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Flying on her new Specialized Myka. |
Though already half over, July has been eventful, encapsulating bike camp in Waterton Canyon and a double digit birthday. For good or bad, bike camp happened during an especially rainy week in an abnormally rainy year, so big sister is now a seasoned veteran mud rider.
In the midst of bike camp, she made the jump from 24-inch to 26-inch wheels, via a slightly early birthday bike. The 13-inch frame of a 2012 Specialized Myka Sport is the perfect entry to the world of high quality, big people mountain bike parts. After I performed a quick rebuild, the Myka now features a 2x9 Deore drivetrain, Avid BB5 disc brakes, wide 26" tires, and a Rockshox Recon Gold 100mm suspension fork.
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| The girls each on new-to-them bikes. |
I decided after she toughed out the first few rain soaked days of bike camp without complaint, that she was due for the bigger bike. Her old bike, a Specialized Hotrock 24" has served us well, but its gearing was not ideal for conditions, and had begun to look a bit small in proportion to her rapidly growing limbs.
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| Soaked but smiling after the first epic ride of camp. |
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| She was particularly proud of how muddy her legs were. |
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| I sewed a tiny framepack to help with the load. |
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| The Myka will need a larger framepack. |
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| Friend to amphibians. |
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| Skipping rocks is an important skill to master. |
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| The Cateye logged 56 miles of trail over five days. She said she could have gone a lot farther. |
After she figured out that the bigger bike could do things that her old bike couldn't, it was an instant hit. It didn't hurt its popularity that
Lael also rides a
black Specialized bike. She was especially amazed at the ability of the Rockshox Recon to both smoothe the trail and improve control in a way the mostly ornamental RST fork on her Hotrock simply can't do. In all, she's faster and more confident on the Myka, though there is still much to learn.
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| Packing material shenanigans. |
