20 October 2013 - Redhill and Oxford Falls

Well, well, well...  a return to the domestic equivalent of The Great North Road...  that is, the spiritual home of shutupandride when not travelling real far!

Simon, Toby, Waxhead (Andrew?) joined Stephe to cruise around Redhill, over to Oxford Falls, and experiment on new ways out.

Waxhead was on a $99 K-Mart special which was ten years old.  And, sadly, managed to demonstrate that skill, fitness and all 'round class care nothing for the nature of your bike.  He was a legend.  Indeed, the only possible dent in the theory about the bike not being relevant was around 200m from the end of the ride, down a steep, rocky descent, when the V-brakes grabbed the front wheel and kicked Waxhead OTB.  Delivering his only injury of the ride...

Toby also demonstrated that general physical skills translate - on his third ever ride, he was jumping / rolling / cruising along with everyone else.  Bugger, eh!

Simon and Stephe rode as well as they could in such esteemed company - it was just good to be out.

Some photos, with the full set here:

Simon charging



Toby, Waxhead and Simon, and yes - I did in fact capture Waxhead off his bike at one point:






Some clips:








And, some from Simon (showing that you can still have fun, even with only elementary skills (!)):









And, a Strava route here (naturally, we walked our bikes carefully at all relevant protected areas...).

11 October 2013 - Old Man Valley, Hornsby

Toby's shiny new bike had only once been out, and in the rain...

So, Simon, Dave and Stephe decided to help him out and check out Old Man Valley.

He had a very big smile.

Although, did manage on OTB into a tree, which is always a good thing to do early - the mountain bike gods certainly wanted to make a point about hubris, and he's back to the happy and humble Toby that we all know and love - even while riding like a legend!

Two short, very low res videos taken by Simon:






Dave about to enter the board walk of treachery, and a quick snapshot of the Strava page (the actual page can be found here):