After a very successful first Shop Stop @ ZM Cycle & Fitness (photos & video are on the way), we had a very strong request to stop at The Bicycle Shop in Sarnia, ON. Being only an hour away from them on Saturday June 2nd @ To Wheels in London, we decided to pay them a visit on Sunday June 3rd! We also made the East Side Cycle & Back Peddling stops in the same weekend being July 21st and 22nd.

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Hope to see ya there!

   Road trip! The first fmb of the season for me went off last weekend in Grand Junction, Colorado. Me and my Ns bikes/Lama cycles teammate, Aeron Learmonth, set out on the road for a whole day of driving to make it out there. These drives are starting to feel like an everyday thing! The drive crawled by but we were excited to arrive thursday night with just enough sunlight left to check out the course and brainstorm line ideas for the next day of practice.

   The course was pretty similar to the year before so I already had a pretty good idea of what I wanted to do. Practice went great and we managed to ride all the lines and start to get comfortable on the jumps. My foot was still not 100% from my crash 3 weeks earlier in Utah but it was holding up suprisingly well. I made sure to tape it up really well and luckily I was able to avoid casing anything. The top drop although pretty small definately gave me the most trouble but it was clear sailing from there and as long as I didnt have any rough landings or crashes I didnt really notice it much.

   Best trick was that night and I knew I wanted to frontflip the last jump in my run so I figured it was the perfect time to do it. I dropped in early in the session and stomped it clean first try! I was pretty happy to get that out of the way and the croud seemed pretty stoked to see the first frontflip of the competition. I sat out the rest of the best trick and enjoyed the show, things were going off and I was hesitant to keep riding at risk of hurting my foot more and not being able to compete in the main event the next day.

   Saturday morning finally rolled around and after a hearty breakfast me and Aeron got out to the course early and were some of the first people up there practicing. Just one of the benefits of camping at the course instead of staying at a hotel in town! We lucked out because there wasnt much time before the wind really picked up and it was pretty gnarly just to try and ride through the course. We had a long break before the pro slopestyle started and it was a nice chance to relax, eat some good food, and get ready for the main event. The event was delayed a couple hours because of the harsh winds, some people chose to practice in the wind but I felt confident that I had gotten the practice I needed in and didnt want to risk going down in the windy conditions. When they finally started things off there was only time for a 2 run final with no qualifiers. I was perfectly okay with this since unfortunately the wind was still fighting with us. When it was finally my turn to drop I just looked straight ahead and tried not to pay any attention to the flags and just focus on my run. I started off by just creeping off the top drop and trying to stay light on my foot. I went into the whaletail line and backflipped off the stepdown. The next jump was the windiest and biggest on course and had already claimed a couple riders so I held on for dear life and simply survived haha. The jump after this one was the big "5 10" kicker. I spun a 360 on it and knew right away I was going to over rotate quite a bit. I'm still not sure how I road it out because I landed just about completely sideways but either way it worked out pretty well because if slowed me down perfectly for the boner log which I threw a tailwhip on. Finally I was at the last jump and I frontflipped just like I had the night before and completed the run. When I got off my bike I saw that part of my tire had blow off the bead on the over rotated 360 and not even a second later it completely blew off the rim and the tube shot out and tangled around my chainstays like a snake. I couldnt believe how lucky it was that I finished the run before it completely blew off.

   I hiked back up to the top and fixed my tire but opted out of my second run. I was pretty happy with the first run I did and with the way the wind was taking people out I figured I'd quit while I was ahead and finish healing up before the next contest. As always after the competition we all went out for some drinks and the Strength in Numbers premiere as well as the awards. I was pretty happy with how I did and ended up in 9th place and bumped my fmb ranking to 35th. The weekend was a great success and I'm excited to go back! I've already started planning out my runs for next year and I can't wait! Up next is John Henry's Jump Jam and then back to Colorado for Teva! Hope to see you there!

 thanks,

      -Garrett

NS BIkes
Hygia Brakes
Fox Head
Lama Cycles
Deity
Spank
Outbound Cycle
SilverStar BikePark



Photo Cred:

   Nic Genovese
   Brett Rink

Garrett Robertson and I headed down to Grand Junction Colorado for Ranchstyle last Wednesday right after building up Garrett's new NS Soda! It was about a 23 hour drive on the way down, but we pulled through and made it there on Thursday at about 7PM. We were camping at the course which was actually really fun, but very uncomfortable. Friday morning we registered with out FMB licence numbers and started to practice.

We practiced most of friday other then when it got two windy. Finals got postponed a few hours on saturday, so all the riders sat and talked about the course. After not riding for 5 hours they told us to grab our bikes and do the best of two runs. The wind was still blowing so I decided to take it easy placing 22nd in Pro men. Garrett decided to throw down a super sick run ending with a fat frontflip! This run got him 9th in men, which is definitely a huge success!

Garrett sending a frontflip!

After a sweet trip, we packed up and headed back to Canada. Another 24hours and we were home sweet home. It was my first time traveling that long and it was tons of fun! Garrett and I will be traveling lots this summer and next time we will definitely film a video to go along with the trip!

Thanks Aeron and Garrett!
LAMA/NSBIKES

Last weekend, Mr.Steezy a.k.a. Kent Woods got some work done with his good buddy Ty and filmed this awesome edit at his local skatepark.  Like always, Kent doesn't disappoint and makes his tricks look totally effortless! Check out that footage and that bike just down below.

Frame: NS Suburban Dirt
Fork: Rockshox Sektor lowered to 80mm sprayed black
Bars: 2012 NS district High
Grips: Animal Edwin
HEadset: Kink internal
Cranks: Redline Device
BB: Deity outboard bearing
Chain: Shadow V2
Wheels (front): Mavic 721 laced to NS 20mm Rotary Hub
Wheels (back): Atomlab Pimp Lite 32 hole laced to 2012 NS Rotary 10 tooth
Tires: Maxxis 2.25 DTH
Seat/Post: Fit ECCD kevlar/kink pivotal
Pedals: Demolition Plastic
Sprocket: Premium 25 tooth

Just to let you guys know that the 2012 NS Soda completes are now in stock! If you haven't pre-ordered one, now is the time to contact your local LamaCycles Distribution retailer!

In the meantime you can check out NS Bikes rider Jaws shredding the Soda 1 deep in Polish woods.

Starting May 12th, East Coast Homies & Buddies will be tripping to 4 bike shops throughout the summer in Ontario. The plan is to gather as many riders as possible at each bike shop and go out and ride their local spots and skateparks all together. We will be giving out stickers, posters, t-shirts and even Kali helmets for some lucky ones! At the end of the ride, everyone comes back to the bike shop for the BBQ and some sweet givaways!

Here's the link to the Facebook event of our first stop @ ZM Cycle & Fitness in Toronto, Ontario.

So if you guys want to have a great time with Alexandre Paradis, Louis Lhomel, Samuel Croteau, Stéphane Bélanger, Kent Woods, Ryan Korpikoski and more, you gotta remember these dates below!

It has become a tradition for me to go to Moab every spring with friends from Les yables XC team.  This year, we discovered some new trails that are just amazing.  The local riders in Moab work hard to build and to open new trails every year.  This time out, we rode Moab's classic trails like slickrock, sovereign and porcupine rim but we also rode the magnificent 7 trails that start near the canyonlands national park and end up on the edge of Moab.  It does live up to its name.  These trails are magnificent.  It all starts with a shuttle ride to the top of the trail, where you ride through beautiful singletrack by the edge of canyons for about 7 miles.  The flow is constant and it will leave you smiling all the way down.  After we were done with the downhill, we rode up top of gold bar and we came down the Portal trail.  It was an exhausting 4 hour + ride in 35˚C temperature but it was absolutely worth it.

My Mbuzi was just perfect for Moab.  It's got the ideal travel and all of the components worked great.  I am still amazed by the power of the R1 brakes.  The guys from les yables were also running formula brakes and they were blown away by them.  Thanks  to the guys from LAMACYLCES for hooking me up with such a great bike.

Mike

We are proud to welcome Chicoutimi shredder Max Compartino on board our Buddy Crew. With a strong BMX background we can't wait to see what Max has in store this summer! Here's his welcome edit filmed at the legendary 'Church' park in Chicoutimi, QC. Max knows every transition by heart in there and it definitely shows in this video!

Filming: Math Plante
Editing: Max Compartino

Frame: NS Capital26
Fork: Marzocchi Dj1
Headset: FSA Impact
Bars: NS Proof
Grips: Flatware
Stem: Black Market
Seat: Shadow fat
Sprocket; Stolen 25t
Crank: Eastern 175mm
Pedal: Colony Clones
Chain: DK Exo
Brakes: Fly Classico
Brake cable: Stolen
Brake lever: Odyssey Monolever (short)
Tires: DMR Supermoto
Rims: Alienation
Front hub: Unknown
Rear hub: Primo Remix 10t LSD

Remember the photo of Stéphane Bélanger riding in a huge dam that made POD!? And that video to back it up!? Well Stéphane decided to bring the whole crew down to pay that dam a visit! That's right, Sam Croteau, Parappa, Louis Lhomel, Stéphane & a couple of good friends made the trip to this absolutely unique location!

This time however, Louis brought his camera and the team's GoPro HD2 to make sure we capture every moment of this epic adventure!

Thanks to our really good friends Mickey & Johnny for being so sick and inviting us over to party and crash at their place everytime we head out in the Saguenay area! This was definitely one hell of a roadtrip!

Just finished building up my 2012 NS Soda Slope! I am amazed, it is the most amazing bike I have ever laid eyes on. I wish it wasn't night time or I would be riding it right now! Thought it would be neat to go down by the lake and get some sweet shots!

Specs List:
NS Soda Slope
Fox 831 Fork
Fox RP23 Shock
Loaded AMX Wheels
Loaded AMX Pedal/Bar/Stem/Headset
Loaded AMX Seat Post/Collar
Bengal Brakes
Maxxis Larson TT Tires
Cromag Seat
Stylo Cranks

I hope you enjoyed checking out my slope bike for 2012!

Thanks
Aeron

Harrison Mendel and myself took a trip to Sicamous, BC on Sunday to meet up with Corbin Selfe! Turns out he has a set of super sick jumps and we had a great sesh! Corbin was killing it on the bike while Harrison was getting some rad photos. Super stoked on getting out of Kelowna and riding some really good jumps!

Aeron Left, Corbin Right.

Check back soon for my NS Soda bike check!

Thanks
Aeron