acohoon

This shook me to the core and brought back all of my own experiences with brain injury. In 2015 while riding I went off a cliff on a trail I had never ridden before in South Korea. My helmet was totally shattered and had a hole in it big enough to pass your entire arm through. Strangely enough the rest of my body was only bruised and scraped up, just the brain was hurt. I spent the next week at home asking the same 10-15 questions over and over again with a terrified wife who thought she was going to have to spend the rest of her life caring for a disabled person (we were 28 at the time). At the end of that week everything "snapped" back together. I know this because there was a clear moment while setting on the couch where I could remember things again. The crash and resulting brain injury cost me at least 3 days of memory before the event plus 7-8 days post crash. The crazy thing was that because I couldn't remember the crash I had no associated fear in my mind to slow me down, so when I got back on the bike I was just as fast as before. I now purposely slow myself down on rides, I no longer chase any type of KOM, my taste in bikes has changed, and biking overall has moved from an obsession to a simple hobby that I enjoy when time allows instead of rearranging everything to ensure I can ride. I still don't know what the total cost of the crash was or will be; maybe I'm not as smart as I once was, maybe one day I will suffer some new condition that stems from brain injuries suffered in youth, etc... The whole biking community owes Lorraine a major debt. By sharing her story she is giving each and every person who has never experienced this type of injury the gift of perspective without the direct experience. Often times in life we think that experience is what grants people wisdom, but most often it is the perspective gained through experience or learning from others that benefits us the most when making fateful decisions. Thank you Lorraine for doing this and keep up the fight, you are an inspiration. Thank you Matt for shining a light into the dark corners of our hobby.

@chyu: Thats what I thought too. I stood next to him in the Canyon booth at Crankworx the other day and he seemed much smaller than me and I'm 176 cm. The weight might be close though.

My wife and I made the video at 1:22. She's laughing because of the dirty joke I just told her! The race was awesome, two Americans road tripping NZ and we managed to get crankworx on the itinerary.

I took a header off a cliff while riding a trail in South Korea (love that place). Completely smashed the A1 I was wearing and got a serious concussion. I have no doubt the helmet saved my life though. I originally bought it for the comfortable fit but now I have a certain loyalty to the brand that only a life or death experience can bring. I have been wanting a MIPS helmet and will give this a look.

This is very unfortunate. Page 38 of the document clearly states that anyone who wants to participate in recreational activities within the lease will be displaced, especially if there is oil and gas activity near trail heads. It also states the the downhill mtb trail within the lease won't be affected since MTB riders do not need pristine environmental conditions to perform their activity. What the page doesn't say is that these oil and gas leases will limit all access to the area. Once the roadways become part of the lease no one will be able to drive through the lease. This will turn out just like western Colorado where the public cannot access the lease property. No driving, hiking, biking, hunting, etc... Leases last for an extended period of time (20-100 years). Can people afford to give up access to public land for that long?

PS: This place it remote!!!! At one point I literally drove until the highway stopped then had to transfer to miles upon miles of backroads. It was quite the adventure but lots of fun as well.

Spent a summer living in the area building a wind farm project during college. I didn't have space in my car to bring my mountain bike halfway across the country and couldn't afford a rack at the time. I've always regretted it!

These YT videos are super high quality. I think they give a lot better perspective into what is going through Gwin and Angel's heads as they prep for the race compared to what Specialized put out last year. You can tell YT are really focusing on the race aspect of the weekend and not so much about pushing product directly with the video.