Woodlot Rip with Cory

This morning I met Cory at The Woodlot. He is currently reviewing a Spitfire for Pinkbike and he wanted to ask me a few questions about Banshee and get my take on a few things about the frame. Seeing as he's been an owner of a Trance for the past few years, I was also able to ask him a few questions about my newly acquired frame. The Spitfire he has is one sweet ride that has the full SRAM X0 groupo as well as a set of Tioga tires, both of which he is also reviewing. Given the amount of riding Cory does and the number of bikes and gear he has ridden over the years, he has insight into what makes a great bike or piece of gear.

Banshee Spitfire: Photo by Cory Hemminger

Our ride consisted of a pedal up Shotgun, Stovetop and the skidder road and then an descent down Krazy Karpenter, Upper and Lower Toadstool, Bloggy Style and then Shotgun.

Lets just say I am out of shape right now and Cory is in much better shape than me. He was doing a fair bit of waiting on the climb and at times I felt like puking trying to keep up with him on the way up.

At the top there was about 3-4 inches of fresh wet snow. At the trail head of Karpenter we dropped our saddles and rode down the trails making good time ripping along. We stopped on one trail where Cory showed me a little trail work that he is doing which will be oh so sweet when it is completed.

My new little bike was a blast to ride but one thing I noticed was that I was only getting about 3" of travel on my 5" fork and I was blowing through the travel in the rear a little too easy. A few tweaks to my suspension will make this bike even better.

Cory and I had a pretty good ride. I certainly noticed that I am lacking in the cardio department but the DH was a lot of fun. Hopefully I am able to get out with him one more time in the next week or so before my life once again get too busy for weekday rides.