That looks like a very cool trail Cal.
Here on the front range of the Rocky Mountains where I live, just about all they ride are fat tire bikes. The trails can get pretty harry indeed. I have never had the cojones. Take a look.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFlEaP0DSG8
Austin,
That is some chute. Any mistake though, or catching a little too much air and things can get very carried away. Also taking on too much speed is easy and tempting, but will lead to crashes.
I learned after the fact that I had broken both my collar bones. Also I have a savage key-loyd scar that is thick like leather on my left shoulder. It happened in West Viginia near Snow Shoe a ski resort at a trail called "Tea Creek."
We parked at the trail head exit, and used granny gear to climb on the road. That in itself was a long and brutal climb. The pitch was steep enough that if you stopped you would not be able to start again, so you just tested your threshold of pain on the threshold of choking yourself.
Tea Creek was a lot like the chute in your video, with the cliff like roll off, but the trail was carved into a cliff so on your right was a wall, and on your left a roll-off that went way down.
The climbing was behind us and all done on the road, and now a descent on Tea Creek was a different kind of chute. So on a return trip a year later, we went back to Tea Creek, and I kinda went "Gonzo." So everything was great until I crashed.
I was going fast and I caught a bit too much air, and then landed on a rock that trapped my front wheel event though I had a suspension fork, and the next thing you know the bike is doing cartwheels and I'm tucked in a roll getting sliced up on rocks.
Luckily I stayed on the trail and did not go off the side. It was a long roll down.
So I don't need any tatoo's, I have scars.
On the single track in the pine barrens of Long Island it was not so rocky, and climbs were short and could be steep, but there would be scabs on our shoulders that I called "bark-burn" from brushing trees as we wove through scrub pine forests.
When mountain biking was first invented that's when I got my first mountain bike, an IBIS Mountain Trials, that I still own today. Back in the day a serious concern was not to be mistaken as a deer by some hunter, as the trails we rode were very very narrow and pretty much were deer trails.
My abused bike I was wearing the paint off the steel frame from crashes, so I took it apart and sent it out to get powder coated, and in a "Calzone" manner I had it powder coated florescent orange so I would not get shot or mistaken for a deer.
Today in some spots the powder coat has blistered, but the dots of rust resemble the "spatter" coat paint jobs that Scot Nicole at IBIS performed as a custom paint job back in the day.
BTW this Mountain Trials bike has a short 39 inch wheel base, a tall bottom bracket, and features a 26 inch front wheel with a 24 inch rear wheel. The handling is kinda violent and twitchy, and this kinda makes it a bit dangerous.
Somehow I managed to secure a titanium version of the IBIS Mountain Trials. I contacted Scot Nicole and inquired about how many of these he might have made because I knew it was a very rare bike.
Scot's response was, "Hard to say, but realize I don't remember every bike I ever made. Probably only a few, but in fact you might have the only one."
So I might have a prototype. My steel version dates back into the 80's, but the Ti IBIS is pre-Vee brakes and features a "Hand-Job" which is an investment cast fist that is used as a trademarked cable hanger that was on some 1994 and before bikes.
I'll try to post the link on Gary Helfrick who was involved with the development of titanium bikes. He is an interesting genius who had to choose between going to MIT on a full scholarship, or going on the road with Aerosmith as a roadie.
Guess which he picked. LOL.
Anyways he is an interesting guy.
So imagine you still owned your first car. That's what that steel IBIS is for me. Then decades later you somehow secure a Mustang GT 350 with the flat plane crank and evil exhaust tone. That's what the Ti IBIS represents.
BTW I'm not so young and dumb anymore. Never thought I would live so long is the truth though.
Augie
