Sessions With Sessions Podcast #45: WMBC The Beginning
In this episode Shawn and John sit down with one of the Original Members of the Walden Mountain Bike Club, and latest addition to the shop crew; Rob St. Marseille "Saint".
We chat about how the Mountain Bike scene started here in Sudbury, how it's grown. We talk about the first ever bike race locally and how that push created a culture and community that we enjoy today.
Thank you to the team at Walden, past, present and future.
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Thanks for listening, from the Sessions Crew
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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Sessions for Sessions podcast, guys. Thanks to everybody for tuning in. We're here for another episode. We said we were going to try to do this thing bi-weekly and this is us actually almost being bi-weekly at this point. I'm John. I'm the host and I'm here today with Sean. How's it going, Sean?
What up? And today we've got Mr. Rob Samarse, the legend himself. How's it going, Rob? How you doing?
How are you? So for those of you guys who don't know, if you're just kind of getting with us, we're the Bikeshop podcast in Northern Ontario. We're up in Sudbury.
We are in the back of the Bikeshop Sessions Ride Company. And we're here to talk about all the things in the North. We're here to talk about biking in the North. We're here to talk about what works up here in the North, what works, what we use in our backyard, what we've tested, and also just local events and local things that are happening. So kind of first thing I want to hit on, guys, like what's been happening the last while? I mean, Nick, it's winter time. We've kind of been riding some training. Sean, what have you been up to?
Speaker 2: Well, as you know, like rehabbing, like some pinched nerves, but indoor training, like you know, just trying to map out next season for myself and my young athlete. Yeah.
Speaker 1: What have you been doing for programs?
Speaker 2: Um, playing around with Zert, like the daily discussion in the shop here, AI, coaching software, and playing around with that. I'm on Continuous Now, and like you know what, midnight at Pumpto to work out for me to do today. And I'm kind of using that as a guide and a suggestion. I don't really follow it, as you can probably know by following me on Strav or seeing me on Zwift. I use it as a guide and kind of help me make sure I don't go too much over, but it gives me a suggestion on what to do.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so basically it checks out your training load and makes sure you're kind of, and then suggests workouts. And then you're using Zwift to run this? Yes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I'm on Zwift. We do a Wednesday night ride. We do a Thursday night ride, group ride on Thursdays, the chill one, elastic band, everyone rides together. And we did a nice really ride yesterday. I think we were what, eight on there? Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was cool. It was fun. Yeah. So we do, guys, we do a weekly group ride. We just started it up last week. If you're listening to this, like you will get this before Thursday. We do it every week. If you follow Sean S. Mayew circus on Zwift, you'll get the invite and then we run this ride every single week. It's super low key, super fun, more of a social ride.
Speaker 2: It's just the main thing is consistency, right? Like yesterday, I told you guys a big thank you. I didn't think I was riding my bike yesterday. Didn't sleep good, didn't think I was riding my bike. I saw there's eight people from the group hopping on the ride. So I was like, all right, I got to ride my bike. Right? I want to hop in and ride my bike. And so you guys helped me to motivate me to ride my bike. The groups are great for that.
Speaker 1: That's the whole reason to have social rides, right?
Speaker 3: It's a chance to enjoy the sport. And what it does is creates that opportunity to meet people and that way you find people to ride with and you find people who ride at the same level as you. And it gives you a chance to figure out where all the trails are, where all the cool places that the ride are and where to get your bike fixed. 100%.
Speaker 1: The nice thing on Zwift on the Thursday rides, they have an elastic band. So the elastic band means that if you show up and you have a workout to do, you can do your workout during the group ride. But also if someone goes out there and they're going, if we're racing with say Alex, like Sean Sun, who's a total rocket chip, and then you might be a first time cyclist, you can ride in the group together and it'll keep you guys together, which is nice because it keeps it super social. You can have a conversation. You can chat back and forth, all that kind of stuff. There's no one feeling like they're getting dropped or any of that stuff. So it's a really inclusive environment.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And then usually we're on. So if someone wants to ask questions about bikes or training or whatever, or it doesn't matter, it gives people a chance to chat too while they're riding because it's very low pressure.
Speaker 1: 100%. Rob, you've been doing anything off season?
Speaker 3: Well, one of the biggest things is, as you know, I've retired from policing and I'm settling into having, you know, adjusting to having a little bit of time. So right now I'm looking at getting myself back into more of a regular training type scenario, but also now that we finally have a little bit of snow, I have a few trails that I work on my end of the city and I'm kind of getting into, getting those into rideable condition and that sort of thing. Yeah. So fat biking. Fat biking started.
Oh, it's huge. I'm going to be starting that in the next couple of days, getting out myself and seeing what trails are in what kind of shape. I know over the conservation area, I ride a little bit there too and when I have a little bit of time, I head over that way with the snowshoes and try to make the trail keep trails open. And then I'm going to go to the lake. I kind of, that's my stewardship thing.
Speaker 2: Are you going to let the people know where the trails are or are we going to keep it hush-hush state?
Speaker 3: Well, I'm, when I have them in a, where I feel like they're okay, these are cool.
Speaker 2: They're perfectly many. They're perfect.
Speaker 3: I mean, you guys have ridden, you guys have ridden a couple of the trails that I do. Yeah. And right now, I'm hoping people are out there walking. That makes the snowshoeing a little bit easier because you don't have as much work to do so. And the summertime trails are great.
Yeah. And it's a couple of times a year, get out with the weeds or mern, but right now it's no shoes and doing it the old school way, pulling a tire with a rope with the snowshoes. It kind of falls into the training. Well, that's why you look so good. Oh yeah. I agree.
Speaker 1: So that's actually a really good segue guys. So for those of you, I mean, if you listen to this podcast and you're in Sudbury and you've been in Sudbury for a long time, you know who Rob is. I don't need to tell you this, but for those of you who are kind of, you know, just stumbling upon this podcast for the first time or maybe just got into the bike scene, Rob was the original president for the Walden Mountain Bike Club. So Rob was one of the founding members, one of the guys who created the clubs on its inception. A lot of the trails that we ride, a lot of the trails that exist out in Walden and even all throughout town exist because of some of the work that Rob and people that worked with Rob at the start because of what they did.
So we, having him in the shop and I mean starting to actually pick up shifts has been kind of cool. He's definitely a legend in the scene and having him here today, I think it's a probably a good opportunity to chat about, you know, how it all happened. And kind of a cool time to chat about where, I mean, everyone who rides in this town rides Walden. Walden is responsible for all the, really almost all the trail systems in town that are worth riding and the, like we all just kind of assumed it's always been here, but it hasn't always been here.
Speaker 3: Oh, and it was definitely a process. I mean it all started, I would say the movement towards a bike club started in around 2005 because I've been racing O-Cups for, I've raced 15, 20 years. And around 2005 I was coaching cross country skiing at the ski club in Walden and as a result of doing all the O-Cups, I was sort of saying to one of the members there, Rusty Hopper, who became one of the founding members of the bike club is, dude, why don't we build some trails here in Norton and that would give the cross country ski kids a chance to do a little bit of cross training during the summertime rather than just walking around with their ski poles and running. Maybe we can do that. So after a little bit of conversation with the ski club and the city, they said, well, sure, we'll make a few trails. And that's kind of how it started. I mean, we made a couple of kilometers the first year or two.
Myself, Rusty, a guy named Joe Herbin and my brother. And that's kind of how the first lower section of the trail system started. And it started to go really well. And around 2008 we figured out that Sudbury was going to get the Ontario Summer Games. Which was a big deal. It was a big deal. And that is when Walden officially took a week. We started forming a riding group and the foundation of Walden Mountain Bike Club started.
I think there were about 30 members. Well we took over the mountain bike tour portion of the Sudbury Fitness Challenge. And as a result of that, oh, gee, there's trails in Walden. So when the city got the bid, they approached this group, the ski club, and said, well, we'd like to host the mountain bike races in Norton. So the executive came to us and said, well, we'd like you guys to form a club or encourage us. And we even got a little feedback from the OCA. He said, we'd really like you guys to have a team.
If you're going to host, we'd like you to have a team. So there were only three of us racing in Sudbury really at the time. So through the whole process, the Wolfpack kind of started.
And it was the Wolfpack, myself, Dominic Gerard, Alex, Anstis, Paul, Gannett, that's when things started to happen. Well, we built a race course for the Ontario Summer Games, which is the lower trails.
Speaker 1: So basically the whole lower heading west part of the trail system?
Speaker 3: Yeah, Ferns, Whitney's Whip, Roller Coaster, Cliffside, Penthouse, and then all of those trails, that was the Ontario Summer Games race course for that year. That's cool. So we got a race team together and surprisingly, we finished third in the standings of the team. The team just killed it.
Guys like Dominic Gerard, he just rocked the show and the race team we had did really, really well. And the event was a huge success to the point where actually we won an award for the yearly rewards, so the OCA rewarded us for the quality of the event. And after that, interest in mountain biking kind of started. We formed a race team, the bike club got started. And in 2009, we started with 30 members. And then as the club started to grow, we were able to get in sync with the ski club in the city as far as trail agreement and maintenance, things like that.
And then I think the thing that really, really got things really rolling, then you were coming on the scene at that time is when my now wife, Shelley, and Dominic Gerard said, why don't we start having social? Because what it did, initially the Wolfpack was the mountain bike club. There was only really a race club, right? But what it did was brought the social aspect of mountain biking and it brought the wreck riders and the beginners into the club and it allowed, it brought in a whole bunch of mental energy too. And that's when trail building really started to grow.
We had a trail crew going, the social rides were huge and they still are huge. And that brought the public in, people started buying in. And that's when there was some significant growth and we got involved in some of the things going around the city. We were a vendor at the Band Mountain Film Festival, those kind of things. And things have grown. I mean, I think last year we were north of 500 members. Crazy.
Speaker 1: Absolutely insane. And it's great because what it's done now is like the founding members were still around but we have a new generation of younger people like yourself who have kind of picked up the ball and things are going.
Speaker 3: And what it does is brings new ideas and it brings new...
Speaker 1: 100% and the team now, I mean they're still, so we've got Rusty. Rusty was one of the founding members. Rusty is still very much involved.
Speaker 3: Like on a daily basis.
Speaker 2: Rusty is a pillar. I mean, I think the thing that's cool about it is that while it's one of two places in Ontario that has its own venue.
Speaker 3: Pretty cool. You know, we manage 15 kilometers of single track and work with the ski club in the city to create and maintain a great venue. And one of the things that we've been fortunate enough is we've been able to host. We've had three Ontario cups here. We've had, you know, Canada cups, which in Ontario summer games, we had guys like Jeff Cabusch, Catherine Pendrell, Emily Batty were racing at our venue.
Speaker 2: These are world-level brothers. You can see them on the leaderboards of Strava.
Speaker 3: And Amanda Finn and Cam Jetty, like Cam Jetty is only a couple of years ago was still racing World Cups and Cyclocross. So I mean, we had heavy hitters at our venue, which really, really brought some notoriety to the place. And through that, you know, I've been able to meet all the some of the big, big names in mountain bike organizing like Glenn Mawissa, who runs Pulse Racing, and he hosts national championships and World Cups. And he's been to that. He's Jeff Cabusch's initial coach and Rufal brother Sean and Adam from Pulse Racing, Chico Racing.
So that's allowed us to really pick their brains. Like that was one of the like Sean and Adam were the one those two guys I met them on my first O Cup and I don't remember when like, and they said, Hey, look, if you really want to do this, here's what you should do. And when the club started to happen, they they supported our events, you know, t-shirts and swag and stuff like that. And they came up and did rise with, you know, here and well, I think you should do this and maybe look at that. So we had some great, great mentorship.
Speaker 1: Awesome. I mean, it's it's cool to see. So for myself, when I came out of the scene here, really, when I got back from out west 2017, 2016 and there, the scene is already so developed. You guys already done so much work and I myself didn't come from a race background. I came from the like snowboard, like hang around like drink beers and ride bikes background.
Seeing how much racing did for the foundation of the club. And it's funny. Just like for, I mean, a lot of people listening to this podcast, like you may not be a racer, you may not be someone who wants to put spandex on, go ride the mountain bike at 50 kilometers an hour down the side of a trail, breathing through the ride balls. But it's important to know that a lot of that stuff, like the racing, especially in Sudbury, the racing culture is what brought those trails out. And then through, like you said, meeting other people who run events and other racers, you really start to learn these things. It's what I've, you know, the last three years in this shop, we started getting into racing because I want to help run events. And the only way to run an event is to participate in them first. You have to go to the venues, you have to ride your bike, you have to race at the highest level that you can so that you can meet the people and allow them to help you create your own events. And then it doesn't necessarily need to be about the fastest guys, it's about the funnest attitude, which the Wolfpack was always about.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Well, we, that's the one thing about the Wolfpack. We really, you know, when I'd say around 2010, 2011, we actually changed the mentality around the sport a little. The Wolfpack, we were kind of these referees from the north. That's the way they initially thought, am I on these guys are loud and everything, but they thought it, wow, look at how much fun they're having. And look, they're cheering for the people that race for them, you know, and then they're actually cheering for their friends who race in other teams. We made the sport fun again. Yeah. And I think one of the things that we learned along the way is that, hey, if we're going to do events, we've got to make them fun here too.
Kind of percent. So, so that the people that maybe want to try race for the first time know that I'm, you know, it's not going to be this elitist thing that I can just go out and have fun and try my best. That's the one thing that, you know, Sean and Adam really were good at, you know, years ago when they were Chico racing is that, you know, they had, you have that section of the population who are fast and they're great riders and they race in clubs and everything, but they thrived on the weekend warriors who maybe want to go and try a race only because it's in their hometown or the race comes, you know, to where they live. So they go, but they made them fun. You know, there was a great atmosphere, made it fun for everybody, helpful. And it gives people a chance to try it out. And, you know, the courses were made so that, you know, the beginners weren't going to go out and do something they shouldn't. And that's what we learned here is that, you know, if you're going to make a race, make it fun, take the pressure off and just make it a chance that we'll ride your bike on some really cool trails and of course mark like a big event. That was one of the things that we really take pride in is when we mark a race course, it's just like you're riding in a World Cup in terms of the way the courses marked how things are. So you get that big, big, big event feel. A lot of tape. You and Rasty like your tape. There's a lot.
Speaker 2: But they are super well organized.
Speaker 1: Yeah. They have been super well. And even like seeing, like I can remember coming back and Sean, you were there because it was that year venue and you were at Stack. I brought JP who was at the time the rep for Pivot to one of the first social rides I had really been a part of. And I can remember the jaw dropping amount of people. I want to say we had 80 people in your parking lot at Stack. Yeah. JP was like, I have never seen a group ride this big, let alone in butt fuck no where. That's it.
Speaker 2: It's coming from like deep in Quebec. What the heck is going on here? Did you guys do something right? It's been super cool to see how it's happened over the years and kind of where it's ended up now. And how it's going to even keep progressing. What Walden's doing now with the winter fat biking. It's just always more and they're doing such a good job. Yeah.
Speaker 3: The disease has taken hold.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, so builds we're getting back there again. Like, you know, you can see it. We're getting back. We're back.
Speaker 3: I mean, the thing I love about biking from, like I was a hockey player and played junior hockey and cycling was always one of the things I did as part of my training because I hated running. You know, and I'm not a grateful runner. Like dishes rattle when I run, right? So I always use cycling and that's kind of how the love of the sports started.
But the thing I love about it is that. It's a great way to get out into nature and be in nature and you cover so much more territory in a bike ride than you would as you're hiking. You get to go and just be out there. And it's a great way for a family to go spend the day and be out and enjoy the company and all that. And I think the one thing that's happened is that people are starting to realize that there's a lot of great places to ride here now. There is. Years and years ago there was maybe the rent in and now you have wealth and you have.
Speaker 1: And you have purpose built bike stuff. And all that stuff, all the opportunities people have to ride, opportunities people have to race. I mean the fact that we have this many shops in town, that's all thanks to the work that guys like you, Rusty, Gerard, all put in back then. So thanks Rob.
Speaker 3: And we have to go back another 15, 20 years to the Bushpigs. The guys. Well the Bushpigs.
Speaker 2: The OG OG. Well they were the original mountain bike scene and there was a little bit of a gap there for a while when those guys weren't riding as much and weren't working on trails. We kind of came along just at the right time and I think the other thing that made that so
Speaker 3: another catalyst was how bikes change so quickly. Oh yeah. It became a little bit more affordable and get a good bike for a decent price and the technology changed and bikes became really cool.
Speaker 1: Well that's why we're in a bike shop.
Speaker 3: It's not in a bike shop. For a long time a high end mountain bike was like I love to have one of those but then all of a sudden the bike company started making a lower price point bike that was still really good that made it possible for people to say I'm going to get one of those.
Speaker 1: Accessibility. It's accessibility and the cool thing with biking is that you can often times, if there's inner city trails which there are now, it's all stuff that's accessible for people if you can get a bike. So making bikes getting to an affordable price point is huge. Super huge.
Speaker 3: But in short we're super proud of what we've been able to accomplish and we're so grateful that we had great cooperation and partners in the Wildlands Cross Country Fitness Club and the city and then the bike shops all bought in so we had amazing people jump in and help us, help the sport grow and it's just amazing. I love it when I go on a Saturday to Wildlands and there's 30 cars in the parking lot.
Get packed. And just to see people out riding a trail that you made is one of the most gratifying things there is to see people having fun thing. Yeah they get it. That's cool. And now we have the Nicoldale stuff and we have all that other work you guys are doing and there are little pockets of trails appearing now and suddenly becoming a bike destination slowly but surely and that's amazing to me.
Speaker 1: It's getting there. It really is and the next couple years we're going to see I think even a little more. It's going to be cool. So we're super stoked to have, I mean Rob is going to probably be regular on this show now. Rob's also someone you're going to see a little bit in the shop from one guy that hates running to another guy that hates running. I think that's probably the gold standard around here.
Speaker 2: Anything to add there Sean? No, thanks Rob.
Speaker 1: That was super good. Rob's first time on the podcast and he crushes it. Okay we're going to chat quick guys moving from that into just kind of stuff we've seen around the shop for a while before we start to wrap up here. So cool things in the last couple weeks here Sean. What's up? You guys have been wild. Do you want to throw at me right away?
Speaker 2: Cool things. Yeah we had a wrap in, brought some goodies, brought a bike in, the pivot vault that we got to check out. What kind of bike was it? A gravel bike. A bike with the kind of like the new take on gravel, fit 50s, stretched out, shorter stem, high stack, suspension corrected, future proof, upgradeability and aggressive pricing.
There's the elevator pitch. What kind of drive train? That one was the SRAM Explorer 1xMullet. So it had the big mountain bike cassette in the back and then it had the 42 or 44 in the front, something like that. Yeah 42.
Speaker 1: So like what we're seeing a lot of now guys and super super cool to see pivot, I mean known as being one of the like top level brands. I mean pivot when you think pivot you think premium. This bike is actually not super crazy premium in price. They've brought the price down to be more competitive but this bike is current and in the world where everything is evolving so fast, it's honestly almost at a point now where like bike companies can't keep up with the demand that the consumers are putting on them. Like there's bike companies like I'm not going to name but like last fall a bunch of bikes came out when all the pros are riding 50 mil tires on their bike. Not meaning everyone needs to run 50 mil tires but generally speaking most people are running a 40 but if you want to run a 50, brand new bikes coming out this fall that can only take a 42 and it's just brands that are their bikes take so long to develop that they haven't actually come out with
Speaker 2: these new products yet or brand new 2024 gravel bike model is not UDH. Yeah that you can't take
Speaker 1: the new drivetrains and it happens guys like we see it all the time and there's something I've been saying for the last little bit is there's a lot of really good bikes out there but there's like really bad bikes too.
You can buy a bike they look in 2025 that's a 2020 that just it's so outdated and this pivot vault was super sexy. It came with a 42 chainring in the back. It came with a mountain bike rear to rear on the transmission drivetrain which is the drivetrain you can shift under load. It's the T type stuff with axis shifters had compatibility for a dropper but it came with like a flex.
Speaker 2: Yeah that's the flex they yeah so some vibration dampening built into the seat post. It looks a little weird when you look at it and then you kind of like okay that's for the vibration dampening.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah and then it's got suspension corrected front which means the like basically the front end of your bike sits at a point that is it's with a rigid carbon fork that if you hold that fork off and you put a suspension fork on the front end of your bike will be in the same spot which is a big deal because a lot of people are putting suspension forks on their bike right now and for example my kaha from chapter two if I just took that fork off and put a suspension fork on it would raise up the front of my bike by like 40 which may not give me the position that I want. The nice thing with this bike is it's built with the carbon fork that's the same size as a suspension fork so that if you swap it out you can keep the same position so super cool bike super current bike well priced looked really good. The colors were nice. I was honestly like super surprised something you will see in the shop from us this year guys we will have it's a cool gravel bike.
Speaker 3: I'm really super stoked about the new bike generations is that the wider wheels and wider tires bigger tires are people are seeing that you can still be fast and still ride a bigger tire but what that really does for somebody that has a gravel bike is you can ride way more places when you have that type of setup. 100% You can go ride some of the trails we work on with a gravel bike within years past that was just like not even 100%.
Speaker 1: And now like some of the and this is where like the world still figuring stuff out like how big is too big like if we take a fat bike tire and put it on a gravel bike it's probably too big but we have we should test that and find out. You know like apparently if you take a 40 mil tire and if you take a 45 mil tire you would just assume that a 45 mil tire would be slower than a 40 but apparently if you do the math the 45 is actually faster.
Speaker 2: Feel faster. If you got a account for PSI and what you're doing in terrain you got to dial it in but if you dial it in you take like an hour to dial it in and okay that's where she's at. Yes.
Speaker 1: So then there's a 50 mil tire faster than a 45?
Speaker 2: Well GCF no.
Speaker 1: There is a tipping point. There is a tipping point. That's what I'm saying. One of the online guys did that but yeah there is a kind of crossover point then you're going more into comfort instead of speed. But it's always a noticeable more comfort. When you got Dylan Johnston running 2.1.
Speaker 2: Yeah but it's just like oh I'm going to mimic a world tour to France.
Speaker 3: I'm not Dylan Johnston. Yeah you're not Dylan Johnston. Sorry John check out the strap. I'm not Dylan Johnston. And on the comfort side of things you know it allows you you know even like me an older person like the wider tires it's so much easier on your body.
Speaker 2: Yeah so much more. A lot easier on your bike. So then you're going into nice comfort. You can ride for like 4 hours or as before you can only do an hour and a half. Right.
Speaker 1: So I think we're noticing a lot of that. A lot of bikes heading towards that more like comfortable and I think people are getting more okay with hearing the word comfortable. Comfortable doesn't mean slow.
It doesn't necessarily mean slow. If you can finish a race. If you have less fatigue on your body and you can finish a race more consistently it can be faster. Like if you're riding for 100 kilometer gravel race and your back blows up after 20k and you've got to limp 80 kilometers versus if you're able to actually ride the whole race at your ability it definitely makes a difference. And having stacks super low, bike super stretched out, super aerodynamic, narrow tires it doesn't always mean faster. So we're starting to really notice the difference there. And if your bike feels good you're going to ride it more.
Speaker 3: More often. So for training and all that kind of things that bike fit and just a good comfortable bike. It can be a difference. Big key point for success.
Speaker 2: I got two more kind of cool shop cool things. Got the opportunity. We did a nice linsky titanium custom build. That was actually next to my list. Oh my god I love that bike. Yes we had it on the bike display area of the shop and we have a bike display area now guys. Everyone wanted to kind of touch and feel and look at that bike.
Speaker 1: So give me the cold notes on why Scott's bike was so sick.
Speaker 2: Well it just looked like an all day smash cruiser take anywhere kind of gravel flat bar gravel bike. Like Scott's a taller guy too. Well a little bit taller than me but the geometry of the bike the steer tube was like it always stretched out a bit. Kind of neat with the titanium how they did it where they can fit like you know 50's. So basically a tube bike or a big freaking chain ring in the front you can do whatever you want to this bike.
Speaker 1: It was a gravel bike so it's a linsky's gravel bike. Titanium a beautiful bike with like the twisted helix titanium on the down tube just looked awesome. And what Scott said is you wanted a bike that he can go for rides with whoever whether it be with his wife with his friends some of his friends maybe more intermediate riders. Scott is a pretty advanced rider himself. Just something that is fun that you know if you show up with a race bike to rides that people are on no comfort bikes it just doesn't make sense.
So he wanted a bike that he can ride with his buddies that's cool and fun to ride. So he wanted to run flat bar so we had like kind of like a mustache bar. Yeah he brought in his bar.
Yeah is it a mustache bar. So it had like a good nice sweep back to it. We put 700 C I9 wheels with 50 mil tires on it so big big tires. And there's still a lot of room to play with. There's so much room in there it was a cool bike for that. Suspension fork on the front. Yeah so it had the Fox factory step cast or so taper cast gravel fork on the front.
We ran a mullet. No just a regular axle because you're a flat bar. We went to a axis drivetrain just on like an on the affordable end of axis. Again not trying to go crazy with this bike just trying to make it like we ran a GX normal axis super fast shifting which he had on his other bike and absolutely loved. And ran regular brake levers to flat mouth calipers.
Speaker 2: Yeah road calipers to mount bike levers.
Speaker 1: Yeah which is cool and then redshift seatposts which honestly super cool. Like a seatpost guys if you're familiar with the thud buster the old thud buster seatpost. The super big clunky cane creek one. It's basically a new take on that with a spring inside.
It's from redshift. It's the sleekest coolest little suspension seatpost that honestly gonna start playing with a little more on some bikes. I think it's cool. It was easy to dial in.
Speaker 2: Yeah. You just got it like you know your weight and you know this dialette sucker. I love them on my fat bike.
Speaker 3: Yeah I believe I have one on my fat bike. You know being my fat bike is older and doesn't have the same geometry. I found that really really really made it easier you know on your body and just more fun to ride.
Speaker 1: 100% and I see it on gravel bikes with guys for sure too. I see it pretty common honestly on gravel bikes. This bike it just made so much sense for the like kind of pub bike feel something comfortable. You're sitting more upright with your like back sweet bar like super light.
Speaker 2: Yeah it was light. He can ride the double track at Laurentian like you know even some easy trails like you know Lor Haffa Walden he'd be able to ride that.
Speaker 1: Yeah that was a really really cool bike. You said you had another one. What was the other thing? That was this bike Mondays in general.
Speaker 2: Mondays have been cool. Mondays and cool sold a couple of bikes. Did some bike fits. We got a couple of fits coming in today. One's a tri fit and then bike getting geometry consultations for bike purchases like you know really using the brain.
Speaker 1: Yeah I want to say and I mean it seems like we do mention this every episode but we probably should mention it every episode. Mondays the shop is closed kind of the shop is appointments so the idea is Mondays are for you. You person listening to us we are recording this on Mondays so that you have a podcast. We do bike fits on Mondays so you can make appointments or you can make an appointment for anything.
Speaker 2: It doesn't cost anything. Yeah people talk to us about training and stuff like that and races and yeah it's like it's perfect.
Speaker 1: If you want to talk about tires and want to do it on your own time or bikes like last week we had someone come in and they want to buy a gravel bike.
So it gave us the time to really walk through everything with them about the gravel bike or to talk about different geometries for different road bikes to treat that nerve.
Speaker 2: Yes we are still selling bikes in January.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah we're a bike shop. It's not the snowboards but definitely lots of bikes. So it's been fun honestly like and today I'm excited to fit so it's going to be fun. I want to do some triathlon fits again. I've never done them but it's going to be awesome.
Speaker 2: The brain is going to melt outside of my ear.
Speaker 1: So when you go into a tri fit so for the guys who are just kind of learning bike fitting so there's doubles to bike fitting. There's bike sizing and then there's bike fitting. Bike sizing is like the one where you roll up and people measure your inseam and then set your seat height and send you on your way. Bike fitting is really diagnosing problems and solving them. On tri fit we really start to work on hips. So it's a level 2 fitting kind of thing.
I've taken multiple courses to get to the point where we can start doing triathlon fits. We start running lasers over the back of the hips to see how the hips are rolling and rotating. Because in a tri position you're so lean forward on the front of the bike that if you have any discomfort you're going to really feel it. And a lot of triathletes don't use a massive shimmy unless they're doing a costume change. So you really need to make sure that you're dialing in that bike to make sure that they're going to be comfortable. They're on that bike, they come out of the water and getting on that bike for hours. So can wet tri suits.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really got to be thousand. But bike fitting is so important. I mean it could make or break a race right if it's not. Oh, 100% right. I mean it can make it the most painful bike ride of your life or the most awesome bike ride of your life.
Speaker 1: 100%. And with that said guys, I'm going to do one more little quick hit here to talk about bike fits on trainers. If you're on your trainer and you have a bike fit issue, it's going to become real obvious. I mean we talked about this last week, I think too, with people going numb and stuff.
Speaker 2: Like even on our ride yesterday you were chatting someone up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, right. Like where the guy is saying you're starting to go numb. Like you shouldn't have issues. Don't push through your issues. Issues are not normal, right? You shouldn't have knee pain. You shouldn't have pain anywhere close to the saddle. So, particular pain.
Any of that kind of stuff. So make sure you're standing up once in a while. That's been a big tip. Like five minutes. Just stand up for a second. Like give yourself a minute.
Speaker 3: Fit issues can create bike injuries too.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, that's it. And then you very quickly. 100%. They become a compounded problem and then all of a sudden it's something. So if you're having issues, reach out. It's something that like honestly, even if you come in just to pick a brain Monday or book an appointment on a Monday. Or something we can even just like oftentimes have a conversation to get the ball rolling.
It's not something that costs any money necessarily. We can kind of give you a couple tips on like what you might be feeling. If it's a bigger issue, something we can schedule for bike fit. Everyone should have a bike fit anyways. But like something we can diagnose specifically for trainer stuff. Like we can really hit on those things. So anything else from you guys on your way out the door here?
Speaker 3: Right here. I think just going to encourage people. I mean, when you look at how things went getting back to the wall and stuff. If I can say anybody out there that is interested in if you're in the process of trying to put something together. It's so worth it. You know, if you build it, people will come. And don't be afraid to ask for help. And it gets hard.
But just if you believe in it, I mean stick to it. I mean look what's happened here. The clowns, the rolling circus, the wall. Look what we have now.
And it starts with a little wee idea. And through a lot of hard work and a lot of network and all that. Look what's happened. But it is so worth it. And I don't regret a second of the time that I put in to doing this. Amazing.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much Rob. Honestly, thank you for all the stuff, for all the work you put in and what we have here in town. I mean if you wouldn't have stuck with it, I wouldn't have a bike shop. Alright guys, so I guess that's it. I mean with some final words from the master himself there. We're going to wrap it up here. Make sure you guys are like. Make sure you guys are subscribing to the podcast.
Share this with your friends. It's how we get it around. We don't do any crazy paid advertising for this stuff. We just like, just tell your buddy. Just tell your buddy about this podcast.
And people are like, oh my god, there was a real podcast in separate. Yeah, send it out. Okay, make sure you're sharing. Make sure you're like subscribing. And if you have questions, reach out. Comment on the post or send us a message on Instagram, Facebook, however. And if we get some questions, we can throw them through on here if you want us to. Or we can just send them privately. But I guess that's it guys.
Everyone over here. How about that? Keep spinning, Lantain. Yeah, rubber slide down folks. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
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