Thread: Ray's over the Holidays

It's a good bit shorter drive from my folks house than my own, so I'm gonna try to hit up Ray's during the Thanksgiving and/or Christmas holidays. Anybody gonna be around or making the trip?

Christmas is much more likely for me, but if there's likely to be a group there around Thanksgiving, I might try to make something happen.

May be down for this Sat or Sunday, we even have place to stay with friends.

Originally Posted by SuperChief

May be down for this Sat or Sunday, we even have place to stay with friends.

Damn. Too much going on this weekend to make that happen. 14 hours round trip is a bit of a deterrent as well. Only about 4 hours each way from the folks house, and I'll be there from Tuesday through next weekend.

I miss that quick jaunt over from Morgantown.

Good lord was that place packed today. I think I counted 6 out of state plates today.

it was nearly empty on 11.25, but had plates in the lot from texas, md, va and wisconsin - had entire rooms and long trail sections to myself. rode for a little over three hours. it was my first time - good times.....

Give us a shout when you want to make the jaunt. Would of been hard to make it today, didn't take into account that we had a game last night at Mountaineer field.

there is an ann arbor crew that rolls down one or two times a week. I'd love to ride with you, just give me some notice. You can ride my blue pig or slopestyle bike if you don't feel like renting.

Pretty much, whenever your there give a shout, it takes me less effort (2hrs) to get to rays then to ski, so unless its gonna be good, I'll be there.

Hunter

edit: should have said i'm doing grad school in ann arbor, and if your legit and not smelly, you can stay there before a rays run, which is 2 hours away.

There's a few of us from Fort Wayne planning on going to Rays sometime after Christmas. We don't have any dates in mind, but Wednesdays generally work the best with our work schedules.

Ms. Shred and I will be through in February. Half my section at work gets sent to UT on business, half gets sent to OH. Of course, I got assigned to the OH side, but I'm looking forward to Ray's.

Weather was too good to spend indoors, so didn't make it. I'll definitely be up over Christmas, though.

300hp, I've got a hardtail and I'm coming from the opposite direction, but thanks for the offers.

I'll bump this back up in a few weeks and see if we can pin down some dates. I think mid-week would be better, though that may not matter during a holiday.

Here are some 20" guys DESTROYING Ray's. Pretty freaking impressive. Should bump your stoke meter up a few notches about going there.

I'm gonna head up early tomorrow morning to catch opening, ride for a while then head home. My grand plans of a solid couple days of riding were torn to pieces, and this is what's left. Super last minute, but if anybody wants to meet up for a ride, I should be there (as long as the weather doesn't get any more uncooperative).

The Mrs. and I are heading there Feb 18th for the weekend and a girls skills clinic.

Rode yesterday for free and took a private lesson with Shaums, Learned a bunch and am going to be at it again today. Wish there was one of these indoor parks in every town.

Oh yeah, the place was full of Hot women.

Man, I feel like I need to attend that clinic too Never been to Ray's, although a group from my local bike club goes out there every year. Hasn't worked for my schedule yet, but I'm def hoping to get out there at some point. It'd be nice if I could grow a pair and hit some of those features too! Private lessons sound nice

Post trip report,

I started out Friday morning barely taking a little air off the small tables in the rhythm room, and taking other gumwrapper airs off non scary jumps. I was able to build confidence and hit them with speed in a few hours, but wasn't clearing them. Then I had an 1.5hr lesson with Shaums March, we worked on technique and skill building, with a little time I was able to link all three of the small tables in the GT room, then moved to back to the rhythm room and was hitting the the beginner line with authority and smoothness. The next day we worked on a table that was alot bigger and got it dialed, when I went back to the rhythm room I was hitting the tables with too much confidence and was overshooting, landing close to flat and narrowly avoiding a painfull crushing of the SAC , with a better get the eff away from this bike dismount. Reality check... after two days of hard riding in the middle of winter in a completely foreign environment, I was exhausted. I decided it was better to to chill out, go ride the skinnies and BS with Doc from Superco about his wicked new DH bike and hardtails. (he's a damn cool guy)

With regards to Shaums coaching, the guy is super patient and well worth the money and time spent. When we discussed goals I wanted to learn how to be more comfortable in the air and wanted to learn things that will transfer to DH riding. He did a very good job with those requests and took the time to explain how this plywood box and skinny log will x-fer to the steep rocky trail. The next day he spent three hours with Mrs. Chief and invited me along halfway through the lesson to work with both of us on how to coach each other when we ride together and fine tune what I learned the day before. I'm convinced Shaums truly loves his job. Mrs. Chief came away with some new tricks to dial her skills and I'm pretty psyched I can do nice arced jumps over tables... An old dog can learn new tricks.

A big shout out to Mrs. Chief who organized our trip and arranged for lessons. I probably would of never sprung for 'em to begin with but I will be saving for the next round of instruction. Ray's is a very cool place, to see her go there with the enthusiasm of developing her riding and taking me along to gawk at 180 female riders, was a quite the first time experience. I'd have to say this was one of the best riding weekends we've had.

Also have to mention the womens weekend with 16 female instructors covering X-country mtb to bmx and trials of all levels, a gift grab bag, t-shirt, two frame and a complete bike give-aways, along with some other sweet schwag, along with a days riding, were all free. An added bonus was that place with 200 people riding seems empty.

I think I'd like to do it again next year, and will definately try and get back there two or three times before it closes for the summer.

Originally Posted by SuperChief

I decided it was better to to chill out, go ride the skinnies and BS with Doc from Superco about his wicked new DH bike and hardtails. (he's a damn cool guy)

Glad you had a good time! We likely bumped into each other and never made the connection. I was rocking one of the new PurpleCo bikes with a few gold bits.

All in all an amazing weekend!

Go buddies, go for it. But please think once before doing it that is it worthful or not...

thanks.

Originally Posted by beast

Glad you had a good time! We likely bumped into each other and never made the connection. I was rocking one of the new PurpleCo bike with a few gold bits.

All in all an amazing weekend!

Nice, did you have the lowered Fox fork I was asking about on the deck of The rythym room? If so thanks for the offer to let me take your bike for a spin... more like roll in my case

Good shit, J. Ray's is crazy now. I really want to get back up there before they close, but it's so damn far from here.

I've heard from a lot of people that Shaums is a solid coach and a good guy.

Originally Posted by SuperChief

Nice, did you have the lowered Fox fork I was asking about on the deck of The rythym room? If so thanks for the offer to let me take your bike for a spin... more like roll in my case

Haha. Bingo! So we did connect.

You were killing it by the time you left, btw. Def saw a ton of improvement.

Thanks Beast. We had some friends just move to Cleveland and have a great crash pad. We are planning to get back in March and April. Plus the food in Cleveland was great.