Trip Report: Northstar/Mr. Toads

I think I'll take this opportunity to offer my opinion on a bike while I'm reporting on one of the finest trails I have ever ridden. The weekends agenda included a Sunday trip on the slopes of Northstar and a Monday trip down Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, arguably the best trail I've ever ridden. The bike of choice for the weekend was a 2008 Specialized Enduro SL. Alloy frame, Avid Juicy Ultimate 7 brakes, SRAM build. I was a little worried on the first lift up at Northstar that the Enduro would act like nothing more than a long travel XC bike. I was prepared for a very fast twitch unstable feeling. Much to my surprise the machine handled jumping remarkably well, and remained quite stable on bumpy straits.Northstar was, to be generous, chewed up! The braking bumps leading up to jumps were brain jarring, caused by lesser experienced riders doing a last minute brake jam right before the jump. I'm not sure if Northstar is strapped for cash, or they are just lazy but they seem to be falling behind on maintaining the more popular trails like LiveWire or Gypsy. They are adding new jumps, so I know someone is up there working. Perhaps a constant grating down of the braking bumps will keep us riders happier.

Monday was a trip down Mr. Toads. The climbing to reach the trailhead is about 3 miles of HIGH quality technical uphills. Any rider worth their salt would consider it high priority challenge to ride a trail like this cleanly. Once at the top the views are enough to remind anyone that amidst all life is a beautiful thing. Decending beings right away, and will not let up. Initially the terrain is technical. A few of the steeper sections came at me pretty fast, as I was chasing Zach and didn't notice. So I hit a few of them much faster than I would have liked. Riding terrain like that versus regular single track is like the difference between pleasure reading and studying Harrison's text of Internal Medicine. You have to focus on every damned word on trails like this. The enduro handled this terrain quite well. My only gripe was that the rear suspension was not as plush as I would have like. Even at it's softest, it was still to springy.

Another major problem with the bike is the propiatary triple clamp/stem system. Being that they tout this bike as an "do it all" it's amazing that you are limited by two key points. One, you cannot replace stem lengths or change the angle of stems. Basically you are stuck with a fixed connection point. Two, the turning radius at slow speeds is severely compromised by the fact that the fork sliders hit agains the frame. I found tight turns at slow speeds actually kind of difficult.

Eventually the terrain mellows out and leads into amazing FAST sweeping sand turns. Amazingly fun riding. I'm very glad we all decided to not rest stop after a certain point because connecting the whole last section in one go was amazing!

I'm giving the Enduro an A- It's overall versatility is truly amazing. With the adjustment options for the rear shock on the frame and the adjustment on the front fork you can readily switch between a stiff XC machine and a slacked downhill worth machine! After this weekend I would seriously consider buying one. I would swith the fork out with a TALAS 36 for the same adjustment and travel ability, but decreased turning radius. I would love to switch the shock out with one of the Fox models.