We are still alive!

To Brian Bailey, Cory Ross and anyone else who occasionally checked this blog!

It has been a very long time since I have last posted, there have been many events that have happened since my last post!

The bike season is over! The season was a long one, it ended pretty well with a second place finish at the collegiate national championships. I finished 3rd overall in the RMCC Collegiate ranking behind Cody Wilderman who took two 1st place finishes at the conference championships to take second overall. My teammate Joey Schusler destroyed the field every week and won conference and the Collegiate National Championships. Collegiate racing is so much fun and I hope to try and accomplish my goal of becoming the D1 National Champion, that means I'll have to still be in school next year which will most likely happen but where? That is still to be determined! I would like to also thank my mom again for feeding the whole entire CU Cycling team, and even though most of the kids seemed to under appreciate her efforts, I know I really enjoyed all she did and having her there!

Other highlights from the bike season and the trip to Banner Elk, NC included: 1st place at the CSM collegiate open race. Getting a full page picture in Bike Magazine. Joey manipulating the presidential race in North Carolina. The Mud fest in Durango. 2nd place in the Sol Vista G3 stage two race. 4th in the Sol Vista Dual Slalom. Dirt Jumping and shredding with friends. Golf course sliding contests. Getting 2nd to Joey in every race almost. Um...lots more...

After the bike season ended the ski season has officially begun. Michael and I are in full swing coaching mode working full time! I have school and Finals, so I'm unable to work full time right now. I will be taking a semester off this winter as I look for new educational opportunities, devote more time to coaching full time and to train hard for the 2009 bike season! Michael and I started training 3 weeks ago using James' MTB Strength Training Program which has so far been a great experience! Better than any past weight training programs I have tried thus far that is for sure. I really enjoy how the program utilizes and recruits muscles used most while riding, I recommend this program to all aspiring mtb racers!

Thats about it folks, other than the Buffs missing out on a bowl game, the broncos playing different every week, not too much else is going on. This time of the year things seem to slow down, most of the sponsor requests have been sent and now we play the waiting game. Next year things are again looking to be very promising as we will once again be part of a new growing MTB team, Team Geronimo, and will most likely be sporting some new sponsors.

Moving back to Boulder

Taking a break to watch the Olympics which has pretty much consumed all of my downtime this past week, but I'm packing up and moving back to B-Town for the rest of the summer and the beginning of school. I'll be starting my first semester at CU after transferring from FRCC. I'm really excited to be apart of an actual team this year for Collegiate Cycling, don't get me wronge, FRCC was an awesome experience and creating my own team and floating around hanging out with different teams and riding in a swaetervest was sweet! Maybe I'll find a sweet CU sweatervest and continue the tradition? Thats all gonna happen in a few weeks, so we'll just have to see how things pan out!
Last weekend was the G3 mudfest in Snowmass, and let me tell you...it was slippery! I love the G3 format, I think its great; a stage race creates so much opportunity for lead change and opens things up in the overall. I have been plagued by bad luck on my first race every time, crash, flat, crash and this time 45 seconds from the bottom all the air let out and I peddled hard smashing a brand new rim to pieces. The night before I spent all my time building a new rim that had a lifespan of all but 5 minutes. If I didn't have two more races ahead of me I think I would have saved it for another day! After a slick and mis fortunate first run I started nearly last in 16th position in the Super D. After a 50 yard sprint the super D trail winded down single track through the forests and wide open flower filled fields, however I didn't really get to enjoy the flowers and all that good stuff due to all of the mud caked on my glasses; glasses were a bad choice in the rain and mud! The track was sooooo much fun though, I passed two guys, including michael who had poor tire choice and was sliding every which way. The best part about the Super D was that it was taped through the mountain cross course, and theres nothing more exciting then riding an xc bike over 20 foot doubles in the wet:) An 8th place overall helps my position as I move up in the standings, but i really had no chance at the podium after the first race anyway, but I still wanted to get the best result possible. Sunday brought the rain and mud. People were scrambling for tires and we turned into tire salesmen practically donating our extras to the needy, including our sister who had the race of her life, so far at least by staying on the bike and passing 3 others on her way to a landslid defeat finishing first! For Michael and I it was a different story, no passing or even staying on the bike. The weather had been fluctuating between constant rain and then the sun would poke its head out drying the track making it greasy. Many riders had trouble staying on their bikes, I had trouble staying on the track as I was trying to stay loose, but it didn't work as I was staring at silly lines that had engulfed earlier riders. I hit most of my lines but managed to run some turns wide into the tape destroying my momentum. Without any major falls, but many mistakes I ended up in 6th and 6ht overall, one off of my pre race goal . Michael had a rough weekend with some crashes, but for the most part was riding really well in practice. The new 31.5 inch bars made an instant impression as I felt more comfortable and stable on my machine which is how I've felt all year, but its all coming around and I feel that I will end the season strong at Sol Vista for another G3. I'm off to Sol Vista tomorrow to break in the new trails and to also train for the upcoming race!

Snowmass G3

Gonna try to get back on this blogging thing, been pretty busy the last few weeks, lots of working, riding, and traveling. Its the night before the Snowmass G3 kicks off and its been raining all afternoon, looks like there will be mud!? Its been a 3 weeks since Blast the Mass, and I think I am finally comfortable on the DH bike...finally:)! We've had an awesome last few weeks of riding our backyard trails, got some suspension testing done this week, and with the addition of 31.5 inch bars(HUGE!) everything is rocking and ready to go! I have high hopes after coming off of a relatively successful weekend at the Colorado State Championships in SOl Vista. Sol Vista by the way put on one hell of a race, mad props go out to Wentz, Thompson, Sharp, Moga, Andy W, Mike Mac, and the rest of the Bigfoot productions crew for putting on a race to remember. Check out the link for additional coverage from an awesome weekend:

http://www.littermag.com/2008/news/newsarticle.php?newsID=1230

The fourth place finish, second place qualifier was confidence inspiring especially while rocking the hard tail on a bumpy and fast Dual Slalom track, the best I have ever experienced! I learned that night that consistency counts as I watched Brian Lopes and Chris Herndon advance to the final, I started off the night smoothly, but the runs were getting so fast, I lost focus a fews times and thats what hurt me in the long run. Still stoked to get on the podium while riding well. The DH however was a little different story! Still not entirely comfortable on the bike, I had some great practice runs, my qualifier however didn't go as planned with a fall in the rocks even though I thought I was on my line. The weather was a little quirky, lightning was flashing above but the race went on, I was on deck when a flash popped, people's hair stood up inside of their Helmets, Joey's brake levers shocked him, did we stop the race...no! Concerned for my safety I stayed crouched on my toes until the final ten second count down where I rolled up the ramp, looked down the ramp and was off. The rain had just started creating a greasy track which I noticed immediately making me a little conservative, I didn't take any risky lines, was cautious and used my brakes a wee bit too much. I didn't hurt, but it also didn't help seeing a blue flash surround you while riding and the boom fallowed immediately as I entered into the tree's. It was pretty neat though as not too many people will ever get to experience anything like it. I came down first, the race stopped and was held for an hour until the storm went away leaving a fast tacky track for the faster qualifiers. Many had conservative runs as they didn't know what the riding conditions were like, some improved their times as the ruts formed firmly in the usually unsteady sand. Mike Kreger 4th, Kain Leonard 3rd, a disappointed Chris Boice 2nd and a huge breakthrough for Joey Schusler as he came across the line in first 2 seconds in front with a broken transmission. Congrats Joey, you earned it! This weekend in Snowmass I will be looking for a good result, but most importantly I want to have a fun weekend, few mistakes, clean runs, successful working bike set up and of course to beat everyone else!:) I'm not going to put pressure on myself this weekend, I will do the best I can, and go hard. A top 5 overall is the goal, top 3 in a race run with 3 total consistently fast race runs. Michael I'm sure is also feeling the sam ewaqy as both of us are looking to get back on top in the DH department after a hard beginning to the season. Tune in for further updates and pictures(maybe!)

What a Weekend!!!

We had a ton of fun this weekend! We had all the Kids over this Saturday for the World Cup Races. It was a blast, we all watched the DH, then went and rode bikes, I stopped riding early and started the grill. After the Mountain cross was over and everyone ate, we all went out again. Then I got invited down to the ski lake and went tubbing with the kids, it was a pretty good time! After that, we came back up to the house and had a campfire and made smores and a water fight as well.

Today we were invited to Tyler Spences birthday party. No pin the tail on the donkey here though, we woke up at 7am, left around eight for carbondale with kids in tow and from Carbondale we drove down into gleenwood canyon to the grizzly exit where we put in our rafts, ducks, tubs and kayaks for a day on the river. It was a ton of fun! I haven't been rafting for I think about 8 years and it was great to be out on such a beautiful day paddling down this stretch of river while getting to check out the canyon from a different point of view. It was hilarious to watch all of the kids in tubes flip over in the big waves and gnarly rapids, Michael flipped his boat a few times on purpose but I don' think people knew so they assumed that he was a terrible rafter. For the most part I was usually towing around two or three kids at a time and the whole time we were pretending that we were riding bikes and doubling the rapids doing tailwhips. I tell you what, while living over here I don't get to spend much time with kids my own age but these kids sure know how to keep me feeling young as they are full of energy and stoked on everything. After playing around in the play wave which Cory flipped in and cruising through south canyon we finally made it to our pull out spot. It was a great day on the rive, we had lunch and sang Tyler the birthday song as well on a nice beach by a large eddy. The adventure however wasn't entirely over, it never is. After rafting, all of the kids came back to our place to ride bikes. Roy Binge also showed up and was stoked for his first day of riding our trials, I'm pretty sure he has been dreaming of this day for at least a year or so! All of the kids really impressed me with their riding skills, Roy hit everything and was incredibly smooth, I tell you, in a few years he will be dominating! Tyler and tanner were killing it and as always the Lane bro's were ripping it up on the big bikes boosting the big table at the end. By this time of day I'm exhausted, I was extremely tired after rafting, I can't believe I even made it out to bike. So this weekend was extremely eventful! We got a lot of pictures, video and all had a great time! I definitely would have liked to have been out east riding Mount ST Ann, but the kids made this off weekend one to remember, I don't know what we would do without them!

Check out for pics:

http://ridemonkey.com/forums/showthread.php?t=206437

Brian

AMERICA F@&K YEAH

Michael says: So Europe was fricken sweat, but its good to be back on home soil. Were currently sitting in the Chicago airport eating big burritos!!!!! Hopeing to catch the next flight on standby as we missed our connection earlier. Either way we'll be in Boulder tonight, minus our bikes ( thanks again to Iberia airlines again) there 24 hours behind us:( hope to we many of you soon.

Colorado here we come!

First time we have had internet in about two weeks, sorry about the lack of information, ever since we started camping power has been an issue! Well, the day is finally here, Michael and I will be finally coming back home, and how great that thought sounds. Throughout everything we have been through over here, its been quite a lot we have never quit, our desire to finish what we started is how we made the last few weeks work. There has been a lot of downtime, problems and setbacks, but I believe we passed the test! When I arrive back in the states I will work on a full recape of the end portion of our trip and maybe an overall summary, but in the last two weeks Michael and I have braved the weather, rain soaked nights, my diet has been that of a squirrle-bear, broken bikes yet no broken bones(hurray), but with all of this came great sights, riding and new friends. One thing though that was rock solid the whole trip, the KANGOO! We goo'ed up and around so many mountain passes, made some of the most delicious Nutella rice cake meals and ate so much tuna fish in our KANGOO kitchen. Somehow, I really don't know, that thing survived and passed inspection when we dropped her off. So there is a ton, metric to be exact, of information that I will bestoy upon you all soon, so keep checking in often as there will be more wicked sweet stories and pictures of our rocking European adventure!

The adventure never stops though, once back in Colorado its off to the races once again as we get to enjoy the comforts of our own home cooking half an hour away in Snowmass, Colorado! Just had an awesome vacation day in Barcelona, lots of beach action, oceaning to be exact, I'm burn't, I'm tired and I'm ready to come home. Thank you everyone for your comments and support while we were here in this very foreign land, it really was an experince of a lifetime, not too many people have probably done what we did, which is really cool!!!

Broken Bikes equals many friends here in Germany!

So our bikes took a beating this week, the frames are fine but many other things have been buelled! However when a kid from the USA is in need and is very far away from home, it is no problem for many people to go out of there way to help us out! Our neighbors helped me, as well as the swedish junior team, the whole race organization knew who we were and were stoked to have racers from the USA, we were very popular with everyone. The race was good, I'll talk more later about it when I have battery, but I was just glad I could race so the result didn't matter too much, but I got 21st out of 65 racers. I sat in the hotseat for a while because I ran third due to a mechanical in Saturdays seeding run, in that run I also tried doing a no hander over the finish line jump no clipped in and nearly biffed it huge, but was able to save it for the most part, that was also a good way for people to know who you are. Michael was a little bit behind me, had an OK run but would like to be faster yet so would I. We both hope to due a little better in Switzerland for the next IXS cup. It is in Scual(sp). Thats where we are headed next! We will try to update all of you soon, we will have to find power first! Thule, Germany was great, the people are awesome and the rider was good. Free camping, showers and a DH only race with a good turnout here in East Germany. I would like to see more of this back in the states where the race organizers really care and the mountain works with them to put on the best race possible. I was told to tell all of you about this race and hopefullly more people from the states will race. Germany sure was fun, now, it is off the Switzerland!!!

Race Recap

Michael Says:
So Don't have much computer battery so this will have to be quick. Just wanted to do a quick recap on the weekend. Everything ended up working out pretty well. We got Brian's bike a squared away on Friday so he is now back in the Game. My bike however suffered the same blown shock problem today during my last practice run, I was also able to get a hold of a shock to borrow for the race run. The race was greate, IXS cup puts them on well, the competition was strong. At then end of the day Brian finished 21st with a 3:12 and got to sit in the hotseat for quite some time. Due to some technical problems during seading he was one of the first out of the gate and held the lead for a while till some of the higher qualifiers came down. I finished 30th with a 3:14
All in all it was a pretty awesome weekend.
Next we'll make our way back south towards the Alps and Scoul Switzerland, and hopefully do some riding at a few spots along the way, if I can find a shock. I'm sure I'll be able to get one to use at the next race just not sure about for the next few days. If not maybe we'll just play tourist, and go swimming in some sweet lakes or something.
We have lots of pictures for this week as well but will have to post those after charging the computers.

This Just In

Michael Say's:
Turns out we won't be coming home early, as changing our tickets would cost something like $4000 dollars, so well instead find something else sweet to do over here in Europe land for another week like originally planned.

Then there were two; The end of the road is near!

The last 24 hours have been interesting! First off, my bicycle is out of commission due to lack of product support over here in Germany, secondly we had to make a midnight hour trip last night to the Hanover Airport to drop Caleb off for his early flight home, the trip home was a hoot as Michael and I got lost seriously ten times driving around in circles till nearly 3am, the European road system is either terrible or they need to dumb it down for us Americans, thirdly we have decided to cut our trip short, returning to the states early so we can prepare for the Snowmass mountain states cup race as well as to save for a possible trip to Canada to race two World Cups up there. Our bikes will need a little loving when we get back, but I think this trip has prepared us greatly for the rest of our race season back home, and we both are looking forward to possibly eating some burritos and sleeping in an actual bed, but first Michael and hopefully me have to kick some German butt this weekend, sleep on the ground for a few more nights and if all goes right party on the streets with all of the other Soccer hooligans Sunday night if the German futbol team wins the Euro Cup VS. Spain. Sorry about the lack of pictures, blogger didn't want to upload mine last time. I'm sure we will poach this sweet spot again for internet and give more updates on the race weekend, maybe some friendly people will provide me with a bike so I can ride, I know I would try to help someone out if they were in a different country without a bike!

Germany

Michael Say's:
Now up in Thale Germany, North east of Frankfort. Parked on the street in front of an apartment building, stealing the only unlocked internet we've found in a long time. Hear for an IXS cup race this weekend, www.ixscup.com I think. Should be pretty sweet. Hiked the track in the dark last night, looks like a ton of fun. Hope everyone had a good time in CB.

IXS CUP RACE: Thule, Germany!!!

Quick update here for ya'll, Caleb is in the driver seat about to melt, pass out, or freak out. We have been cruising around the lovely country of Germany for a few days now taking the bike park tour, finding places to ride on our way up to the IXS Cup Race here in Thule. Here is a recap of our last few days; after leaving Italy, we drove up through Innsbruck, Austria, accidentally found ourselves lost doing round about donuts through Munich, and cruising 95mph but still getting blown past by Ferrari's on the Autoway. We spent two days riding in Winterburg, they're bike park was really fun, small, but I felt like I made some big improvements, then off to Willingem(sp) for a day on the WC course which claimed my rear shock. We hoofed it up here from there walked the DH course last night will fireworks from Germany's Victory lit up the night sky above. Trying to find a shock right now, hopefully I can find something a race, cause this course looks awesome! More updates to come, Calebs about to lose it!

Shladming Adventure Continued

As I was saying before we were off on another adventure, this time up north to the Country of Austria to ride Shladming's bike park to ride some serious DH! It was quite the effort on Michaels part driving and finding his way up there throughout all of Italy's confusing highways. As we ventured farther north into Austria I started to feel more like I was at home. The scenery, architecture, and vibe that the land was giving off reminded me of Nederland and other Colorado mountain towns. I really like the fact that the Gas stations stay open later, and they also have water faucets with drinking water just another plus! I'm not saying that Austria is cooler than Italy, but it sure is more convenient to travel through. The Euro Cup is in full swing right now and Austria was playing Germany, so there was nobody on the road providing for the easiest night drive in Europe so far. After about five hours we made it, found a sweet place to sleep up in the mountains and since it wasn't threatening to rain it made for a good night.

The next day we found the information desk, bought some tickets to ride for the next two days, built up our bikes, geared up and got after it! The first run my bike was making weird noises, so I look down and miss a switchback, go careening down the run, bottom out on the next switchback, go flying and land on the road. That was only the first 20 seconds of my run! After I tightened a few loose bolts, we rode hard all days blowing my hands by the end! The riding was awesome, it was a long mountain but steep so I really put a toll on your brakes and trigger finger. We all had fun but ended up getting rained out mid afternoon a few hours before the lift closed, it reminded me off a Colorado downpour! This ruined our camping plans so we went on the hunt for a bed. There were a lot of B&B's in Shladming, I rung the doorbell on one of them and was greeted by a very nice old man who did not speak English, so he sent in his wife who spoke very little English but somehow we together managed to settle a room and a price in their lovely house. It really did boost an awesome view of the mountain and was situated right above a lush green valley. The fallowing day we rode some loose wet muddy terrain, got dirty, went big over some sweet jumps and overall pushed ourselves hard for the rest of the afternoon. Once packed back up we hoofed it back to Val Di Solle and found our camping spot yet again. So our journey to and from was successful , the Kangoo survived and we had ourselves one hell of a weekend cheering on our boys/girls in red, white and blue.

Mountain cross was epic last night, the USA kicked some butt and Ross "the crusher" Milan killed it yesterday showing everyone when it goes bar to bar he is one not to be reckoned with. Brian Lopes(lopez) looked good, but couldn't put it together like last year and Carney and Nelson each had a great day, got some valuable experience and will be much wiser the next time around. The night ended up in the streets with most of my riding idols stumbling around, there were plenty of hugs going around and Texans getting loose. It was really fun and now we are planning out our next adventure. I believe we will be heading up to Winterburgh or Winterburg, however its spelled, but we heard there is a fun bike park up there, so we will once again be loading up the Kangoo for another adventure with our bikes!!!

For all of you who raced CB this weekend shoot me a post and let me know how things go eh!

Take care all and have a great day!

Brian

World Championship Update

HOLY CRAP! Just popping in, the cliffhanger story will have to wait, but for the time being I thought I would give a quick update on Championship Saturday here in Val Di Solle. Sam Hill killed it all the way till the end, he crashed, and still ended up third!!! One of my Idols Steve Peat was in the hot seat till the last racer, I thought he just might finally win a World Championship, but fellow countrymen Gee Atherton took the Victory alongside his sister who won the Elite Women. I called Gee for the win, but I would have loved to have seen Peaty win one right in front of my eyes! Joey finished first American, and had a good run considering his rough weekend of getting his ankle crushed, pretty proud of him for gutting it out and giving all he had. Joey will be leaving us as he will be heading back to the USofA to his sisters place for some R&R. I hope he rests up and kills it out there! So our crew has been trimmed from 5 to 3! Michael, Caleb and I will be heading up to Winterburg, Germany for some DH action tomorrow after all is finished here in Italy! It has been a great day so far starting with a hike through the forest from my campsite to the DH course, and will probably end somewhere in town after the USA boys go for the Mountain Cross gold. Its almost time for the big show. First I need to re-apply more sunscreen as my face is burning to a crisp!

Good luck Kristin, hope your having fun this weekend, good luck with your race, hope all goes well and can not wait to here how everything goes!!!

Its about time - World Championships!!!

So sorry for the delay on this post, it has been nearly a week since my last update and for that I apologize to all of my die hard readers. After talking to my parents for the first time earlier this week I learned I have quite the readership, I'm really happy that this has made a difference and has kept everyone updated on our adventures. Also its great to read all of your comments, so keep them coming!!!

Since the last read the adventures have not stopped, everyday has been one big adventure for us.

Traveling

Morzine to Val Di Solle was quite the journey, definitely a little more than we bargained for. Of course the drive was longer than what we thought, we got lost trying to drive through towns, the freeway is pretty easy, but the tolls are fairly substantial and are starting to add up, the bike box straps started to make a heinous vibrating noise, kinda like we were a huge bumble bee! Gas is really expensive, especially in Italy. Gas stations are full of crap in France, but occasionally you find something worth consuming, once you enter Italy, the Auto Grill greets you with delicious sandwiches, I used to live for these types of sandwiches, now I cannot enjoy them, it is fairly depressing! The wine and olive vineyards are stunning and everywhere in some parts, mom you would be in heaven over here! Fun fact of the day: Wine is cheaper than water!!! Don't buy fizzle water, its terrible but it does make you drink it slower, so at least you have water! Castles are everywhere, its incredible, we haven't done anymore wall rides on them but Joey invented a new game called "dibs" where you point and "dibs" the castle, if you do then it is yours and you gain more castle strength. Basically it was a way to argue with each other about who has the coolest castle! After a full day and who knows how many Kilometers later we made it to Val Di Solle!

Val Di Solle

Our mission was to get Joey here in time to get everything done and ready, Mission Accomplished! Now we had to figure out what to do that we were here with five days till the races. First things first, find a place to camp out! Bingo, a circle sign with a nice road leading into the forest, it must be a campsite or something right? It was a glorious spot situated in the spacious Italian Woods, the only problem was it rained that night. Good thing I had my tent all set up! We slept in that next morning until the rain slowed, broke down camp and went to town. After going to the market, which by the way closes for like four hours for lunch, a little inconvenient for us but really cool for the locals, I wish we did that, it would slow the pace down to our daily lives and we would all get more family time! We went exploring more into the crazy mountain villages, it amazed me that people built and continue to build on the hillsides with the steepest switchbacks needed to get around. It was foggy up in the high altitude village so we didn't get to see the view but it must have been incredible! Back into town we went with one question on our minds, what were we going to do next? We asked around for a bit, did some research and settled on Shladming Bike Park, home of World Cup races and a really tall mountain boosting tons of vert for some good mid trip downhill mountain bike training. We were told its a 3 hour trip, but traveling in the Kangoo I'm sure it will take us longer!

Tune in next time and find out whether or not we find the place, if the Kangoo makes it, we all sell our bikes and buy a vineyard and turn into major Wineoes! I figured that I would leave this story to be continued as it will be a long one and also that I have to head on out into the rain find Michael and Caleb and set up camp. Check out the race tomorrow on freecaster.tv! It should be showing around 6am for you Colorado folks, it'll blow your minds what these riders are riding down!

All of the USA Team members are going to bed now, many of them beat and bruised from the long weekend, but they will all be going for the gold tomorrow morning risking everything down the gnarliest course ever! Dustin Belcher would like to extend a hello to everyone and that he may be down right now, but he is not out as he will be back riding soon looking to prove to everyone that he really did deserve to wear the Red, White and Blue!

Still having an awesome time, watching a little futbol right now just enjoying the last moments of comfort inside the USA hotel before I head out into the night, into the rain, spiders and forest! Next blog also will include world championship racing action and reports, so check back in about 24 hours for full coverage!

Goodnight,

Brian

HAPPY FATHERS DAY DAD!!!

Being after midnight over here it is fathers day, so I would like to extend and Gigantic HAPPY FATHERS DAY to our father Mr Tom Buell! Thank you dad so much for all of your support in making our dreams a reality, we have the greatest dad in the world. In my 21 years of life, and I'm sure Michaels 24(dang he's old haha), my father has been such a great influence and inspiration to me and if he wasn't such a dedicated father to all of his children I wouldn't be the person I am today, that I am sure of!

A few things I admire about my dad and what has influenced me to this day!

• His work ethic: I've never seen someone so hard working. I don't think anyone will find a nicer man, someone who always wears a smile on his face and is there to greet you the second you walk into his shop.
• Attitude: Always positive upbeat and cheerful! Now you all know where I get it from. and Mom too, they are both great people, but mom its dads day so let him have his glory:)
• Motivation: Up @ the crank of dawn, coffee brewing, ready to meet the day dead on no matter what lays ahead of him!
• Perseverance: Once he starts a project he finishes it! I'm getting better at that, one thing at a time right?
• Kindness: Would drop everything and go out of his way to help a stranger fix, pull or push anything.
  
• Leadership: The best trail boss, keeps everyone well informed and grouped together! Can't wait to come back and ride dirt bikes!
• Being Tall: It doesn't hurt being tall right? Reaching things in high places so my mom doesn't have to climb on the counters:) Just kidding!
  

There are so many more I could list but I should stop because he is also a very modest man and doesn't brag about every good fortune, I know he likes to talk his kids up and show everyone what we are doing, but it is him who deserves the credit and praise, if it wasn't for our dad none of this would be possible! So anyways before I make this thing a biography, HAPPY FATHER"S DAY DAD, we hope you enjoy yourself on your day! Wish I could be home on this day with you riding dirt bikes, eating a home cooked meal by our wonderful mother, and watching the sun set sitting outside in our own backyard!

Love,

Michael and Little Bull

PS Let me know when your email is back up and running!!!

Colds can't keep me down!!!

hahmhm, or whatever noise you make whenever you have a frog in your throat. I think Joey was kind enough to share with me his cold yesterday, and today I suffered a bit with lack of energy, but I still managed to have an awesome time on yet another beautiful day of riding! We explored Les Gets this morning. We all got up earlier than our usual 9am wake up time and found our way over the mountain to Les Gets resort where the 2005 world cup was held. It was fun to ride a new area for a while but we got bored of riding break bumps, swampy rutted jumps and flat wooded trails, so we adventured back to Morzine. It was an ADVENTURE cause we didn't know where we were going, all we knew was we were going down and towards the valley! The hiking trail I believe that we were on was called the grand tour, and was it ever. There were a few good elbow dragging berms, but most of the way down consisted of fire roads, bike trail and cow trail. The weather was fairly nice out and the track in Morzine had surprisingly dried out substantially and mud tires were a little sketch on some of the dry corners. Because of this we rode mostly in the tree's where the traction was excellent and the roots and mud made for good fun! Joey called it early, probably figured that he had survived a good week of riding and didn't want to risk anything else before worlds. I cannot blame him since we were just riding faster and faster, yet were getting more tired which eventually leads to disaster. Michael and I took one more and after playing around on the roots up top I had my best run on the bottom of the whole week! It was fast, loose and fun! That was a great way to end it so I called it, I was also tired, because of Joey's stupid cold and hungry.

Eating snacks has got be be one of my favorite activities! Anything tastes great after runs on the Pleney, and my choice of snack for today was about five rice cakes with chocolate hazelnut spread, jam and nuts, a banana, orange and an apple! I told you all I've nearly eaten a fruit basket everyday! Snack time however was cut short to wash my bike. I love how the bikes when wet look so nice but when they dry they look like pieces of junk. All of the dirt streaks show up, its just unpleasant. Anyway, after greasing every bolt on my bike and putting it in my bike box we all went to the store where I bought a heap load of snacks for the next days journey to Italy, and Gluten Free pasta which would be accompanied by an awesome salad! It was the best meal I've had all trip and to top it off I found some chocolate quinua cereal and had that for dessert! Now I am extremely full and stuffed to the brim, even had to unbutton my size 32 shorts, it sure beats not having anything to eat the night before, yet that adventure was worth it and provided me with found memories I will cherish for the rest of my life! No crazy adventures tonight, just some dance offs, packing and general goofing around.

Being in Morzine was a great break from the previous intense race weeks. Riding here I hope has made me a better rider as I feel I am more comfortable now riding on my own bike that doesn't feel so new anymore. This place was so much fun I really hope I get a chance to come back here, and when I do I know I have a place to stay! Now its off to bed and in the morning Val Di Sole Italy for the World Championships of Mountain Biking where Joey will be going for the Junior Downhill gold, GO JOEY!!! We will be team USA personal assistants and will help as much as possible, but also we will all learn as much as possible from the best riders in the world as they too will all be vying for the top box and to be called world champion. Its gonna be awesome, I can't wait!!! Who knows when I will find more internet so for the time being, this is Brian Buell signing off, stay classy America!

Just another day in Morzine, France.

For some reason I'm having a hard time committing myself to writing this, it feels like homework. The reason being I had such an epic day and I want to go to bed! Lets just say another beautiful day in paradise, 8 laps on the DH, some timed runs, fun runs and slippery runs. In the afternoon after riding some of the sickest trails ever, we walked down our driveway to the road where a road race was taking place. In one day this sleepy town transformed into a road biking mecca, and after the racers went flying by with Michael and I cheering them on, they tore everything down and probably started to head to the next town. Never have I seen a camera man standing on a motorcycle pointing the lens at a cyclist right next to him, nuts I tell you. Road biking gets way more exposure than I could dream downhilling could ever get, and this is just a warm up race for the tour, I can only imagine what the tour is like! That was pretty neat though, I have never witnessed a road race before, so I appreciated it! Cleaning the bikes is turning into a daily choir just like doing the dishes, its non stop mud! I'm not complaining, its so much fun and I can tell I'm getting a lot more comfortable on my bike! Finally after a few days of settling in and working on bikes and other stuff, we all went and explored(everyone but caleb as he was preparing for a date with this french lady from Paris) . Mike, Joey and I took the Kangoo)rental car) up to Alvoriez for the ride of its life! The town is crazy, dead like most other resorts during the off season, but the architecture of the buildings and hotels were something out of Dr Seuss. It looks like someone found as many wood boards as they could, nailed them all together and called it good, but the best part about this place is its situated over a huge cliffside, you don't see that in the states! We went on some four wheeling adventures with the Kangoo and it Kan got err done! We tooled around on some fire roads for a while on the mountain, went through a tunnel, did a car wall ride in it, the Kangoo can go anywhere. So after we tried to rally down the mountain into the town below the cliffs but found a road block and when we tried to come back up, the grade was steeper than what we thought! After some pushing and going nowhere, Michael backed her down the hill, revved the engine and peeled out shifting into second and keeping her pinned the whole way up, sparks flying, rocks spraying, axles stressing. I swear if someone was watching out of one of those hotel windows, they probably would have thought this thing flying up the hill making terrible noises was a rally car doing the Pikes Peak hill climb. I was doubled over rolling on the ground trying to avoid the spray and also laughing so hard, probably the hardest I've laughed in a while, at the sight of michael gripping the wheel close to his chest grinding his teeth trying his hardest to not let up, it kinda looked like he was laughing uncontrollably. Definitely my trip highlight so far, by far the most awesome thing that has ever happened in a Kangoo! After regrouping, we did some photos on the cliffs and did some driving on the sweet curvy mountain roads through montroude nad back to Morzine. I honestly thought we were not going to get back in time for Caleb to go on his date! Now I'm here, just ate about a whole fruit basket today as my food supply has dwindled. Looking forward to some more good riding tomorrow as Les gets lifts open for riding! I really have to pee so good night and god bless! Made it through another friday the 13th!!!

View from outside my window

It was great sitting here by myself eating breakfast and looking outside the window down out at the town of Morzine and the mountains that surround the area. Its such a good view I figured I should share my breakfast views with all of you! About to suit up and ride, as soon as those lazy bums get out of bed! Yall have a great day now!!!

My Morzine mansion, or should I say...Chalet!

Its interesting to compare mine and my brothers style of writing, I don't know who is more interesting, but he sure can supply some interesting filler pictures! Anyways, right now I am listening to the wind, rain and church bells outside, Michael, Caleb and a fellow named Peter who shares the mansion with us, its actually called the Eira Chalet, check it out @ http://www.chaletfinder.co.uk/viewpropertyimages.htm?pid=28944
I didn;t rea;;y think about it until now, but the place is pretty much ours!!! HAHA, its glorious, just have to make sure we keep the joint clean otherwise we might have to pay, don't think it will be a problem even with all this mud! Its so nice though, we have a power wash to hose our bikes down with, boot dryers, like a hundred of them hanging on the wall to dry all of our stuff, they are a huge lifesaver, cause evreything from top to bottom is soaked after each day of riding! Yet today I wore my fisherman pants which are real fisherman pants and a simple spray down is all you need to clean them and everything underneath is dry! I love my fisherman pants and was stoked to wear them! We were all in rain stuff today, it didn't rain though, it was just peanut butter, I wish I could find peanut butter, they have no peanut butter! How am I supposed to make a PB&J sandwich? Anyways, the riding is super excellent, great for training and will help in our quest for getting faster! Yesterday was fun because we got to ride all new trails, but today was awesome because we knew what the tracks were like and got to bomb down them getting really loose in the mud...I LOVE MUD! My bike doesn't though, I was working on it for like a day and found about a pound of mud stuck in to nooks and crannies. Shes all ready to go now and I'm so ready to get rowdy tomorrow with my mud tires! Caleb and our British buddy Peter are all hanging out now in the couch room, talking smack and having a good time. They all just got back from the pub which was kinda deserted, certainly no good looking French ladies. I have been on the computer trying to upload pictures, speaking of which check out my facebook photos or my on Flickr.com, http://flickr.com/photos/16919417@N05/ I'm trying to get all of the photos uploading in one place or another by hopefully tomorrow, trying to take full advantage of the internet here! I kinda don't want to leave, I could definitely see myself living here, but I would definitely have to learn some French first, speaking here is really hard and the people are not too helpful either. Found some gluten free bread yesterday, I finally can eat a sandwich, now I need to buy some dough and make myself a pizza, or past! I think I have been living on way too much fruits and veggies even for my taste. It was awesome however when we went down to the farmers market yesterday and I bought a roasted chicken and potatoes, good energy food for riding and great for making delicious salads!!! I'm feeling very good though, been riding hard and no bad injuries or sickness! The mountains here are stunning and I haven't even touched the surface yet, tomorrow after riding I think we are going to to some exploring and check out some of the mountain passes and towns. I will be taking tons more pictures in the next few days so look out for those! I should go to bed about now if I plan on riding well tomorrow, but as you can tell I'm having a great time. Wish I could have some cereal in the morning, cannot find any cereal though, I'll make due! Could go all night, already have just about, but its time to call it a night! More pictures and updates tomorrow!

Frenchie

Yeeeeehaaaaw

Michael Say:
Just got done riding our second day out here in Morzine. The trails are awesome, and we get to be covered head to toe with mud all day which makes things even better. Don't get to play in the mud to often out there Colorada way, so I always look forward to tuning brown once in a while. The slick fast trails are great to train on, and there are ton's of fast riders around, it will be impossible for all of us to move on from here without getting faster. I think the gondola people hate us though, wiping those things out probably gets old after a while.
Sorry no new pictures from the trip yet, but I promise there will be some soon, in the mean time enjoy the angry cat below, and since pictures are usually more fun then words here is a sweet picture of a scorpion I almost stepped on in the grand canyon a few years ago.

There hasn't been any photos for a while here, so for those of you picture book liking folk, here ya go.

Michael's Section

Michael’s first post!!!!!

Well Brian has somehow done a pretty good job keeping this blog going with fairly frequent updates, not really sure where he finds the time, especially with always having to go on adventures to find the internet. Now that we have easy internet access I guess I have no excuse not to contribute a little bit.

So far this trip has been pretty awesome!!! Sure getting all our luggage lost for a week, and having to race on rental bikes was a little annoying, and by a little annoying I mean it kind of blew. Oh well though, at least we got to spend those days hiking around in the Pyrenees (which are awesome mountains), and driving the scenic drive to Barcelona and back.

Andorra

Andorra was awesome, Brian has done a pretty good job filling you in on that one. We had a great time. The place can get a bit overwhelming at times being such a bustling city, but the mountains were pretty spectacular, and one gondola ride puts you up above all the chaos on to one of the coolest bike parks around.

Barcelona

From Andorra we traveled back to Spain again, a few wrong turns later, we found ourselves right in the middle of the city center, a nice reward for having almost no clue how to navigate the ridiculously confusing highway system. We drove right past a bunch of the big monuments and squares with all the giant statues and what not, I recognized a bunch of I from the trip I took to Spain back in High School. We explored around there driving down random roads for a while, half just checking things out, and half having absolutely no Idea which way was the right way to go. Eventually we made our way back out of the city and south toward the airport, we found ourselves the cheapest hotel room we could, (TIP, when traveling with a group of five tell the hotel people you have 2-3 and hide the others while your there, seeing as they charge per head, and we don’t mind sleeping on the floor we find ourselves doing this quite often. Our day off in Spain was pretty rad. After finding the hotel room and unloading all the luggage off the roof of the car we got ourselves some food and headed to the beach to relax for a few hours. I hadn’t been to a real beach in six years I think, and seeing as I spend almost every day in the mountains I was looking forward to this. I would of stayed out there all day but unfortunately we still needed to deal with getting our luggage back.

The Fiasco

Not really an exciting read but this is how it all went down. If you get bored reading as I do I would skip to the next part.

So Brian and I both did a pretty good job I think not freaking out about our lost luggage, and bikes, I’m pretty sure about 99 percent of the people in this world would not of handled things quite so well. I guess that just the way the two of us go about life though, getting all worked up about things and letting it ruin your day, doesn’t make anything any better.

With that said though, I was still pretty frustrated with dealing with the airline people, they were full of nothing but promises and never delivered. Now wanting to do nothing but hang out on the beach, Brian and I headed back to the Airport. My 3^rd time there in less then a week. After talking the guys at the car rental lot into letting us park there, we headed in. We had lost the paperwork needed to clear security to get to the lost baggage people (and by we I mean Brian), so after dealing with a bunch of unhappy people, me speaking poor Spanish and them speaking poor English. I got in, Brian was cut of and had to wait. After a half hour of phone calls, they tell me the luggage will hopefully arrive back to the airport sometime the next day. I in no way believed them after they had failed to come through everyday for the last week, but we hoped this time things would work out. The next day we went back to the air port again early. I worked my way through security with the right paper work this time. I get the the office, they call around and now tell me that the baggage wont be back now for 3-4 days, from what it sounded like it was close to the airport, but this is how much time it takes them to get stuff checked back into there system, After letting them know as nicely as I could that this was completely unacceptable, and how bad they were messing up our vacation due to the contents of the luggage, they were able to make a few more phone calls and that 3-4 days turned into 1 hour. Funny how that works. They send us to some back office across the street from the main terminal, I guess this is there way of getting around the check in time, and soon a truck pulls up with all of our stuff, and surprisingly undamaged. Needless to say we were quite relieved to have our stuff back and to finally get on with our trip.

Scottland

Traveling to Scotland was a breeze. All our luggage arrived so already we were about a million percent ahead of last week. The Train ride up to Ft William was absolutely gorgeous. This time last year I didn’t think Scotland was a place I’d get to anytime in the near future, so all in all it was pretty awesome to be there. I’d say so far from all the traveling I’ve done it is definitely up there amongst my favorites. Racing there as well was on another level. The locals are so into the sport, and the atmosphere was awesome. Oh yeah, and they have this Bannana Milk there which is basically like the best stuff ever put in a bottle.

France

Now were in France, I was hoping to do a little better recap on my thoughts of the trip so far but its getting late and I want to get some sleep as we will ride all day tomorrow.

The riding here is really good, and from what it sounds like we have just scratched the surface. We’ve somehow managed to find ourselves a place to stay in this really nice chalet. We were wandering around on the streets and asked a random dude on the street riding a bike if he had any recommendations on where to stay around here he made a phone call and set us up with this guy named Simon who owns this place.

Its off season right now and the place isn’t technically open, there are two other guys more or less living here for the Summer and then the caretaker. So 7 of us total living in this huge place. So basically its like were staying in our own private mansion.

Lots more to talk about but I’m going to bed, more to come tomorrow, and hopefully lots of sweet photos.

Traveling: Ft William to Morzine, France!

Ugh, we finally made it after two flights, lost baggage and a night sleeping underneath the stairs in the train station in Geneva, Switzerland. Today started out very slowly, and with a security guard staring over me telling me to wake up in french. Travel information desk didn't open till 10:30, and the plan carrying the rest of our bags would not arrive until 12:30, so we all had some time to kill and with the security guard waking us at 6:30 it was a long morning! Luckily I found a grocery store where I bought some fruit, yogurt and chocolate milk. Joey completed his first sudoku puzzle ever and Michael and Caleb spent their morning wandering around asking for info and watching bike videos studying. We ended up renting a car after finding our bags, this car wasn't very big and the pack job we had to do was hilarious, but it got the job done. I'll provide pics after I download them, sorry I can't find the cord at the moment? Anyways, driving through Geneva into France we were informed by some arrogant French security guard that Swiss rental cars can only spend 8 days in Europe, they are not a part of the union? Confused we agreed and moved on, we have the car for 27 days and we all agreed we would deal with that then! The Alps are pretty neat, and I have just seen the start of em! We drove through town after town till we made our way to Les Gets, found information and was told that the lift would not run till sunday, the town was pretty dead so we headed on down the road to Morzine where there is also tons of riding, and when all the lifts are running you can bike into Les Gets and also back into Switzerland. Hungary, we found the only place open, lucky me it was a pizza place, I'm really craving pizza right now, bu they do not do rice crust anywhere! We spoke with a few locals and they hooked us up with this guy by the name of Simon, he runs a Chalet just on the edge of the hill. The place is awesome, two rooms, a large lounge area upstairs with pool, internet and TV, a place to store our bikes and a very nice women who made up our rooms by the name of Jill, It is also the early season here, pretty much the off season, not much going on as the snow is all almost melted off. It was raining and the temperatures dropped from those in the valley, but should make for some awesome riding tomorrow! I can't wait to just ride, train and have fun for a while with now schedules to fallow but our own. It really is a beautiful place here, can't wait to explore the area which we should seeing that we have a car. Wish I could speak french, but its not all that bad because most people speak english as well. Its getting to be pretty late now, Caleb and I are just finishing up on the Internet, which is addicting , and I'm looking forward to a warm bed and some sleeping in, we in to at least 8 I think would be n ice, then riding all day long!!! Still can't get over being in Scotland last week, now we are here in Morzine, finally, it is time to sleep!

Ft William: Race day!!!

Oh boy what a week!!! I had a very surreal moment in my qualifying run yesterday as soon as I crested up over the Nissan arch jump starring down towards the grandstand finish area. I had watched so many movies and have seen riders do this many times before, but actually doing it at that moment made me pause for a second, and I thought to myself, I’m doing here, doing it, time slowed down for just a second and little video clips of past movies ran through my mind, then time sped back up again and I executed exactly what I just visualized and saw myself not from a riders point of view, but from a spectators, weirdest experience I’ve ever had riding! I think the past few days of riding were catching up to me and fatigue was setting in, or the golf game I played the day before screwed up my arms because I had massive arm pump, it was really bad! Yes, I did play golf and it was awesome! I had made friends with the owners of the Ft William Country Club and Caleb and I played a round as one of their guests. The course was different to say the least, your never going to play on a course like this. It was full of rolling hills and natural terrain which made it tough, but the surroundings were so breathtaking that I didn’t even care how I played, just the fact that I was there was enough make me extremely happy. I figured if I didn’t play golf in Scotland I would regret it, now, back to the bikes. Compared to the first few days, race day I felt weaker, I still haven’t figured it out but it played a major factor in the way I rode my run. I didn’t psyche myself out or anything neither, I was riding well, liked the course and had finally figured out all of my lines. Before the race run I chilled out with my fan club, all seven of em, just a few kids I met at a bus stop, they made me a banner which was awesome! While watching the women qualify I ate an energy bar and drank plenty of water, so lack of energy shouldn’t have been a problem. At the top of the gondola I did my warm up, a variation of one at least; really don’t have a set warm up yet, I more or less just ride around visualizing, looking through turns, do jumping jacks and other dynamic warm ups. The start was delayed for around 20 minutes, I watched some riders set off down the hill before I went up for my run. I also took in the view from the top taking mental pictures all the way up to my race run as I was in the gate, figured it would keep me relaxed. My run was a mixed bag of great, good and bad riding! Out of the gate I felt a little twitchy and not as loose as I would have liked to have been, as soon as I entered into the rough sections I started to ride faster, however I made mistakes and my arms started to pump up causing my hands to lose their grip. After giving all I had up top I tried to be smooth and to have fun on the bottom but it was too late, my hands were gone and my technique was faltering. I made it down successfully through the middle tree section, but it was slow, and as I came out of the forest and entered in the last stretch called the motor way, I was holding on for dear life, death gripping my bars and letting out joyous heehaws off of all jumps as I knew I had just about made it. Then on the last table top jump, the excitement of finishing turned to fear of endowing over my handlebars as my bike bucked me forward nearly ending it all, but it didn’t and I finished into the arena and I could hear my fan club yelling from the top of the stands, I gave then a little point and a wave, my day was done as I finished out of the top 80. The rest of the day was an awesome display of riding from Greg Minnar and Tracy Mosely as they were the victors. Ft William was and probably will be the coolest race I will ever compete in, the fans were amazing, the numbers were outstanding and the environment was a celebration of bikes, also I was listening to the race at the top on the radio, when does that ever happen? After, we rode our bikes back on the bike path for one more time, did some wall rides on a castle and then packed and celebrated our weekend of riding long into the night!