Check out the full versions of all the articles recently featured in 'xplor' magazine.

Riding With Pachamama (mother earth) Source: Mountain Biking mag (August 07)

Ben Boyko Interview Source: NSMB.com

Norway Through A Rider's Eye: Darcy Turenne Source: rideguide.ca

National Geographic Names 'Adventurers of the Year' Source: angusadventures.com

September 2nd Swiss Power Cup: Zurich, Switzerland

September 8th World Championships: Fort William, Scotland

September 15th World Cup Finals: Maribor, Slovenia

September 22nd Good luck Beijing Invitation Race: Laoshan, China

As you can see I’ve got an exciting and busy fall planned. It all kicks off this Wednesday with an ungodly 4:00am wakeup to get to the airport in time to start my Around the World Adventure. I decided to kick start the next set of races with the Swiss Power cup to get my mind and body focused for Worlds the following weekend. I am psyched to get back to Switzerland and visit Sandra and her family –my favorite Swiss – Sepp and Sonya. Ricky Federau and I will be traveling together and teaming up with our Swiss counterparts. It should be awesome. I hear there is even a Minnie golf tournament in the works.

The following Tuesday Ricky and I head to Scotland to meet up with the rest of team Canada to prepare for Worlds. Canada has decided not to enter a relay due to lack of rider interest, myself excluded. By this time I should be on the right time zone and well rested for the “Big” race. Fort William promises a wicked course and I’m sure it won’t disappoint based on the race I did there in 2005. I’m ranked 29th going into Worlds with 4 women in front of me racing the Espoir category instead and Gunn Rita still absent from this year of racing so a poor starting position will not be the case and I’m excited to see how I can do after an exciting summer of racing.

Everyone leaves Scotland on the 10th with many of us heading to Maribor, Slovenia for World cup finals. I’ll be meeting up with Sandra in Zurich and doing a road trip through Switzerland to Slovenia. Should be rad! I’m looking forward to seeing a new country and World cup race venue and of course visiting many backereis along the way. Sandra is going to hang out with me for a couple days after the race to see more of the country and keep training at the tail end of the season fun.

Recently added to the schedule is the Good Luck Beijing Invitation race. Yes I get to go race the Olympic Mtb Course and I am a little excited. What a great way to send you into the off season with some motivation!!!! I’m not sure how it ended up being 3 women and one man being sent, but am thankful that I was selected to go. I have to assume 1-2 of the guys declined the trip, but who knows. So I head to China on the 19th making it a trip around the World by the time I fly back in to BC. At the moment I’m slated for one race on the 22nd, but there is a possibility of doing another on the 25th. We’ll see...

- Kika

Source: cpendrel.blogspot.com

The Norco sponsored, Symmetrics Pro team jumps back into racing this weekend with the 14-day Tour of Venezuela, from August 27-September 9.

The race is the team's next stop on the UCI America Tour, led currently by Langley's Svein Tuft. Symmetrics Cycling Fueled By FarmPure heads to South America with the goal of winning stages, and the overall. In fact, the first stage is an 18.8km TT which should suit the team's strong time triallists--notably Tuft and Eric Wohlberg. Following the TT there are several stages of flat riding so whoever wins the TT needs to have a strong team to defend. The entire stage race runs 2200km.






Heading to Venezuela for the S-Team are: Tuft, Wohlberg, Cam Evans, Jake Erker, Jeff Sherstobitoff and Brandon Crichton. This will be the beginning of a heavy race period, as four of these riders will head straight north to contest the Tour of Missouri, immediately after.

The team will do its best to provide daily updates for those following the action in Canada.

Source: symmetricscycling.com

To me Norco Bicycles have always been like Honda motorcycles in the sense that if you start out on a Norco as a child, you’re sold on the brand for life. Like all the little kids that get their first Honda Z50s back in the 80s and 90s and now have owned CR80s, 125s and are now rocking CRF250s. The same is said for those of us that got our first Mini Mountaineer as a kid, then maybe a Bigfoot to a Team Issue XC bike and now we are wanting to rip on a Team DH or a Faze 1 as adults. The line up of bikes at Norco allows you to grow as an individual and a rider and explore the style that is yours. For 2008 you’ll find 139 models of bikes, so that means there is something for everyone. Here’s a look at the company that wants to support you in what ever genre of cycling you persue.

Source: pinkbike.com

‘ZzZzzzzZZZzz’ has been an unknown term from me last couple of days but I still feel like I’ve been living in a dream. This past month, I was given the chance to fly to Vancouver to visit Norco’s HQ and compete in the Crankworx Slopestyle in Whistler, BC.

My first day was big and I still wasn’t sure if I was dreaming or not! I arrived at Norco’s headquarter and I could say I was the happiest guy there that day – Smiling all day! The first person that I meet was Trish, a super nice girl who gave me a quick welcome and a tour. She also gave me a sneak peak at lots of great bikes for 2008, and a walk through the warehouse. I had never seen so that many bikes and bike parts in my life!

The next day I met some more great guys: Pete, Jamie, James,... everyone there was so nice. Jamie, the Team Manager, gave me lots of new presents (sponsor gear), and showed me all the new parts he’d put on my bikes. It was like living a dream all kids who ride have…show up at a factory and getting your bike completely rebuilt with amazing new parts, and being given a ton of free gear. THNX Jamie, Thnx Norco!

That afternoon, Pete took me to some local dirt jumps to meet Ben Boyko ( Boyko = KING! ) Boyko and I had a great dirt jump session and got a few photos.

Then it was time to go to Whistler...center of the world for MTB.

I just heard so many great stories about the place but I had never been there! As soon as I arrived, I knew that all those stories were real! WHISTLER IS SICK!!!

There are a 1000 bikers going everywhere. You look left and see some guys killing the Elevation dirt jumps. You look right you see crazy DH guys doing the final A-Line drops, and of course, in the middle was something special...the BONEYARD!

I was lost...I didn't where to start or which way to look first. So, the best thing was go settle in at our condo and start from there… which was again, one more surprise. The place was big and had a big outdoor pool & hot tub…ahhhh…I just love life!!!

I had a good nights sleep to get my mind back to normal (although I was still SO excited). Morning came faster than I expected and I went to see if I was ready to tackle the Boneyard. I watched as guys flew everywhere, trying to get comfortable with, what would be the Crankworx Slopestyle course – it was BIG. It seemed like very few minutes someone was crashing or getting hurt, so I decided to play it safe and start slowly.

The following day was qualifiers for the slopestyle and I was # 86. Waiting in line was the hardest because I was nervous and lots of riders were earning themselves hospital trips. Finally my turn came, and I had no choice but to DROP IN!

I played it safe and finished in one piece. I did manage to throw down few tricks like flipping the step-up to and X-up drop. Although my run was solid (I finished in the middle of the pack), I knew I wouldn’t make it into the finals.

However, my teammate Ben went to Finals and as almost everyone knows now HE WON!! He went home with very nice $10 grand prize and the respect of the entire freeride community. I was so happy I felt like*I* had won!

I still had a few days before I was to fly home, so we stayed in Whistler to ride. I went shredding trails with Pete, who is a super fast downhill rider. It was all so perfect but I knew that I am getting close to end of my dream!

I flew out of Vancouver a few days later and now, here I am, awake and back in Croatia. Not that it’s bad to be home, I went straight into a sea coast vacation with my girlfriend.

I can’t wait to come back to Canada and hopefully, to compete again in the Slopestyle next year.

Cheers
- Mislav

Things just wrapped up at the 2nd round of the Jeep King of the Mountain Series here in San Luis Obispo, CA.

The event here is always a good one, cool track, awesome hotel and great parties. Racing was a blast! I made some big mistakes in qualifying. I ended up not jumping much of anything on the track and I was surprised to be only 2seconds behind the fastest ladies. With a 4th place qualifying position I drew Joanna Petterson in my first heat. JoJo is a great racer and a good friend, but I bested her at the end of two runs to move on to the semi-finals. I drew Anneke Beerten in the semis, but she managed to slip past me and advance to the finals, leaving me to battle it out with Tara Llanes for 3rd place. T-dawg beat me to the line in our first heat and I knew I had to step it up to knock this experienced rider into fourth. I put my race head on and sprinted my butt off and was rewarded with a 3rd place finish! My first podium at the prestigious Jeep King of the Mountain Events! You can check the race out on CBS Sports September 23rd, 5-6pm
Results (Top 5):

1st- Anneke Beerten - NED
2nd- Melissa Buhl - USA
3rd- Fionn Griffiths - GBR
4th- Tara Llanes - USA
5th- Joanna Petterson - RSA

Source: fionngriffiths.com

Cycling is all over the news this month! With the biggest race in the world, The Tour de France, all over the tube - and the S-Team racing almost every day in the past ten days in BC Superweek, what more could you ask for? Wins, that's what! And we've got plenty of them. The team has had one of its best months ever with incredible rides at the Road Nationals and BC Superweek. And on top of that - our comic book has been a smashing suceess. So without further ado - let's spin the Spin!

Road Nationals! What A Week!
The S-Team headed to Quebec for a rainy by successful week of bike racing - at the 2007 National Road Champs. The team had an unbelievably successful week: with Cam Evans winning the Elite Road Race ahead of teammate Andrew Randell; Christian Meier taking the U23 Gold in the RR, silver in the ITT; Svein Tuft taking silver and Zach Bell bronze in the Elite ITT; Marni Hambleton scoring an incredible silver in the women's RR; and Bell taking a close second in the Crit.

MORE...

When it comes to mountain biking, Darcy Turenne has truly taken her own path. Once a downhill racer, she's now traveling the world as the host of a TV show about the sport and at the same time continues to expand her freeriding career.

Turenne, now 23, started mountain biking at 14 and also had a knack for volleyball, playing that sport through high school. But thankfully she choose to focus on MB and hasn't looked back since. In the last few years she's done TV work, taken part in tons of photo spreads and even found herself appearing in a new movie -- about skiing, surprisingly. Not bad for someone born and raised on Vancouver Island -- not exactly the big city. But perhaps the perfect environment for a world-class mountain biker.

We first talked to Darcy earlier this year when she gave us a look at her trip to the Costa Rica with fellow Oakley girls Kira Sheppard, Mizuki Hagiwara, Roxy Louw, Niki Gudex and Claudia Goncalves (all surfers) -- video and photos from that trip would be heavily used in the Oakley "Uniquely" campaign that kicked off in April of this year. Then in June Darcy started her new gig and went to Europe, visiting Austria, Switzerland and Norway.

We caught up with her before she started on a whole other set of trips and found out more about the show.

Read the Full Interview on: lat34.com

This week, our enthusiastic website designers have brought us, yet another update with the addition of a new video. Don’t forget to check back regularly for new videos, podcasts, team updates, photos, and much more... Go check out the newest video here!

Symmetrics Cycling fuelled by FarmPure has come a long way in its five years of existence. The team began as a brainchild of Kevin and Mark Cunningham, both entrepreneurs of successful businesses who also happened to be cyclists. Since 2002, the team has grown from a regional team to Canada's top pro team, signing up many of Canada's best road and track cyclists.

2007 has been another breakthrough year for the team with a whole host of top results, ranging from wins at international events such as the Tour of Cuba and Redlands Cycling Classic, to the National road championships.

Currently, the "S-Team's" Svein Tuft is ranked number one in North and South America, wearing the prestigious UCI Americas Tour jersey. Symmetrics fuelled by FarmPure is also leading the team category in the UCI Americas Tour. With that in mind, many readers have asked to learn a bit more about what goes on behind the scenes of Symmetrics fuelled by FarmPure. We took a trip to Kevin Cunningham's estate, where the team is based.

READ THE REST ON CANADIANCYCLIST.COM...

Flying into Norway, I was expecting a complete culture shock. To be honest, I had no idea what to expect, all I thought was that it would be completely different from anywhere I had ever seen before, so when we touched down in Bergen we were all a bit shocked.

Norway looks like home! Not just a little bit, a LOT. If there weren’t so many blonde people and Norwegian signs everywhere, I could have sworn that we had landed in British Columbia!

At this point in the trip we had all been away from home for quite a while, so this resemblance came as a very pleasant surprise. My Norwegian stereotypes of reindeer running through the streets, snow and ice everywhere, and people eating sheep heads (oh wait, that stereotype was accurate), from what I saw, were completely wrong!

As we drove from the west side of the country inland farmer style in our 3-seater cargo van, the breathtaking scenery made me lose sight of the stick shift digging into my kneecap and the claustrophobia I initially felt pinned in between Dylan and Cory.

Finally, we made it to Voss – the site of Ekstremesportveko, an international extreme sports festival with more crazies competing in sports like base-jumping, skydiving, longboard skateboarding, and white water kayaking than I had ever seen. These people made us mountain bikers look tame!

One of the big things we learned right away about Norway is that when they do something, they put in %110 and they do it right. There’s no half-assing in this country. The festival was no exception.

We were lucky enough to stay on the mountain next to the slopestyle course that had been beautifully built, but claimed a few over-eager Norwegian locals during training. We met up with Cam McCaul, Andrew Shandro, and Matt Hunter and we were all looking at each other in shock because the Norwegian kids seemed to have no sense of self-preservation whatsoever when they rode the course. Most had never done jumps half the size, yet were sending themselves down the hill on hardtails with only a back break! It was scary and the paramedics had their work cut out for them that day! Dylan rode the slopestyle and I rode the jump jam, and thankfully both of us made it out of there unscathed.

After a great Gimmie Gimmies concert and seeing how crazy Norwegians are off the bike (equally crazy as on), we headed to do some sight seeing on the way to Lillehammer. That’s when we hit the fjords. I’m happy this website has pictures to go along with the blog, because words can’t describe how beautiful the fjords are. Ok, I’ll leave it at that.

Lillehammer was one of the highlights of our whole Europe trip for two reasons. 1) Hafjell bike park is the best bike park in Norway, if not Europe. Dylan and I had both been dreaming about riding A-line in Whistler, and Hafjell was home to the Norwegian version…needless to say it was the most fun I had on my bike the whole trip!

2) We went bobsledding on the Olympic bobsled track. Imagine the most fun rollercoaster you’ve ever been on, add to the danger factor because somebody is actually driving it, increase the speed, and add so many g-forces that you can’t hold your head up. That’s what bobsledding feels like! I couldn’t stop laughing for a few minutes afterwards.

Oslo was the next and final stop on our Norwegian journey and the perfect way to end our trip. Although it poured rain for 80% of the time, our guide Eirik took us on an amazing biking journey that started at the central train station downtown. We piled in, bikes and all, and spent the day doing shuttle laps with the train as our shuttle on super fun single track just outside the city. It was definitely the best shuttle system I’ve ever experienced! Way better than a chairlift!

That wound down our biking time in Europe and Cory and I began to re-adjust to North American lifestyle by spending our last day of our European tour shopping in the heart of the city. Besides, what’s a trip to Europe without buying some clothes that are the same, but way more expensive than at home?

Although Norway was nothing like how I thought it would be, it was an absolutely incredible place full of beauty, culture, and really fun people. I can’t wait to go back…and maybe next time I will see reindeer walking through the streets!

- Darcy

We arrived at the Grand Georgian hotel late the night before the event. The hotel was very nice. It is designed to look like a railway hotel, with 199 suites ranging in size from studios to three bedrooms. The hotel is right at the base of the hill and there was a lot of amenities readily available. Our room was a large one bedroom with a fireplace and a full kitchen. If you’re staying at Blue Mountain this would be a great choice! We got to bed quickly so we would be fresh the next morning for the start of the event.

The following day we got our gear together and met up with our Norco friends to see how things were going. There were lots of riders milling around getting registered and set up with all the proper forms.

MORE ON SICKLINES.COM

Congrats to Mark Hale of Bannockburn, Scotland!!

Thanks to everyone who came by the Norco booth during Crankworx to check out our '08 line of bikes, meet our team riders, and sign up for our Norco E-Newsletter.
See you all next year!

Ben Boyko wins Crankworx!


Whistler, BC, Canada. 2007 Crankworx Slopestyle Event.


This weekend at Kokanee Crankworx, Ben Boyko, surrounded by the world best mountain bikers placed first in the final slopestyle event. The world was watching when Ben threw down two solid runs, and the crowd appreciated it as he 360'd the final drop. While riding his 2007 Norco Six, Ben took home gold, and ten thousand dollars.

First off let me start with a not so well known fact…there is no such place as the Teva Mountains. I know this may sound dumb as the Teva mountain games are held in Vail Colorado which is clearly in the Rocky Mountains, however the name eludes that it is held in The Teva Mountains and if you try to find a plane ticket to the Teva Mountains you may end up in India… now on to the story.

It was a sunny Wednesday morning and my big sister (who is actually smaller than me) dropped me off at the Bellingham airport. It was off to great start when the pilot announced that we were too heavy to take off. I thought it was a joke at first but finally after a couple people took the free tickets to anywhere Alaska airlines flies, we were off and running err…flying.

We got to Seattle and I had the roughest landing in my life, the plane hit the ground hard and you could see fear in the elderly folks faces. The flight to Denver, Colorado went smoothly and it felt like I was there in no time as I slept most of it. After arriving in Denver I hopped a shuttle to Vail and was on my way. The road to Vail is quite mountainous and at one point it goes over a pass that summits at 10,000 ft. It was even snowing! Yes, it was snowing on my way to mountain bike event.

Once in Vail I hooked up with Jeff Lenosky, Kyle Ebbett, and Ross McMasters. It was already evening, so we headed to a local pub for WTW aka White Trash Wednesdays. It is very clear that in Vail they do not know what true white trash is because the girls were still all dressed in hot clothing and they were playing Top 40.That’s right, no White Snake and I didn’t even see one mid-80’s Camaro in the parking lot. I guess white trash in Vail wear Versace and drive BMW’s. It was still a fun night though.

I had offered to help Jeff finish up the course, so the next day was basically filled with building, painting, and transferring obstacles. Most of Friday I helped Ebbett with the slopestyle course, which ended up being a super sick mini-slopestyle . It went right hip, left hip, hitching post, step-up, step-down, and a big ender dirt jump. The course looked super sick and was even more fun to ride.

So it was Saturday race day. I was a little tired from all the building but feeling rather good. On the speed trials course Kyle Strait was killing it. He was going so fast it hurt to watch. After a few practice runs it was qualifying, I managed to pull off 8th. From there I was matched up against T-Mac (or Tyler McCaul). We were mid-pack and our times were the closest of any two riders. First round we were off and going neck and neck. I knew I had him because at the end of the courses there was a skinny across a pond however there where two routes a slow one and a fast one, the fast one being skinner. I though I had Tyler but as I came into the bunny hop for the skinny I froze, cased the skinny and Tyler took the lead. I now had to make a 1.5 seconds on a fast course which was hard. So next round Cobra V.S. T-Mac I took it to the bank but not enough to make up my time differential of 1.5 seconds. T-Mac went to the finals but got bumped out by Strait. I was still cheering for him though.
In the end the speed trials came down to Legend Jeff Lenosky and Rockstar Kyle Strait. It looked that despite the age difference of about 40 years or so - hei hei just joking Jeff - they were quite equally matched. In the end Strait crashed on the skinny allowing Jeff to take the title for one more year.

In the evening it was all about the slopestyle. It was held as the sun was going down over the Rocky Mountains…very picturesque…but also completely blinding for the riders. But who need to see their landing or lip anyhow?! So we waited for the sun to duck behind the horizon and then it went off. 3whips, backflips, 3’s, INSANE style and every other trick in the bag.

Right here I would like to insert a note that Alex Reveles, who came all the way from Aptos, was not allowed to ride because he did not have his guardian’s signature on the piece of paper. However, he was absolutely killing it and should have been in the comp. Joe Perrizo was doing insane crooked flips complete with fork topout…it scared everyone but him. In the end Andrew Taylor took the first place spot, with Jamie Goldman in second, and Captain Kyle Ebbett in third. I managed to squeak my way into the to top ten out of over 20 sick riders so I was quite happy when the announced, “in 10th place Dylan Korba!”

Last but not least, I have to shout out to the freerider babes of CO. Emily you redefined the trick to a Superwoman! The Event was sick and Mad Props to Ebbett for all his hard work.

The next part of the trip was kinda blurry but I know it involved peer pressure and a full shot of Tabasco sauce. Kids seriously listen to me…do NOT EVER shoot Tabasco sauce unless your toilet has a seat belt…. nothing can prepare you for how bad you think it will be. There was also some pizza and just a general good time with a bunch of friends. Hacksaw thanks for pouring that Tabasco.

Jumped on that plane and headed home only to be delayed 6 hours in Seattle which is 3 hours from my house but at least I met back up with Ross in Seattle for a few more good laughs and then I was home.

So as usual I am now going to get my butt out of this chair and grab a Tall, No whip, No Drizzle extra-runny Carmel frappe!!
Cobra out.