo board in my living room, which is great for practicing balance. It looks exactly like this (I can do all these tricks also). My favorite sports are wakeboarding, slalom skiing, downhill skiing, and trials (both motorcycle and bicycle) so yeah.. balance matters.