Sea Otter 2019

**Dantheman** · 04-01-2019, 12:46 PM

Anyone going to be there? We'll be at the Hayes tent.

**Dantheman** · 04-11-2019, 08:06 PM

Civilians attend this voluntarily? For fun? Huh.

**gravitylover** · 04-11-2019, 09:31 PM

Haha

**TahoeJ** · 04-12-2019, 10:01 AM

Originally Posted by Dantheman

Civilians attend this voluntarily? For fun? Huh.

Ha... I've been told not to bother.

**mcski** · 04-12-2019, 10:11 AM

I have a buddy that has gone for years and year after year tried to recruit me. I think I have finally broken him of that fools errand

**Dantheman** · 04-12-2019, 10:19 AM

Originally Posted by TahoeJ

Ha... I've been told not to bother.

I pretty much knew what I was getting into, consider everything you may have heard validated.

**mcski** · 04-12-2019, 10:30 AM

Lol

**TahoeJ** · 04-12-2019, 10:53 AM

Friend on Strava yesterday called his ride.... "Fun" at Sea Otter "race"

haha.

**jono** · 04-12-2019, 12:16 PM

Shitshow's gonna shitshow.

Couple years ago IMBA had a sign in front of their booth I wish I had photographed: "We are IMBA. We hike. We fish. We camp. We birdwatch. We ski. etc etc. ....And we ride." Rare moment of honesty could only have improved if they'd added "if we get around to it." Even shitshows can't be perfect, I guess.

**simple** · 04-12-2019, 01:17 PM

Dual slalom is a good event. The rest can die, especially the e-bike race. At least the weed is good.

**Gone Skiing** · 04-12-2019, 03:22 PM

Phil is a good friend from CB, wouldn't have guessed you guys knew each other. I love the small world we live in.

**ACH** · 04-12-2019, 03:22 PM

Originally Posted by Dantheman

Civilians attend this voluntarily? For fun? Huh.

Right?

Nice to meet you this morning.

Sent from my cellphone at the airport

**Dantheman** · 04-12-2019, 09:54 PM

Originally Posted by simple

Dual slalom is a good event.

Not sure I agree. I entered Sam in the DS since people we knew who went last year said the DH course sucked and the shuttle was a massive cluster. DS seemed like less hassle while still being good fun.

He did one practice run today, got to the bottom and immediately said, "That was stupid." Can't say I disagree; a couple lame corners through grass, 5 berms, and a few more lame grass corners. Our obligations here are satisfied so we're bailing a day early and skipping the qualifier tomorrow.

Originally Posted by Gone Skiing

Phil is a good friend from CB, wouldn't have guessed you guys knew each other. I love the small world we live in.

No way, you know Phil? He's awesome! All the Hayes people we've dealt with have been great.

Originally Posted by ACH

Right?

Nice to meet you this morning.

Sent from my cellphone at the airport

Yeah, great to talk to you too.

**toast2266** · 04-13-2019, 07:43 AM

Sam's kind of a big deal.

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/hayes-...tter-2019.html

**zlatham** · 04-13-2019, 07:53 AM

Ya saw that! Congrats Sam and Dan! Im considering a new 24” commencal for my kido, if you have any beta on the Clash, that would be awesome, cheers

**volklpowdermaniac** · 04-13-2019, 07:57 AM

Can someone fill me in on the inside joke of the suckitude of sea otter? Never been but figured it was a cool event?

**TahoeJ** · 04-13-2019, 08:09 AM

Originally Posted by volklpowdermaniac

Can someone fill me in on the inside joke of the suckitude of sea otter? Never been but figured it was a cool event?

No inside joke. It’s just a MTB festival hosted where the trails suck. It would be like a big ski festival at a mountain with 500 vertical feet.

**volklpowdermaniac** · 04-13-2019, 08:09 AM

Ah, got it.

**jono** · 04-13-2019, 09:59 AM

It's not mountain bike specific. It's held at Laguna Seca, so the road races are probably less sucky, if you're into that. (It is kinda fun to ride down the Corkscrew.) But the year we went we decided we'd rather ride Pebble Beach than spend another day, so take that FWIW.

It's embrace the shitshow or hate the experience.

**Dantheman** · 04-13-2019, 03:01 PM

Originally Posted by toast2266

Sam's kind of a big deal.

https://www.pinkbike.com/news/hayes-...tter-2019.html

There's a sweet demo video in the press release. He's in the gray shirt and blue full face. Hits a nice drop about 3/4s of the way through.

https://m.pinkbike.com/news/video-ha...-For-Kids.html

Originally Posted by zlatham

Ya saw that! Congrats Sam and Dan! Im considering a new 24” commencal for my kido, if you have any beta on the Clash, that would be awesome, cheers

Thanks! It's a pretty rad opportunity that we basically fell backwards into. Hayes is super committed to the product line and all the kids. It's super cool to be in on the ground floor of it and see a big company step up and make stuff they deserve. This stuff is going to be on tons of bikes within a year. All the parts are cool, but the forks are especially rad. They put some serious engineering into them and they are far better than anything else out there in 20/24.

I've been told commencal has had some production hangups and it may be a while before the Clash is available.

ETA: They made a custom set of brake levers for each kid that had their names laser etched onto them. So cool.

Originally Posted by TahoeJ

No inside joke. It’s just a MTB festival hosted where the trails suck. It would be like a big ski festival at a mountain with 500 vertical feet.

Maybe it started as a bike festival back in the day, but now it's more of a trade show that has races attached to it. And, yes, the MTB courses all suck.

We made a big trip out of it. Visited family in redwood city for a few days, rode bikes and went to the beach in Santa Cruz for a few days days. Great trip.

**plugboots** · 04-13-2019, 05:02 PM

Originally Posted by Dantheman

Maybe it started as a bike festival back in the day, but now it's more of a trade show that has races attached to it. And, yes, the MTB courses all suck.

I pretty much agree with this. I’ve raced the x-country race, gone to the festival w/o racing, and worked a booth. I had fun doing all this. My first trip, before and after the race, I had the manufacture reps/mechanics work on my bikes, give me assorted small parts and stuff, and give me all kinds of tuning pointers for free. Why would that suck? Also, I’ve watched all kinds of goofy bike demo things. It’s also in one of the prettier parts of the planet. I guess I really am the dork that just likes doing stuff.

**joetron** · 04-14-2019, 11:36 AM

I thought Sea Otter was a pretty cool event. There are multiple types of bike racing happening all day, every day for 4 days and a timely and relevant trade/media/consumer show. And it’s all outside instead of in some shitty convention center.
Yeah the courses mostly suck but the level of competition is high.
I found it to be a great celebration of bicycles and after working a booth the past 2 years, I was kind of bummed not to be there this year.
It’s a bit of a cluster, but show up early and leave early or hang out, go for a ride and drink some beers and miss the exit cluster.

Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums