My new bike!

I am contemplating getting one of the following bikes for DH racing, can you help me choose please

Funny funny

Some great old school propaganda!

Fluidride cup action

more pics rom Port Angeles

here are a few more to wet your whistle!

FR Cup #1, Port Angeles

If you were not there this weekend you missed not only a great race but an absolutely beautiful weekend to boot! The sun was out (which has been a rarity here in the NW) and was warm all weekend, the trails were in tip top shape and over 400 riders were there to throw down. I was racing the new Firebird that I got just last week and was stoked on how great it was riding. Although I didn't do so hot on my race run I couldn't complain because the riding was just perfect all weekend. I was riding most of the weekend with my friends Jason, JR and his kid Joe. I also did some riding with my buddy Mike Estes (no explanation needed for Mike if you were at the race you heard his voice somewhere on the mountain all weekend!) and Ted from Recycled Cycles in Seattle. I have a full race report going up on www.sicklines.com shortly as well so head over there for a full report. but do enjoy some of these pics that I took.

Be There or be square

Next weekend is the 1st race of the year for us folks here in the NW, are you going? have you been training at all? I know I haven't!!! but I will be there regardless

Real Old School DH

this is my rig from '97, I raced for Dirtworks that year and this was the build. The zzyzzx forks (pronouced zie zix) looked impressive but were the biggest piece of shit you have ever ridden. I had to put those big boots on the stanchions because the first race I did on this at Plattekill they completely locked up. You see when the seals got wet they caused a pnuematic lockout of the fork because of the pressure that built up inside the huge legs. the brilliant fix was drilling holes in the bottom of the forks so air and water could escape. I worked on these forks all the time because they were always breaking down. Jan Karpiel made some sweet wet bath seals for them that helped out a lot but they still sucked big time. I remember that I could have bought a Marzocchi bomber fork with 4 inches of travel that would have been better than the Zzyzzx fork with 6 inches of travel. The bike on the other hand was awesome it was light and stiff and I wish I had that frame still because it would be an awesome trail bike today with it's 5 inches of travel. (BTW the alligator on the bars was the DH mascot! I had that thing on my bike from '91 to '98 when finally decided to retire the guy, he was broken and fixed so many times that his squeker didn't work anymore!) The build went like this

Dirt Works Monster Frame 5" of travel with a Fox Vanilla shock

Bullit bros Zzyzzx fork 6" of shitty travel

crappy red stem

Club Roost bars with cross bar

Magura HS33 brakes, blue

Curve cranks

Shimano 105 rear derailluer with Bullitbros tensioner

Ringle fron hub with Rhyno rim

Hugi rear hub with Rhynolite rim

I still have those wheels!!

Shimano 646 pedals (the best clipless pedal ever until the Crankbros mallet and Acids)

oury grips

IRC Missle Tires( some of the best ever)

Knappa Trails and bicycle destruction!

went riding at the Knappa trails a few weeks back and had a great time. Eric Loney did an amazing job on the trails along with some other great trail builders. I would have taken some sweet riding shots but half way down my 4th run I had total carnage! took a turn a little wide and an angry stick jumped out and attacked my bike. the ensueing carnage was 1 destroyed XO derailleur, 1 deastroyed 991 cassette, 1 destroyed hollow pin chain, 5 broken spokes! all in all a fun day followed by an expensive mishap.

More pics from the sales meetings

So on Wednesday we did this ridiculous road ride. It was a 7 mile hillclimb up to the top of South Mountain. It actually wasn't too bad and I did alright the last 200 yards is a 14% grade which hurt real bad! but the view at the top and the fast twisty ride down was well worth the trip up.

on Friday I got to take the new Firebird down Geronimo and that made the whole week very worth my while!

more pics

Have you hugged a cactus today?

Magura sales camp

Well I was in Phoenix AZ this week at the Magura and Pivot/BH sales meetings. It was a lot of fun and I learned a whole bunch about brakes and forks. With the magura meeting we went over all of the new features on the brakes and the forks. We got to take apart the forks and saw how they work as well as taking a new set of brakes and bleeding them and putting them together. the following are pictures from the meetings. We did a whole bunch of riding while down there, Phoenix has some great trails with lots of cactus and rocks to get hurt on.

Geronimo

Geronimo run with the Firebird from Ken Bennett on Vimeo.

The snow if falling!

We got a big arctic blast this week and here are the pics from the nice winter weather!

Post Canyon sloppy ride

Here are some pics that my friend Carl took from the weekend trip to Post Canyon. My friend Mike was super jealous of the new 2009 Sombrio pants that I was rocking! they kept me dry and looking sexy! haha enjoy