Candy Cranks

Every year for an annual conference regarding trees, cycling arborists gather together for the Stihl Tour des Trees. The Tour is a 5-day cycling trip covering over 500 miles in the country or state where the conference is held, with the intent to raise funds for the TREE fund, a tree research organization. Over 100 cyclists participated in the 2012 Tour in Oregon, USA. I was unable to participate in the full tour, but joined in the last day for a 30mile ride around Portland, OR for the Ride for Research.

All the tour riders in their matching attire gather for the final day of their ride

In good tree humor, the ribbon to celebrate the beginning of the ride is cut with a Stihl chainsaw, complete with the protective equipment donned over the spandex

Rolling out of Holladay Park

Some happy Ride for Research participants

Beautiful Oregon day

Nearly finished with the Tour

And a Tree themed ride would not be complete without custom made wooden bicycles!

Through the Tour des Trees, the TREE fund raised over $500,000 for grants and scholarships to improve knowledge and technology regarding trees. Next year, the tour will be held in Toronto, Canada.. hopefully I can make it to the whole tour and that some of you may participate as well!

I’ve been away on another field season and have not had the opportunity to organize bike rides, so this ride marks the return of the Hawaii lady cycling group Punani Pedal Club. Though the turnout was small, we had a lovely ride to Christmas Tree park, through Waikiki and then to Kakaako Park for firedancing.

Couchsurfer Diane joined us while visiting Hawaii, borrowing Louise’s bike

Jade being excited about Sau’s organization represented on his new team jersey

My friend Smiles decided to join the ride after a long day at work

Molly relaxing before biking home

Diane poses with the wonderful photographer of the Punani Pedal ride, Mike Keany

Sau trying out the safe version of Firedancing with light sticks

Amazing group picture from Christmas Tree Park in Kaimuki

Thanks Michael Keany for documenting the ride with the wonderful photo memories.

Thanks to the lovely people that showed up and hope to see more Hawaii ladies on upcoming rides!

While headed to the grocery store while traveling through Petaluma, California, I randomly came across the Rapha bus, as they are filming a California ride. Team rider Evil Ryan was kind enough to provide me with a cycling cap and let me take pictures of the bus.. thanks!

if you have not yet viewed the women’s prestige, here it is:

early stage of our camp build with the headless unicorn bike

A month ago I did a little post about the bike I was planning to take to Burning Man and the heap of bikes in a dust lot in Reno that I picked it out of. I never did get to ride that red Specialized because the friends who took it up to the event early sent me a text saying that it had a totally busted tire and to just grab another one from the lot. So I did. They gave Big Red away. There’s a lot of gift giving going on at Burning Man. So, I picked out another bike, a beautiful silver cruiser. I didn’t have much luck with bike number two either. It turned out that under Silver Lightning’s sparkly coat was a bright lime green finish, meaning that she was a “yellow bike”, a shared community bike, and I got busted by the crusty yellow bike police. While the loss of this second bike nearly broke my heart, I knew that she had community duties fulfill.

The thing that people say about absolutely NEEDING to have a bike at Burning Man is totally true. Black Rock City, the town that exists for just one week of the year in the Black Rock Desert, is a big place and a bike comes in handy for getting around to all the many things you want to see and do, plus when everyone else has a bike and you don’t it just sucks. It was a great pleasure to just cruise around in the open desert at night all lit up on a bike, avoiding pedestrians, other cyclists, and art cars, and trying not to get lost from my friends. I learned that when going to the massive parties in the club districts at either end of the city, it is imperative that you leave your lights and EL wire on and blinking or you will spend a good chunk of time looking for your ride.

So, on that sad sad morning when Silver Lightning left me, what did I do? After a few moments of feeling sorry for myself, I remembered that Susan, the lovely lady from Reno who had let me pick my first two bikes out of that pile had had the smarts to pack an extra bike in her RV, just in case. At the time back in Reno, I thought she was crazy, but I was blessing her that day out in the desert. I just walked over to her camp and picked up the spare bike and took the opportunity to borrow her kids trailer and hauled some water back to my camp. Bike problem solved and hydration provided! I even inherited some EL wire to light up that last bike, I’ll call her Lucky. So, I rode Lucky through the potholes and fluffy patches of dust for the rest of the week. I cruised around with new friends to the perimeter fence and airport, to various bars, parties, and burns. I checked out art and participated in Critical Tits, the largest group ride at Burning Man with around 5,000 riders, women only, tops off.

Third try's a charm. Me and Lucky hauling some water.

out by the perimeter fence with little planes landing and taking off just behind it

Me and some camp mates all set for Critical Tits with the Man behind us

Dude taking pics of all the tits. Expectedly, still sadly there were many like him.

looks like some sort of Critical Pink is about to happen...I was just passing by in the wrong colour

It was such an amazing week that was filled to overflowing. If you haven’t been to Burning Man and you have friends who have and they don’t stop talking about it, just forgive them a little. There’s just so much going on and it’s tough to describe. I was so into experiencing it that I didn’t take many photos. There were tons of crazy bikes lit up in crazy ways, some super tall, others with antlers, or unicorn heads and ponytails. I did however document the parking lot at the casino hotel I went to after the event. There were cars with crazy dusty bikes all over.

Good ole Lucky served me well and is now is storage in Reno. Hopefully I’ll get to ride her again, perhaps even next year.

Its the first goldsprints event in Singapore and i am proud to be one of the organizers for the event. Here’s some pictures of the event which took place a month ago.

A few years ago whilst traveling through Nepal, Tarn and I were lucky enough to meet Tangi. A lovely French guy who had previously ridden professionally for Commencal. He lives in Pokhara during the summer months taking tourists out on rides, the riding in Nepal is amazing and breathtakingly beautiful.

In this video Tangi journeys from Kathmandu to the high Himalayas in the Solukhumbu region of Nepal. Here he climbs (for 2 days!!) and rides the virgin peak of Pikey discovering exciting trails, snow capped vista’s, and some sort of inner peace. A once in a life time trip to discover some of Nepal’s hidden secrets.

Me and the rest of the Tales From The Crit commitee are organizing the first ever goldsprints in Singapore. I am excited about this. Lotsa work done to put everything together and i hope that it will be smooth sailing.

Here are the photos I took when I wasn’t riding during the Red Bull Ride + Style in San Francisco. You can find more on my Flickr. I also just want to take this time to give a huge thanks to Red Bull and Aaron for putting on this event. It was awesome, and I had so much fun! I especially want to say thanks to Emma for being so supportive of me and my riding. You are the absolute best, and I seriously appreciate everything you’ve done for me!
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Here are the results from this past weekend’s Red Bull Ride + Style in San Francisco’s Justin Herman Plaza. The competition was intense, and every one was really killing it. Congrats to every one who placed! You all seriously deserved it. Photos by Keith Gallagher.

Freestyle Results:
1st – Matt Reyes
2nd – Josh Boothby
3rd – Tyler Johnson

Race Results:
1st Jason Clary
2nd Kell Mckenzie
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