[kidwoo]

In the days before camera phones.......
I'm not buying a corvette so here's my midlife crisis/reflection on dem dayz. I wanted to catalog in chronological order all the videos I'd made and a few people have asked me for one place to find them all. I initially bought a camera because I was lucky enough to keep riding with better and better people to film and thought I should catch some of it. It turned into a bit of a hobby with editing. I mostly just ended up making music videos with bike riding as the scenery. These videos are complete with current and former ridemonkey peeps, either in them or sharing cool places to ride that ended up in them. Honestly, this joint was good people networking before the concept was monetized and made weird. I'll always be grateful. Anyway, I think this is all of them.

Themes: Poking fun at racers and the east coast bike park scene (trumpore-driven), totem advocacy, on-location filming off location, me eating shit, homemade cable cams and helmet cams, an evolving timelapse habit, and lots of road trippin

The first several suck but could be funny to cringe at. They get infinitely more watchable the later you go.

 

[kidwoo]

Virgin 2006. Newly aquired Canon GL2. The first time I ever even tried to film or edit anything. I don't even vouch for this video, it's awful. OG redbull rampage venue. Learned the very obvious lesson of not just going up and filming something the first time you ever ride it, because you look like a hack. You know the song. Keep clicking, they get better.

(Bonus RM thread: https://ridemonkey.bikemag.com/threads/trip-to-virgin-yootar.169127/
expired pics located here: https://cmoney.smugmug.com/Sports/Mountain-Biking/Virgin/)

 

[kidwoo]

Autum 2006. Just a bunch of local stuff filmed mostly in the fall of 2006. The beginnigs of THETRAIL. A separated shoulder. Before instagram you used to able to keep secrets so this is filmed in texas. Swervedriver tunes. Some recycled virgin footage because that video sucks. Keep clicking, they get better

 

[kidwoo]

Bootleg Canyon, Winter 2007. Still Suffering greatly from "don't only film things the first time you ride them, idiot" syndrome. First time I really started using audio cues. Mostly just a roadtrip vid.

 

[kidwoo]

Spring training. Some winter and spring footage from 2007. Someone I met through ridemonkey and is still a good friend let us fuck up his back yard in the name of jumpy pump. Hood river OR before they neutered the big stuff. The beginnings of a trail network we built that is now tourist hell. Totems (heavy).

 

[kidwoo]

Geriatric Extreme Stunt Brigade. Summer collection of 2007. Back when you had to download vids to watch them worth a damn, I called the file jury hat tricks. Get it? Geriatrics? I'm a genius. That's what everyone remembers this as but it was called Geriatrics because we were getting old in our late 20s/early 30s and all. Filmed all over the summer of 2007, California, Colorado, Oregon, Warshington, British Columbia, but all shot exclusively in Yosemite National Park. Janes Addiction. Fun fact: First time I ever met Vital's own Brandon Thurman/Beast and lied to his face so that I could get a number plate to ride sol vista when they were only open for collegiate nationals. This the only time you'll ever see a number plate on my bike. More footage of the evolving THETRAIL

( Bonus RM thread. https://ridemonkey.bikemag.com/threads/video-of-my-head-bobbing-in-the-woods-with-a-bunch-of-dudes.188976/#post-2677709)

 

[kidwoo]

Oh Canda! I had a bunch of footage from filming with @shirk007 in canadia from our 2007 trip so I made another video with it specific to poutine. Mostly just something for these guys to have. Devil Makes Three music before they were cool. Also TSOL for the skateboarders. All filmed in alabama, probably. Gutsploder!

(Bonus RM thread: https://ridemonkey.bikemag.com/threads/ooooohhhhhhhhh.193186/)

 

[kidwoo]

Summers Eve. Late Fall of 2007. Filmed in the magical time between dry dust hell and 6ft of snow that exists here. Mostly local, definitely secret at the time. Plus douche joke and butthole surfers. Some of these trails now feature in every dickbag's tourist instagram posts in the area when they come here (including Intense Cycles). Fun fact: I recommended getting cheaper (at the time) mechanics gloves for commuting to a guy who worked at peets and he sent me free coffee for like 5 years. So Peets! Fun facts: first use of bleeding cowboy font in history. Seriously, this font is everywhere now and I'm a pioneer. Also 'helmet cams' were a thing you had to wire to a real camera in a backpack. Gopro is still like 5 years out. Heavy footage of the completed THETRAIL. Totem (heavy)

 

[kidwoo]

Jax: January 2008. Just a vacation trip home to see my family in northern florida for the holidays. The trail looking stuff is the same place I started riding mountainbikes in the 90s while at university of florida. I just brought my dirtjumper because it's a hella freeride park now. Met some guys online that maintained dirtjumps built legitimately out of sand. Insane amount of work to keep these little guys standing but they were nice enough to invite me over. One of them was ridng a foes fly! Filmed in Africa.

 

[kidwoo]

In the Red. Now the vids are getting watchable. New camera with full lens and color controls. This was back when wildfires were the novelty not the norm and red skies were rare. Remember that backyard from Spring Training? Now we're really fucking it up with a big dirtjump line and earthmoving equipment. Camera crane, gravity cable cam (no drones y'all), more audio editing, ode to the skateboarders in the opening. Helmet cam is literally a camcorder bolted to a helmet. Includes totem (heavy).

(bonus RM thread for the dirtjumps, my photos expired, zach's still work https://ridemonkey.bikemag.com/threads/project-earthworm-wakeup-1st-communication.199676/)

 

[kidwoo]

Diablo. Filmed at Diablo (northstar) Fall of 2008. A good friend had been recovering from cancer, found only because of a cat scan to check his spine after a bad mtb crash. After a year of chemo I wanted to show a lot of him riding because he's good and stuff and it was good to see him healthy again. Some other random collections of video I was just constantly in the habit of collecting now.

 

[kidwoo]

Motive 'trailer.' using 2008 footage. Made for a video contest I entered (didn't win). Footage that didn't fit elsewhere, and some previously used stuff. Also other logos of people that hooked me up with stuff. More music video stuff.

 

[kidwoo]

The Public Option. So much filming was previously at places we wanted to keep secret, or at least not advertise locations. Other than Zach's pumptrack this is places anyone could go ride (northstar and mammoth), hence the name. I used to go up to northstar the day they closed the ski area for the season and rebuild the dirtjumps. That ended up being most of my summer between building those and maintaining the other spot. Like most things, the northstar jumps have since been neutered. Glad to get some footage of Fogelquist ond Cob there.

The Public Option

Socialism y'all. Trails for everyone. Three old guys and two young guys enjoying the new republic.

www.vitalmtb.com

 

[kidwoo]

2009 Collegiate 4x Nationals. Beast/Thurman was in town cuz he was still a wee lad running his school's racing team. Was a kick for us older people because out buddy Jon Wilson had gone back to school to get another degree and was hence eligible to race a bunch of kids 10 years younger than him. Historical reference: https://theteamrobot.blogspot.com/2013/08/wilson-crushes-it.html
Probably the best intro graphic I ever did with the belushi

 

[kidwoo]

iDig. September 2010. Just dirtjumps. Deep in the heart of a time period where where I was spending way more time building than riding. I also broke my back this year so this is the only thing I put together in 2010. New DSLR camera. Probably the beginning of my camera/editing self-indulgence. Inside joke about how every time we'd post pics of something we'd worked on for months and years destroying our bodies building, some dork would just say how lucky we were that these places just magically appeared. Zach's house! While it lasted at least.

 

[kidwoo]

Hella Mega. Spring of 2011. Zach had gotten a contract building up a slopestyle course at Woodward West. He wanted to call them the mega trails since they were huge and right next to their megaramp/quarter pipe. Lots of the aptos kids showed up and did neat things. First time we'd started riding the whole line after working on it most of the winter. I showed up at the tail end of the big stacking.

 

[kidwoo]

Mammoth 2011. Midsummer trip that Mammoth wanted vital to film to highlight their new trails. Most of them sucked so we just filmed the old dh race courses again. Brandon let us stay in a condo with him with some tickets in exchange for a video. They didn't want to load it because of no rights to the song and I didn't want to re-edit it. Brandon just redid it for vital with a different song. Here's the OG edit that I did. Lots of 80% speed because I thought it fit the song better. Skittle shirts for showing up on a volcano.

 

[kidwoo]

Mammoth 2012. Same as above, Mammoth wanted some video from vital highlighting their new trails. We filmed what was fun to ride and didn't film what wasn't because I'm a stubborn asshole. Took me longer to find a public access song that didn't suck than it did to shoot. More skittle shirts.

 

[kidwoo]

Standard Mountain Time. Summer/fall of 2012. This is the last MTB flick I did. I wanted to make something that captured what summers had become for me. Which was a very cyclic spring build/rebuild period, some riding, some choking on dust, and then a mad dash to get the last little bit of riding on wet dirt in right before getting buried in snow again. Most of the guys I used to film with had either moved or gotten old and become boring. Fewer and fewer people wanted to dedicate the time to go shoot anymore with kids and grownup stuff. I was running out of talent to film so I just set up a bunch of shots and got my girlfriend to hit the button white pointed at me just to get some footage I wanted. Some of the then new dirtjumps at woodward tahoe. First and only drone shots! A bigass home made kit by a friend. Tyler Mccaul about to beat our asses for flying it so close to his head.

 

[sethimus]

.wmv

in

the

title

geez

 

[kidwoo]

.wmv

in

the

title

geez

I edited them out of the titles, I don't know why vimeo is displaying them like that.

try it nao

 

[Nick]

dude ....

 

[marshalolson]

Hell yes!

 

[frorider]

Cool. I remember a couple of these. I also remember how professional that iDig one was.

 

[sethimus]

I edited them out of the titles, I don't know why vimeo is displaying them like that.

try it nao

i know why, check your birth date

 

[kidwoo]

i know why, check your birth date

sorry to inconvenience you on this very important matter

 

[shirk007]

Wow a trip into the wayback machine. Seems a lifetime ago, wait maybe it was. I need to watch a few there I think I missed over the years.

 

[Fool]

iDig was one of my favorites from the old-timey days.

For some reason, I have it in my head that ZD used to spray/pack dirt jumps with WD40 to get them so shiny. One of those stupid things occupying brain space that could be put to better use.

 

[William42]

I hit my peak on one of those trails in northern California. I remember exploring that mountain side around beginning in ~2009 and onward, and always finding rad new things that got me pumped to ride a bike.

Never ridden a trail(s)? since then that captured the magic of riding mountain bikes so well. Felt like I could ride anything there blind for the first time and just hit it with trail speed and have 100% confidence that it would work out just fine.

I had no idea you were as involved in building those trails as you were. Some of the best times I've ever spent on a mountain bike up there.

I remember the beginning of the "washing up" period for me was when I couldn't get anybody to go ride those trails and shuttle with me and so I ended up going to Northstar, and since I had to drive myself I wasn't able to drink the normal 12 pack of beers I'd have whenever I'd go hard. Dumbfuck sober me ended up crashing hard on the waterfall and breaking my foot. It took quite awhile to heal, and by that point most of my crew had moved on to other things and that was definitely the beginning of the decline.

I always like to think if I hadn't been a dumbass and I'd just gone to ride those trails instead, I'd have never broken my foot and started the road down suckass lane.

Great trip down memory lane. Gonna be down in California in a few weeks to ride downieville while I pass through on our way to move back to the southeast from upstate Washington. If you're around, I'll buy you a case of beers or some scotch. Or just PM me your full name, address, and social security number or something and I'll shoot you a gift card to your favorite malt liquor store.

Cheers

 

[WestCoastHucker]

For some reason, I have it in my head that ZD used to spray/pack dirt jumps with WD40 to get them so shiny.

the shovels were sprayed to keep wet dirt from sticking to them when packing the dirt. shiny was just a byproduct..

 

[Nick]

@WestCoastHucker aren't you in the Virgin video? That's not you exploding at the end is it?

 

[kidwoo]

For some reason, I have it in my head that ZD used to spray/pack dirt jumps with WD40 to get them so shiny. One of those stupid things occupying brain space that could be put to better use.

That was a joke. We used to spray it on shovels and the bucket of the skid steer just because some of that red clay was so sticky. Somebody spotted a big jug of it in one of our pics so we just said that's what made the packed surfaces so smooth. Surprise, it was just from packing the bejeebus out of them.

edit: sniped by wch

 

[kidwoo]

I hit my peak on one of those trails in northern California. I remember exploring that mountain side around beginning in ~2009 and onward, and always finding rad new things that got me pumped to ride a bike.

Never ridden a trail(s)? since then that captured the magic of riding mountain bikes so well. Felt like I could ride anything there blind for the first time and just hit it with trail speed and have 100% confidence that it would work out just fine.

I had no idea you were as involved in building those trails as you were. Some of the best times I've ever spent on a mountain bike up there.

I remember the beginning of the "washing up" period for me was when I couldn't get anybody to go ride those trails and shuttle with me and so I ended up going to Northstar, and since I had to drive myself I wasn't able to drink the normal 12 pack of beers I'd have whenever I'd go hard. Dumbfuck sober me ended up crashing hard on the waterfall and breaking my foot. It took quite awhile to heal, and by that point most of my crew had moved on to other things and that was definitely the beginning of the decline.

I always like to think if I hadn't been a dumbass and I'd just gone to ride those trails instead, I'd have never broken my foot and started the road down suckass lane.

Great trip down memory lane. Gonna be down in California in a few weeks to ride downieville while I pass through on our way to move back to the southeast from upstate Washington. If you're around, I'll buy you a case of beers or some scotch. Or just PM me your full name, address, and social security number or something and I'll shoot you a gift card to your favorite malt liquor store.

Cheers

Haha. Yeah we spent a lot of time on those trails to make them work well. They're pretty much falling apart now. No need to buy me anything. We got a lot of years out of having that joint to ourselves before stupidgram. That was enough.

 

[jstuhlman]

@kidwoo -thanks for throwing those up. good shit. saw this driving to work this morning. didn't realize how sprawling your empire had become

yo @William42 - where ya moving to?

 

[shelteringsky]

Any Zach Dank updates?? Does he still ride? Last I saw was a jar full of weed photo posted to Pinkbike

 

[William42]

@kidwoo -thanks for throwing those up. good shit. saw this driving to work this morning. didn't realize how sprawling your empire had become
View attachment 181632

yo @William42 - where ya moving to?

My wife is doing a PhD program down at UGA in Athens, so I imagine i'll be back to riding in Brevard a bunch as well as Windrock and maybe Kanuga if I decide to get us e-bikes, as I don't think there is a ton of fun rowdy gravity stuff in Georgia.

 

[WestCoastHucker]

@WestCoastHucker aren't you in the Virgin video? That's not you exploding at the end is it?

nope, that one wasn't me. luckily i'm not going down on record as the only dirt sampler there....

 

[jstuhlman]

My wife is doing a PhD program down at UGA in Athens, so I imagine i'll be back to riding in Brevard a bunch as well as Windrock and maybe Kanuga if I decide to get us e-bikes, as I don't think there is a ton of fun rowdy gravity stuff in Georgia.

They just opened a bike park in north western GA; some good back country options in the northern part of the state too. hit up @velocipedist

 

[Kanye West]

Mammoth sure hasn't changed a lot since then.

 

[monkeyboy424]

2009 Collegiate 4x Nationals. Beast/Thurman was in town cuz he was still a wee lad running his school's racing team. Was a kick for us older people because out buddy Jon Wilson had gone back to school to get another degree and was hence eligible to race a bunch of kids 10 years younger than him. Historical reference: https://theteamrobot.blogspot.com/2013/08/wilson-crushes-it.html
Probably the best intro graphic I ever did with the belushi

Really happy I chose to log onto this site again today.... Rad stuff!