Well, I just got home from a fantastic weekend in Wanaka! The weather was perfect and I had a great time shooting the Urban DH race on Saturday. Once again the Urban DH was a super-fun, well-organised event with an amazing turn-out in terms of both competitors and spectators. 120 riders this year, which is awesome! And just like last year, the vibe at this event was really nice - fun, friendly and relaxed! There was a huge range of ages, ability levels and bikes - and everybody was smiling, just having a great time. The crowd cheered just as hard for the little girl who carried her bike down the stairs, as it did for some of NZ's fastest downhill racers. I was stoked to once again be a part of such a great event! Thanks to Dan at Freeride NZ for organising this "race"! For those of you who haven't experienced the Wanaka Urban DH yet I have included a couple of photos that will hopefully give you a little taste of what it's all about...
I'm off to Wanaka this afternoon to shoot and do a spot of riding. I'll be shooting the Wanaka Urban DH tomorrow for Freeride NZ, and plan to ride and shoot mountain biking in Wanaka today and in Hawea Sunday. Should be a tonne of fun - I can't wait. The Wanaka Urban DH is a super-fun event, I shot it last year and it gets a great turn-out both from riders and spectators. If you're in or near Wanaka on Saturday make sure you either check out the action or maybe even race yourself! This event gets a huge range of competitors from 9 year old girls right through to semi-pros, so the beauty is anybody can enter and have a great time. Right, time for me to throw all my gear in the car (it's amazing how much luggage I can generate as just one person - tonnes of camera gear, two bikes, some clothes, and an unbelievable amount of food for the road trip...so much for travelling light!). I'm going to leave you with an image from last year's Urban DH - have a great weekend!
It’s a gray, rainy day here in Ontario, Canada and I’m sitting in a very comfortable broken-down Lazy Boy at my girl’s parent’s place typing these words and admiring the view of the lake.When we got up this morning the rain was horizontal and Jada and I were stoked – although the riding in this part of Ontario is far from epic (in fact, it’s the opposite of epic!) we have been riding every day for the past three days and now we’re both tired and happy to have a break from the bikes.
So today is to be a lazy, coffee-drinking, movie-watching, contemplative blog-writing kind of a day and there’s no place I’d rather be than right here in my Lazy Boy!
I’ve just finished my second breakfast - delicious French Toast courtesy of The Cheese Monster (a.k.a. Jada) with locally produced maple syrup that is unlike anything you’ve ever tried (unless you’re Canadian I guess) - and I thought I would take this opportunity to do my twice-yearly Blog update!
(To my one loyal reader I will endeavour to update this blog more regularly- sorry!).
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I have been in Canada now since the 5th of August, so nearly 7 weeks – and what a full-on 7 weeks it has been.
WHISTLER
I kicked my trip off by heading straight to Whistler as soon as I arrived.I ended up having a pretty full-on time in Whistler, shooting Crankworx all week, shooting for Specialized US and getting to meet Matt Hunter and Darren Berrecloth, crashing my brains out and spending all of my money within the first three days…
CRANKWORX
Crankworx was full-on.Despite having seen footage from this event numerous times over the years to see it with your own two eyes is mind-boggling.
No doubt about it, the stand-out events for me were the Slopestyle - you simply can’t comprehend how gnarly the Slopestyle course is until you see it with your own two eyes!The only thing that was more impressive than the gnarliness of the course and the skill of the dudes throwing down on it was how the very same dudes would pick themselves up and brush themselves off after an equally massive stack.Like when Brandon Semenuk under-rotated a super slow back-flip on the final 40 foot step-down and landed pretty much on his head.
Brandon was actually unconscious for a while I think and there were some very concerned moments, but then this hard-as-nails kid pulled himself together and managed to walk his bike off the course.And Semenuk was just one of many to eat shit on a massive scale and walk away from it during qualifications and finals.
Berrecloth broke a bone in his hand when he got nose-heavy during a 360 off the same feature and apparently got it re-set on site without anaesthetic because he had a fishing trip he didn’t want to miss out on!
If you ever get a chance to be in Whistler for Crankworx, don’t miss out on watching the Slopestyle – it really is mountain biking on a level you have never seen before!
MISTAKE #1
On the first night I arrived in Whistler I made the mistake of building my bike up while drinking beer and only did my pedals up finger tight.
By the time I realized, a couple of days later, I had totally stripped out the pedal thread on my drive side crank and ended up forking out $300 Canadian for a pair of super heavy Race Face Ride DH cranks.These cranks are 170mm long but are so cheap that they use the same cast moulding as the 175mm version, which means that you get an extra 5mm of un-needed metal sticking out below your pedals to catch rocks etc.
But they are solid and they do the job – and more importantly, they were the cheapest cranks I could find in Whistler.Unfortunately I couldn't afford any more excess baggage charges so the original XT crankset that came with my 2010 Enduro went into the nearest rubbish bin.
MISTAKE #2
So, after spending a very frustrating morning using the free tools outside the Garbanzo Bike & Bean (the bike shop at the bottom of the Gondola in Whistler Village) I finally got the cranks on my bike and I was ready to ride…
The Garbanzo Chair was closed for practice for the Garbanzo DH and so I rode the lower mountain and ended up riding a blue intermediate trail I had never ridden before.First run of the day and I was anxious to make up for lost time…I was pushing a bit hard on a trail I didn’t know and washed out the front wheel on a big sweeping left hander.
It wasn’t a gnarly crash but it was sudden and the ground was rock-hard.I took big chunks out of both my knees (my 661 pads had stretched a huge amount since I bought them the previous summer and didn’t do much of a job of staying on, or protecting my knees) and also tweaked my left wrist.
I did another 3 or 4 runs after that but my knees were killing me and it wasn’t much fun – especially pedaling.So I packed it in for the day.
I shot the Garbanzo DH race later that day and by this time my wrist was so sore I had trouble supporting the weight of my telephoto lens.After a couple of hours spent crouching in the same position taking photos I could barely walk down the hill at the end of the day (riding was out of the question).By this time my left knee was hot and had swollen to the size of a small rock melon.I knew it was probably infected and had also begun to suspect that my left wrist was fractured (the dreaded word “Scaphoid” kept popping into my head).
After a late night visit to the Whistler Medical Centre and forking out NZ$2000 I emerged with my left wrist splinted and suspected of having a fracture, and my left knee heavily bandaged.
Luckily my wrist improved rapidly and as far as anybody could tell wasn’t fractured.The swelling in my knee also went down quickly, although I had taken a sizable chunk out of my right knee and it would be a while before I could wear knee-pads without bandages and a fair bit of pain.
So, within a few days I was back on the bike, although I wasn’t exactly charging round like a madman.Even now, 7 weeks later, my left wrist still isn’t 100% yet, although it seems to be slowly getting stronger and is fine for riding.
ON THE BRIGHT SIDE…
Anyway, the day after I crashed I shot the launch of the new 2011 Specialized gravity bikes for Specialized US.I was stoked to be asked to shoot for one of the biggest (and arguably the best) mountain biking manufacturers in the world.The 2011 Specialzied Gravity range looks amazing – if you haven’t seen them yet check them out online!
In particular the new Demo 8, the Enduro Evo and the new SX caught my eye…I haven’t uploaded photos yet but as soon as I get the ok from Specialized I will post low res pix.
I was also stoked to be able to check out some riding outside the Bike Park during my time in Whistler – the all mountain riding in Squamish, and the “No Flow Zone” near Alpine Meadows were just two of the highlights.Unfortunately, I didn’t get to ride as much as I would have liked in Whistler because I was injured some of the time, but I will be back…there is just so much awesome riding in this area!
Right, Jada just got back and it’s time to chill out on the couch and watch a movie.But when I get back I will continue with Mont Sainte Anne and the World Champs and finally get this blog kind of up to date.I’ll be back…
Well, time has flown by since my last post. (Apologies to my one loyal reader for the lack of updates!) Work has been flat out but has finally quietened down a bit so I thought I would take this opportunity to update my blog.
Despite this being one of the consistently coldest Queenstown winters in years and there still being a lot of snow around even at low levels, I haven't been as stoked on skiing as I usually am at this time of year. It may be something to do with the fact that I am really excited about my upcoming Canada Trip (shooting Crankworx in Whistler and the Mountain Bike World Champs in Quebec, as well as two months of freeriding in BC and Quebec). I guess I'm more stoked on riding and shooting mountain bikes at the moment than skiing, even though it's freezing.
Now that I'm healed up and have a new bike (I love my new 2010 Specialized Enduro - more bike than I ever dreamed of owning) I have been getting back into a bit of biking and the trails have been super fun. I have had some wicked rides in fresh snow, rock hard frozen dirt, super-slippery soft snow on mud, and even six inch deep hoar frost! I have scared the bejesus out of myself a few times on trails up Skyline this winter, it's been a lot of fun! Here's a couple of winter mountain biking pix to keep you all motivated to get out there on your bikes and do some skids this winter (and yes, I know skidding is politically incorrect, but it's riding bikes we're talking about, it's about having some fun and being a kid again!). Ok, the photo below is from summer but I had to include it cause I love this pic. Kelly McGarry doing...well, I'm not quite sure, think it's a tweaked back-flip, a whipped-out flip maybe?...at the Frew Farm Jam last summer. If you have never been to the Frew Farm Jam and you're into bikes (moto, BMX and MTB) then you need to get yourself there next year....this event is insane! Right, that's all for now...back to the coal-face and all that. (Oh, and despite me saying I was more stoked on bikes than skiing at the moment I will be shooting a bit of skiing over the coming month before I head off to Canada...stay tuned for updates and pix).
Well, it's been an action-packed few days. This week I have managed to break my bike and dislocate my right ring finger (for the second time). As I type this there is a small cardboard box full of the remains of my bike sitting by the front door and I have the two middle fingers of my right hand strapped together. (So go easy on me if my typing is lousy).
R.I.P. BELOVED GREEN MACHINE! I went for a ride with two friends on Sawpit Gully Track in Arrowtown a few days ago. On a gentle rolling downhill I hit a bit of a depression in the trail and as the rear suspension compressed there was a loud metallic clunk and the chain slipped. I thought I had snapped a chain-ring tooth off so I just hopped off, fed the chain back on and kept riding. But the bike was feeling strange - every rotation of the cranks it would do this weird shimmy, I had never felt anything quite like it on a bike before. I even inspected the teeth on the rear cassette, thinking I might have broken one off. Next I checked the free-hub as I knew it was on it's last legs and thought it might be the culprit. But I couldn't find anything wrong. So I kept riding. A little further on the bike started making graunching metal-on-metal noises whenever I pedaled so it was time to hop off and take another look. Initially I couldn't figure out what was wrong but when I pushed down on the seat to compress the suspension the entire bottom bracket moved independently of the rest of the frame! The down-tube had completely snapped in half just on the bottom of the rear-suspension pivot point welds. I actually managed to roll back to the car on the bike like this and that was certainly an interesting experience - you could feel the wheel-base lengthening when the bike's suspension bobbed, and if you looked down while pedalling you could see the cranks and bottom bracket moving around, up and down and backwards and forwards, independent of the rest of the frame. Maybe this is what it's like to ride a GT i-drive bike? I have named this new suspension design the VPP - ie "Virtual Patrick Pivot".
So now my bike is dead - I'm bikeless! (Apart from a 20" BMX, which doesn't help me much in winter). At least I'm bikeless until I hear about the warranty/insurance situation on my broken mountain bike. But luckily I have since managed to injure myself riding my girlfriend's bike and so, rather conveniently, I couldn't ride my mountain bike even if I had one at the moment. How lucky is that!?
THE CLAW Yesterday the weather was beautiful and so I borrowed my girlfriend Jada's mountain bike, packed my camera gear and headed up Coronet Peak Ski Area with a bunch of mates to ride and shoot. (Coronet Peak has abandoned it's summer chair-lift accessed mountain biking operation but the riding trails survived a winter under snow and no grooming and have been super fun riding this summer). There was snow and ice on the upper part of the Brakeburner track, and super slick dirt on the rest - it was amazing fun to ride! Unfortunately I washed out the front wheel in a super slick tight corner and hit the dirt. It was a nothing crash but unfortunately my right ring finger (otherwise known as The Claw) is crooked and not very flexible as a result of dislocating it and having surgery to re-attach the tendon the previous summer. So sure enough, The Claw dislocated again - but luckily this time it dislocated at the MCP (bottom knuckle) joint and the tendon survived and there were no fractures. So now I have the two middle fingers on my right hand strapped together and I am icing my hand every couple of hours to reduce the swelling.
So all in all it's been a pretty exciting couple of days! But I'm sure good things will come of all this - I will be getting a new bike soon, which is just as well because the Heckler and it's rag-tag collection of components was on it's last legs. And re-injuring The Claw has made me realise I need to start working full-on on the flexibility of this finger again so it's less likely to re-injure in the future.
In the meantime it's a beautiful day here in Queenstown and Jada and I are going to go for a walk/run in the sun. I hope life is treating you all well! Patrick http://www.fallon.co.nz
The rain was bucketing down this morning and Lake Wakatipu, which was already on the verge of flooding many downtown businesses, will be getting even fuller...but now the sun has come out and I'm planning an afternoon of shooting mountain bikers sliding around amongst the mud and roots of Fernhill Loop (my favourite Queenstown trail in the wet or dry but especially in the wet).
In the meantime here's the first Fallon Photography blog and a very brief update on what I've been up to recently...
For the past month or two I have been shooting mountain biking all over the south island. It's been full on but a lot of fun. I've been able to ride some great trails, spend time with my girlfriend Jada and good friends while I'm "working" (shooting mountain biking hardly feels like "work"), and capture some great mountain biking images all at the same time. The highlights of these two months for me would have to be riding the Croesus and Wharfedale Tracks and staying at the Blackball Hilton (actually called "formerly The Blackball Hilton" to avoid lawsuits from you-know-who).
For those of you who haven't had the pleasure yet the Croesus (6km from Blackball, West Coast) is basically the world's biggest rock garden and is a hell of a lot of fun. The Wharfedale (Oxford, 20km or so north-east of Springfield, Arthur's Pass) is a completely different track, less technical but just super fun, fast and flowy singletrack...a good gradient, loads of roots and you can ride almost all of it flat out. In short a wicked trail that is an insane amount of fun to ride!
I will be shooting a lot more mountain biking over the coming month, then once the snow is here I will be concentrating on shooting skiing and winter biking. This winter I will be spending less time on the ski resorts and will be doing most of my shooting in the back-country. The goal is to shoot great skiers on beautiful natural terrain in a landscape that is untouched by humans. The other side of this goal is just to get away from the resorts and spend more time in the mountains. Here's hoping we have an epic snow season this winter!!
Anyway, that's it for now - the sun is shining and it's time for me to get to work. Have a great autumn!
