Italy - King of Dirt comp at Bike Festival

Ihave to admit being a little nervous of going to Italy because it was my first time in a country speaking a language I could not understand at all. My high-school German lessons and fluency in Dutch were fine for Holland and Germany but Italy was different. We were lucky to be welcomed by a cool trio who had recently moved to Italy from Brazil and spoke English. They lived in a little village of 800 people up in the mountains.

The house we stayed in in the little village of Lenzumo:

It was great fun staying with them and it was cool to show them an insight to the mtb world at the Bike Festival. The highlight was the Festival closing night after the King of Dirt comp when the whole expo site came to life with drunk Germans (who all come to this festival in Italy), a crack-up Italian band playing on the stage and way too much free beer, wine etc at all the company tents.

Kelly rode every minute possible while we were there, after not riding in Holland he was hangin out for it. I went and checked out the festival site and the cool Italian town with little streets and cool old buildings. The comp itself was pretty cool to watch, Kelly did some solid runs and it was hilarious hearing the announcer talk about him in German and Italian.

After the comp a rider came up to Kelly to ask him to sign his Turner bike – he had seen him in Red Bull Rampage Coverage and was stoked to see him in Italy. He was very stoked on Turner and getting to meet Kelly. When we told him our next stop was Venice, he was very excited because that’s where he is from and he immediately asked us to visit him.

Kelly signing the Turner bike:

Our Riva crew - Rafa, Andre and Marcela - Thanks for showing us a good time!

The festival by night - party time!

Riva Del Garda KingOfDirt

Every year there is a Bike Festival in Riva Del Garda, Italy, which is right on the Garda Lake. They also host a MTB Dirt Jump comp which I entered. They built the jumps purposely for the contest, even though the scheduled comp day was hot and sunny the previous heavy rain forced the contest to be postponed from Thursday to Saturday. Luckily we had meet some awsome locals that let us stay on their couch for a few days!! The jumps weren't the best that I have ridden (sandy and soft) but it was still fun to shred with ze large German contingent.
when the comp ran on saurday quite a few spectators showed up and I found it hilarious to hear the german announcer talking about me...

I rode ok , just kept it real and stuck with the tricks I know as it was the 1st comp of a long trip, I got 8th overall .
Josh Bender was at the festival to do his "air show" ..which consisted of him gettin towed in by a moter bike and huckin a massive gap (suprise??), the show was cancelled because his partner Bobby Root broke his shoulder racing the enduro. Me and Bender discussed HUCKING TO FLAT techniques any ways. the next day I went and shot a few pix with ALE from Marzocchi up in the mountains behind Riva del garda it was sweet and me and Sha rode one othe rockiest down hill tracks I have ever ridden in my life! Whoa!

After the that we loaded all the bikes on the back of our BEAST of a car and headed to check out Venice

3 Countries in one day...

After a mammoth of a mission we finally bought some wheels thanks to Kelly's legend of a cousin Luke and his Family in Holland. Here's the beast (and the car) in a wee village in Germany...

The first leg of our trip took us through 3 countries, beginning in Holland and into Germany cruising the Autobahn and getting passed by Audi's, Mercs and BMW's pinning it!

We cruised from Germany through Austria to Italy. We were wowed by some cool typical Bavarian villages such as Dinkelsbuhl and Rothenburg.

Then we checked out one of King Ludwigs castles which was pretty flash. Kelly spent most of the time looking for places to ride his bike on the castle grounds.

We drove straight through the Austrian mountains to get to Italy and rocked into Riva Del Garda in Italy for the Bike Festival pretty late so didn't see much scenery until the next day....

Made it to Italy!

We are in Italy for the King of Dirt comp at Riva Del Garda as part of a 4 day bike festival, right by the Garda Lake - stunningly beautiful.
Unfortunately it has been raining the whole week before we got here and the jumps they built for the comp are too wet so the comp is postponed to Saturday.
Kelly is gonna ride the jumps tomorrow and I have booked in for a women's 4 hour Freeride Tour in the Italian Alps as part of the festival - looking forward to getting out on the bike again after about 4 weeks off -yikes!
OK Gotta go eat some Pizza, Pasta and Gelato, will update after the weekend and post some pics.

T-Mobile Extreme Playgrounds - Germany

Kelly hit the ground running when he got to Europe, first stop Amsterdam to check out the canals, dykes, smart shops and the infamous red light district.

Next mission was to Duisburg in Germany to catch up with our mate Phil Sundbaum at T-Mobile Extreme Playgrounds Dirt Session. The train ride was pretty fun, there's not much room for luggage so we had our legs jammed up on top of it all for a couple of hours till we got there. We've noticed that people over here aren't shy and like to stare at anything out of the norm, so we've had our share of stares. But whatever, you learn to stare back pretty quickly.

Then we got to navigate the streets of Duisburg and find our hostel and then head out on the mission to the venue for the comp. This was an interesting operation, took about half an hour to figure out which train to take, which price class it was, where to get off etc, but my shabby german got us through and some locals helped us out.

We spoke english to the security guard at the venue and said we were looking for the jumps so he let us in assuming Kelly was one of the bike riders. haha.

We found Uncle Phil and watched some of the practise.

The next day we felt like locals, catching the train to the venue and even helped out some germans who were looking for the way to get there. We waited in a line for a while to get our VIP passes which Phil had hooked up for us, YEAH! Cheers bro.

The venue was awesome, in an old industrial iron mill which had closed in the 80's, the jumps were in a massive indoor building with a huge stage at one end. There were 14 riders in BMX and MTB, with two heats and a final 4. It was a sick comp, live onto MTV and we were stoked to be there to watch the action. In between heats there were live bands on the main stage. The best part was that NOFX played after the finals and it was epic. We rocked up to the front and got a good spot to watch the punkrockers take the piss out of Ze Germans and be general munters. A wicked welcome to Europe!

NOFX on the main stage:

Check the highlight vids on Freecaster.tv:

http://freecaster.tv/bmx/1007686/t-mobile-extreme-playgrounds-highlights-bmx

http://freecaster.tv/mtb/1007559/t-mobile-extreme-playgrounds-highlights-mountain-bike

California week 2 and Woodward

We visited Mike at Atomlab to set up Kelly's pimpin' new ride..












After the fun first week in California, I headed to Europe and Kelly stayed on for a week to ride ride ride. He met up with Rick Nolte again and his mate Jeromy Combs and then hit up Woodward West where he has always wanted to ride.









Kelly got hooked up a special entry to ride and he was the only one there the first day and then Cory Nastasio turned up so they rode the rest of the time. The set up is usually only for little punks who go there for a whole week on a camp and their parents pay heaps for them to ride there so Kelly was stoked when he found out he could have the place to himself.

Check out Kelly on Steez of the week on Jeromy's blog Liquid Dirt.. stoked.. http://www.liquid-dirt.com/2009/04/steez-of-week_18.html

Watch out Europe.. here comes Kelly!

Kelly arrives in Amsterdam in 6 hours.. he's up for a full-on weekend for his first time in Europe.
First it's time to celebrate his birthday checking out the sights in Amsterdam tomorrow.
For the weekend we're heading accross the border to Duisburg in Germany for the T-Mobile Extreme Playgrounds Dirt Session. Kelly isn't riding but we are gonna check it out, catch up with our mate Phil Sundbaum and punk-rock it out at NOFX and cause some general ruckus to welcome Kelly.
Will post some pics next week.

Kelly in DECLINE!

So when we were at SDG I was flickin through the latest DECLINE Magazine and checkin out the Red Bull Rampage article and Kelly has a shot of him in it which is awesome!

These pics on the left are the contents page from the previous decline showing all the riders from the Rampage. Go Kelly! And Unit Represent!

Here is Kelly in the Rampage article.. the quote on his pic says 'Kelly McGarry has some big Kiwi's. New Zealand has now been represented at Rampage'.

California Uber Alles

Kelly is lovin Cali..

We hung out at Pacific Beach on the weekend with Rick Nolte who is awesome.. and manuals the sea wall down at the beach every day (photo left).

Yesterday was spent cruising around and visiting some of Kelly's sponsors to check out their digs. Thankfully we hired a GPS with our car because otherwise we wouldn't have got very far.

First stop was TURNER bikes where we caught up with Dave and the crew.

Here is Dave and Kelly checkin out frames and sizes for Kelly's new DHR rig at Turner HQ.

We then visited ODI Grips who make all their products on-site as well as lots of other products. We got the mean tour from Colby. Checkin out the grip molds:

We then headed to Huntington Beach to visit Tyler at SDG seats who also hooked Kelly up. When we were there I was checkin out the latest issue of Decline Mag and spotted a pic of Kelly in the Rampage write up which was cool!! Kelly and Tyler at SDG:

We then realised we were stuck at Huntington Beach because our next stop was on the other side of LA which meant if we left then it would take 3x as long due to the traffic on the freeway.. so there was only one option.. go hang out on the beach.. woooh! Kelly hired out a surfboard and hit the waves. We also checked out the famous sheep hills jumps which Kelly used to drool over when he watched all the pros ride it in vids when he was a youngster.

Spot a kelly on the beach.. and Kelly at sheep hills.

Choice times in USA. Sha for Kelly McGarry.

Sha in the house

Hey peeps,
Sha here, I have decided to add myself as an author for Kelly's blog.. might as well because
1. I type MUCH faster than Kelly
2. I like to update you on whatZup
3. Kelly is too busy riding his bike to write about himself on a blog haha
So yeh keep an eye out for some more write ups on here..
We are in California right now, off to Europe soon and then back to Canada.
I will post some blogs of the summer just been in NZ too as soon as I can.
Ok we are at Pacific Beach San Diego and going for a ride (boys on the HTs me on an old skool Schwinn Cruiser) so catch ya soon yo!
Awesome, Sha.

For Kelly McGarry

Back in New Zealand

After running all over Canada /USA I was beat and jumped on a plane with my 3 bikes and copious amounts of luggage and headed back home for some sunshine and bike ridin.
1st stop was my home town of Nelson, it was good to be back shreddin with the crew. I got straight into building stuff for Tim Pierce's new "Take One". I built a slopestyle line at my friend Grants house. It was pretty hard work lugging timber for my wall ride up a steep DH track and digging my jumps and spending my limited cash on materials. But it was all good when I got to film and ride what I had built.

After that I packed all my gear in to the super cuzzy (my trusty van) and headed for Winton in Southland for the Frew Farm Jam travelling over 1000 kms in one day, all the way from Nelson! When we woke up it was practise day and there was lots of new stuff to ride. We had a good sesh on the super kicker which was set up next to the FMX jump. The big line was looking amazing but the wind came up in the afternoon and we couldn't ride. That set the tone for the remainder of the weekend. Howling winds made it impossible to ride the big line during the main event. WIth hundreds of spectators expecting some action, we rode the smaller line and did the best we could. It was a wicked event nonetheless and I am already looking forward to the next one, minus the wind hopefully.

Next step was settin up shop in Queenstown for the summer. Woohoo! First stop was the newly revamped Gorge Road jumps which I would say is a world class setup. It has been awesome shredding such cool jumps every night after work with the QT crew.

We had the Revolver Wynyard Jam a few weeks ago, it was a hell of a lot of fun. Matt from Revolver set up an awesome cable cam to capture the action going down. There were about 20 riders and we sessioned the jumps with the sounds and bbq blazing. I got a pic in the Mountain Scene (local newspaper) and they somehow mistook me for an Australian - not cool!

Next thing is the Gorge Road Jam on the 11th Feb which will be cool, also heading to Area 9 Music festival this weekend to ride a demo with the boys and check out some live music.

Pics- photo credit to Greig Howell - thanks!

Been a sick summer so far and lots more to come...

Kelly McGarry.

Red Bull Rampage The Evolution run down

RED BULL RAMPAGE The Evolution October 2008
On Tuesday night we arrived in virgin Utah, after driving from Las vegas for a couple of hours. I was expecting really high temperatures as we were in the desert but we lucked out with fairly moderate weather. The landscape was amazing with huge sandstone cliffs towering above us on either side of us as we drove into Spring dale where we were staying. The next morn I headed up to the site of the red bull rampage and was very impressed with the gnarly course and new man made features added to the event. For the next two days I practiced the course and dug lines to ride. Line selection was tricky ,I wasn’t sure weather to go for a safe line and risk getting scored low for amplitude or go for a burly line and risk crashing. I started to feel comfortable on ridge 3 so I opted to take that in my qualifying run. We woke on the morning of qualifying to pouring rain and qualifying was postponed to Sunday . When I showed up Sunday morn we were told that we would only have one run of qualifying ,i was gutted about that because it puts a lot of pressure on you . I was happy with how I was riding in practice and excited about the comp. The pressure at the start gate was pretty intense I was nervous about crashing . I knew I had to throw some tricks on the features as a lot of people were riding my line. I rode the top of the ridge pretty good but when i did an x up on the big triple step down I got a bit blown by the wind and went down hard. My visor was smashed and I was shook up. I was super disappointed but I got back on and decided to i didn’t have much to lose so i floated a mammoth backflip over the last table the crowd went siiiick and I was so stoked to stomp it and help make up for my crash . I didn’t make the finals but it was cool to sit back and watch the insanity go down . Over all it was a great contest in an amazing part of the world and I hope i get a chance to ride it again.

Las Vegas

Las Vegas - INTERBIKE September 2008

Just winding down from Interbike and Las Vegas mayhem and preparing to head to Utah for Red Bull Rampage - www.redbullrampage.com

Interbike was cool, a giant bike industry expo which literally took the whole 3 days to get around. it was Cool to check out all the 2009 gears and catch up with everyone.

Saturday we headed to Anthem Skate Park for the Sin City Jam, it was very hot but we all sessioned the park and it was good times!

-Kelly McGarry

Red Bull Rampage

IM RIDING RED BULL RAMPAGE

A couple of months ago Caleb from Spoke Magazine in New Zealand asked if I would be up for riding the Red Bull rampage in Utah USA (October 2-5). Of course I was keen and he put in a proposal on my behalf. Only 28 riders get to ride the event this year and I just found out I am one of them! I am psyched as and forever thankful to Caleb for putting my name out there.
Check out http://www.redbullrampage.com/
http://www.spokemagazine.com/

Canada Roady

BC and Canadian Rockies destroy all road trip. September 2008

My gf and I packed up the van for another epic mission, I couldn’t decide which bikes to take so took them all. First stop, Sun Peaks bike park near Kamloops. Met up with fellow New Zealand ripper Matt Harris who showed us the sights. There happened to be a 4x race on that day so I figured I might as well give it a go. We had a fun day riding the course and bike park and I ended up 5th in the 4x which was a bit of a laugh.
Next was Silverstar where we rode for 2 days because it was so choice. They know how to make sick berms for sure. We met a wicked dude – Johnny Korthuis in the lineup who ended up on our chair ride up and told us to come ride with him the next weekend at a wee slopestyle comp he had been helping to build in Fort Macleod. On the way to catch up with Johnny I rode a wicked line in Kelowna which I recognised from movies, rode Nelson again with the locals and stopped by at FAVORIT CYCLES in Cranbrook who helped Sha with her new Transition Syren.











Fort Macleod was a wee hick town in the middle of Alberta desert so the bike park was in the middle of nowhere, but it was pretty cool for a small place. The locals all helped build and fund it and had lines for all abilities. The comp was super chill with the Mayor helping run the show. Everyone got 3 runs and then there was a Best Trick showdown which I ended up winning on a whim because not many others landed their tricks. Johnny Korthuis came a deserved first place and I came second.I ended up with my piccy on the front of the Lethrbridge Herald!


















The road trip then bought us to some scenic parts of Canada including Kootenay National Park and Banff. We headed to Calgary to go see Rancid and otherwise would have avoided the city for sure. Met up with Johnny Korthuis once again and rode Millenium Skate Park with its monster full-pipe and rode around the streets of Calgary while the girls went shopping. Right now we are heading to Kamloops to hook up with Matt Harris again for the weekend, on the way here we cruised through Banff and Jasper National Parks and checked out the Rocky Mountains and far too many scenic sites, lakes, glaciers, wildlife, waterfalls and canyons. Time to get back on the bike..


Kelly McGarry

Whistler Crankworx

WHISTLER CRANKWORX SLOPESTYLE – August 2008

I was pretty stoked riding a smaller bike in Colorado and Turner Bikes helped me out with a sick new frame – the 5-spot, Atomlab hooked up some parts as well as Gravity. The new rig is amazing and perfect for slopestyle.
I was so stoked to get a spot and ride with the big guns. I took even more time off work and rode all day every day, hitting up the park riding A-line over and over, smashing the boneyard and after dark I would head to the foam pit.

I was having a blast and had my line dialled in practice. I guess I cracked under pressure and ended up crashing both my Final runs. It was a super hot day and I had a massive crash 360-ing the road gap which I had stomped in the Air Affair. This was my last practise run before the Finals as I noticed my forks had lost their rebound damping and had to get them fixed asap before my run. The next issue was my tyre popping off the rim, I was frantically pumping my tire with a stupid little hand pump when I was needed on the start ramp and in all the haste I hadn’t pumped it up as much as I should. This sent me all squirrily landing a 360 off the first double and the rest of my run was sketchy.

My second run was not much better, Justin Wyper had a bad crash just before me and broke his leg – I was waiting on the start ramp for about 20 minutes whilst the first aiders scraped my buddy off the ground. It was no surprise that I rolled in too fast for a flip and bent my handlebars and couldn’t finish my run. I came 19th overall and was disappointed to say the least. The rest of the comp was wicked and any of you that followed it know what went down. Thanks to all my mates for the support!

Kelly McGarry

Claymore Challenge and Crankworx Colorado

CLAYMORE CHALLENGE AND CRANKWORX COLORADO – July 2008

After changing my plans several times, I decided to make my bid to keep the airlines in business by flying to the East Coast of USA for the Highland Park Claymore Challenge and Gravity photo shoot and then to Colorado Crankworx. This was a tough call because I had been invited to ride the elusive Adidas Slopestyle event in Saalbach Austria which happened to be the same weekend as Colorado Crankworx.

Highland Park was amazing and is worth a visit for any freerider. The course they built for the Challenge was pretty gnarly, a week of rain beforehand made the conditions pretty soft but the contest went ahead anyway. I rode pretty conservatively with Crankworx Colorado on the back of my mind and not wanting to be injured for my shot at getting a place for Crankworx Whistler. It was a good time, we got some good shots with Harookz for Gravity.
Next stop, Winterpark Colorado. Showed up and hung out with my mates and legendary course builders Tommy and Foz and Kona guru John Cowan. The course they had sculpted was the best course I had ever seen and I was amping to ride it.

I was riding my Turner and 45 minutes before my qualifying run I blew my rear shock and was devastated I couldn’t find a replacement anywhere. I ended up with no choice but to borrow my friend Foz’s bike which he kindly let me ride for the qualifiers – cheers bra. I had to quickly adapt to this smaller travel bike and managed to put together a solid run including 360-ing the final drop. Advancing into the finals with the pre-qualified riders and added pressure of TV camera’s and a huge crowd I knew I had to step it up.

The event was broadcast live on the net and it was cool to have friends around the globe watching. We had two runs in a Semi-Final, my second run was sick and got me into the Final. I didn’t complete my Final run after I over-rotated a 360 flattie but I knew I was sitting pretty as my score from the Semi’s carried over and I placed 7th overall. This also meant I got one of the 3 wild card positions I was after to ride Whistler Crankworx. As Justin Wyper put it, also getting a wild card, I was “jacked up” and got “rowdy” at the after party that night.

Then it was back to Whistler to prepare for the big one.

Pic at Goatstyle - http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/2105003/

Crankworx Colorado coverage:

http://www.pinkbike.com/news/crankworx-colorado-3-208.html - write up and pic

http://www.superhumanmag.com/content/view/739/92/ - video
http://www.sicklines.com/2008/08/03/event-2008-crankworx-colorado-slopestyle-finals/ - write up and pic

http://www.vorb.org.nz/ftopict-83426.html - pic

http://www.vorb.org.nz/photos-view-32917-152-normal-0.html -link to vid

Thanks for readin, Kelly