I’m taking a break from self loathing over not being at the Stone King Rally, a completely bizarre and self imposed scenario that I’ve somehow managed to repeat twice now, to not only come out of another blogging deep freeze hibernation, but also recognise that we’ve hit a bit of a milestone…
I can still recall the day on the Trans Provence Tour when Das Wolf finally stumbled upon the name of this ranting endeavour. The trigger for such musings had been the daily digestion of the precursor to this site; the Dirty newsletter. Yes, horror of all horrors, before the Blog there was the e mail version.
As you might imagine, given it had a limited audience, it’s content was of a nature which in today’s terms, a decade on, would lead to my instant cancellation from society faster than having a wank in a Teams meeting with HR and not realising your camera was actually on as you attempted to power through a niche fantasy moment in the work day.
As we sat around post another life redefining day in the Maritime Alps on the OG Trans Provence experience in June 2013, the conversation turned to the inevitable conclusion during that time in history, aptly summed up by Herr Doktor as “Fuck cunt, you should do a website“
As we wrecked another French 2 star accom establishment with fucked cycling kit and Dok’s signature toilet depth charge, the name was the sticking point… It had to encompass the natural bias towards avoidance of anything mainstream, so to speak, whilst also incorporating both the Nomad bike aspect and a new found fever for wanting to ram it into a bike bag and explore new zones. Finally after a plethora of shit ideas, Das Wolf muttered the moniker which felt like it fitted like a custom made cock ring.
A month later, powered by the creative savant that is the Hawk, who was more than willing to unleash his design bukkake on my eager face, and we crawled out of the poorly wiped ass of the Internet and into the web wilderness… First stop: Whistler!
733 posts later and here we are – A grubby 10 year old who is still sticking it’s virtual fingers where it’s not supposed to. And oddly, 10 years on I may have moved from the classic lime green Nomad 2 to a glorious gypsum Nomad 6, but the volume of riding appears to have dropped by more than half since those peak Dirty days…
Yes, this decade anniversary comes at a time that is radically different from the very first Dirty dispatch on 1 July 2013, back in a time when 26 was still alive and well, yet to meet it’s murderer. Things have come full circle, and instead of being unplugged and as free as a singlet wearing Whistler shred beast, I’m deeply plugged back in the matrix and taking the daily baseball bat of hypocrisy to the face as I ponder not only how I ended up here, but more importantly how to get back out.
Having said that – Fucken hell, what a decade its been… riding in places I never thought I’d ride, racing in races I never considered would be on the menu and getting to roll with some of the best GC’s you could ever hope to turn a crank with or shred a hill behind. I’m mildly loathe to over gush it here, that’s the sort of behaviour best left to the back of the Rodfather’s van, but it has been a pretty fucking amazing 10 years considering none of it was either remotely on my radar or by design when I first started posting. Definitely didn’t think I would have ridden in the middle east for example…
I’d attempted to list a lot of it out here… Or capture some highlights or “best” moments, but on reflection that would miss the point. Ultimately it’s about the whole thing, even the ultra shit parts, which unsurprisingly many of you loved the most (The Nydia Bay Massacre a crowd favourite) rather than trying to attempt to cherry pick parts of it. Every single mission, story and GC that paved the last decade added a unique part to the story.
I’d also planned on coming up with something semi inspiring for this decade of dirtiness post, but a combo of white collar fatigue mixed with first world problems and then smothered with an ever growing disdain for on-line content all combined to shank any such plans. Instead, here’s a low velocity drizzle out the filthy tip thinking about the last 10 years of blogging and having you rad cunts as an audience giving it the time of day.
Authenticity remains essential – We’re battling (in relative terms) in a world where most of the people you work with are a LinkedIn AI Bot committing buzzword bukkake all over you on a regular basis, while you squirm at the eyeballing stabbing disparity between what people think and say they are virtually, versus the real world product we must endure and work around. Don’t surrender to the Faux fuckbaggery. Yes, this is a long winded way of saying keep it real.
I give less of a fuck – I genuinely used to care about someones sock length, or their tire combinations, or their bar width… Fast forward over those 733 posts and in a sure sign of what must be the ageing process kicking in, I appear to no longer really give a fuck what anyone else is doing. Unless its The Creator going on holiday without me, that burns deep, even if it’s self inflicted (I see you falling asleep during the safety briefing muthafucka).
Mountains are the best – Doesn’t need much additional fluffing this point, and I will try to avoid the cliche of them calling and you answering, but a look back as I trawled the 8,000 images I’ve uploaded to the site served as a good reminder that being deep in the Mon-tons is hard to top.
Our phones are still evil – He says as he’s unable to put his one down… I only say this as I know they’re the gateway drug for our future AI overlords to control us, but I think the recipe to greater contentment still lies in less phone and more singletrack, assuming you don’t have to stop every 100m to take a photo of said trails to post it relentless to an audience who doesn’t care as they doom scroll past it.
‘Tuteata’ and rebuilt ‘Zoot’ remain some of the most fun things you can do on a bike – Random comment this one right? I guess put another way, when I’m having my brains eaten by a zombie horde of middle managers, and I’m day dreaming of the sweet release of feeling a VPP suspension system floating underneath me as I get as close to cycling perfection as I could ever hope to manage, then invariably I think of these two trails for some reason. Probably more a reflection of Queenstown and Rotorua more broadly, but the fun factor of these trails in particular sticks in my mind. Bonus points for Mens DH in Finale, putting together a run that resembles being comparatively composed high on the achievement list. Regardless, I’ve been fortunate enough to ride so much insanely good trail over the last 10 years my only regret is not being able to remember it all.
Bikes are only as good as the people you ride them with – Let me beat this concept piñata one more time, but if I’ve been reminded of one thing over the last 10 years, it’s that bikes may be the core ingredients, but it’s the crew that cooks it into some delicious and memorable. Most of my rides are solo these days, due both to the tyranny of time and geography, so the below images make me appreciate these characters, and many more than what’s represented here, even more… Here’s to another decade of more of this, just with a more weathered look, probably more batteries and less KOM’s:
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