Mark your calendars Folks!

There are some great events going on this summer, and you won’t want to miss out!

June 8th – Adam’s Gulch Fun Run : Sign up at the perch —- Adam’s Gulch Fun Run Registration Form

June 23rd – The All New Bike Tour Ronde Van Ketchum —- Tour Ronde Van Ketchum Registration Form

July 1st – YMCA Half Marathon Run

July 20th – Backcountry Run —- Backcountry Run Registration Form

August 25th – Shop to the top —- Shop to the Top Registration Form

You can also sign up with active.com, send in your forms, or stop in the shop!

We can’t wait to see you out there!

The post Upcoming Events! appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

The post Backcountry Run 2013 – appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

pictured: Prana Crissy Jacket $110 — Moving comfort urban gym capri $60

The post Find Your Zen… appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

 Club Ride offers cycling clothing that is both practical on and off the trails. Go out, have a great ride, then head straight to you local watering hole. No changing necessary!

With two collections… The Sun Valley, cycling apparel for all day riding on the trails and The Sub 5, urban apparel designed for days of cruising around town… Club Ride will surely have bike apparel for your every need. It’s a staff favorite here at the Elephant’s Perch!

Pictured:  Bandara jersey $89.99& the Freedom short in denim $79.99

The post Club Ride: Support this awesome local company! appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

Want to hit the trails? Check out the newly updated Sportiva Ultra Raptor. With an ultra sticky rubber outsole, breathable mesh uppers and forefoot rack guard this shoe is sure to give you comfort all day.

Do you like Salomon shoes? We sure do, and with the new XR Mission and Speedcross there is surely a Salomon shoe for you!

Minimalist runner? The 2013 new balance minimus 10V2 features a new Vibram outsole  and a material overhaul along with a natural four millimeter drop, it’s like barefoot, only better!

We have a lot more options for both men and women. Our trained staff can help fit any foot and accomodate just about any shoe or foot issues you may have. We take pride in fitting you into the right shoe to get you running on the roads or the trails!

The post From Minimalist to Trail… New shoes for spring! appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

For more information, pricing and registration see the link below.

Sun Valley Half Marathon 2012

The post Sun Valley Half Marathon 2013 appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

This summer, Durance and The Elephant’s Perch invite you to participate in a fun and unusual cycling event.  Via an ingeniously circuitous route stitched together by Richard Feldman, the Ronde Van Ketchum will take you over every hill of any size in the North Valley.  Beginning at Durance, 131 Second Street, at 9am on June 23rd, we’ll roll over nearly every street in west Ketchum, up and over Phantom hill, back toward town and out Trail Creek to the end of the pavement, up nearly every road in the Sun Valley and Elkhorn area, and finish at The Elephant’s Perch.  By the end of the day we will have traveled more than 130 kilometers and pedaled up some 1300 meters worth of hills.  Some of the hills are silly and short, and some of them are long grinds of as much as 1.6 kilometers.  Food and drink in the front yard at The Perch will follow.

This is a non-competitive ride.  You can ride all or part of the course and still come to the party afterward.  Because the ride is organized into a succession of loops (a Warm Springs Loop, North of Town Loop, Trail Creek Loop, and an Elkhorn Loop), you can skip a loop and rejoin the group if you choose.  We just ask that you ride the loops in order to avoid confusing other participants.  We will stay together for the initial roll out and then various groups will naturally form.

Even though this is not a race, it is a formal event and we need you to pre-register at The Perch or Durance.  The entry is only $10 and you’ll get a water bottle for your effort as well as food and drink after the ride.  Sorry, there will be no registration on event day.

UPDATE 4/29 THE DATE FOR THE RIDE IS JUNE 23. SOME POSTS AND FLYERS INCORRECTLY LISTED THE 26TH.

UPDATE 4/30 CLICK HERE FOR A GRAPHIC OF THE ROUTE AND HERE FOR A GRAPH OF THE ELEVATION

CLICK HERE FOR A  REGISTRATION FORM!

[map style="width: auto; height:300px; margin:20px 0px 20px 0px; border: 1px solid black;" maptype="TERRAIN" gpx="http://elephantsperch.com/wp-content/uploads/activity_305466675 (9).gpx"]

The post Ronde Van Ketchum appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

The post Ibis Ripley 29 Video appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

       Backcountry skiing

Backcountry skiing

The post Backcountry Skiing appeared first on The Elephants Perch.

The Ibis Ripley 29

   (click on the picture for more info)

DETAILS (from Ibis site):

ECCENTRICS

The heart of the Ripley is its dual-eccentric dw-link suspension. Instead of using external linkages like we do on our longer travel bikes, we were able to construct the Ripley with two small eccentrics, hidden inside the seat tube, which act as the suspension linkages. This clever system was conceived by Dave Weagle (he’s the dw in dw-link) in 2005, and we started development of the system in 2007. Since then, we have been building, testing refining, racing and simplifying the eccentric system. We had been developing a system with angular contact bushings, and at the same time we were developing a more traditional bearing version. In the end, the traditional bearing system was chosen for production for a variety of reasons.
The system that we finalized has fewer parts and uses readily available bearings. Along the way we kept reminding ourselves about one of our favorite quotes:
“Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.”
― Albert Einstein
We feel that we succeeded.
There are many benefits to an eccentric linkage system. Because the bearings are located inside the seat tube, they are shielded from wheel spray and contamination. The look is very clean, as everything is hidden inside the frame. Additionally, the eccentric system is lighter than our external linkage systems.
A great benefit, particularly on the 29” platform is that the eccentrics let us build the bike with shorter chainstays, giving more room in the tight area around the rear tire and front derailleur.
Though the linkages are small and close together, the eccentrics allowed us to make a right side upright between the front of the chain and seat stay, resulting in added stiffness, critical for the larger loads of the big wheels. Not only that but we could mount the front derailleur to it so that it would move with the swingarm. This meant the chainstay didn’t have to be dropped to provide front derailleur clearance at bottom out. This is particularly important with the smaller gears that 29er’s typically use because you don’t want the chain dragging on the bottom of the chainstay.
All in all, the eccentrics were a huge challenge that resulted in many nice benefits. Here’s an exploded view.

ECCENTRIC BEARINGS

The main bearings are shielded from contamination and are hidden in the frame and behind hardware designed to protect them from the elements. The load ratings on the main bearings are higher than those used on the Mojo HD, a bike which has proved to be durable in the field, so we expect a long service life. Our real-world testing in Santa Cruz, combined with Brian Lopes and Evan Plews putting in tons of hard miles on the system over the last year and a half has given us confidence that it works well in all conditions. Well, at least all conditions you’re likely to find here on earth.
The bearings we spec are black oxide (to resist corrosion but maintain the high load rating of steel), full complement (there is no retainer so they have extra balls and a higher load rating), 100% fill (completely filled with grease means less room for moisture), and the seals are contact seals. The seals actually contact the groove on the race. This specification would not be ideal for a part like a hub where the friction needs to be as low as possible, but in a suspension application where the forces are high and the small amount of seal drag is acceptable, it provides better sealing of the bearing without any noticeable change to the suspension.
The bearings in the frame are standard BB30 bearings, which can be found in just about any decent bike shop on the planet. The bearings in the swingarm are identical to very common skateboard and rollerblade wheel bearings, so all you need to do is put on your hoody and head to the closest skate shop where you’ll be able to find the bearings.
We are going to stock the bearings in our online store should you need to replace them. Additionally, we will have a special bearing press tool for installation of the bearings in both the frame and swingarm. We will also have a bearing extraction tool available. You can remove and reinstall the bearings without these tools, but we highly recommend using our tools, it will make your life a lot easier, and you’ll have a lower probability of messing something up. The bearing press tool isn’t done yet, but here’s a Chris McNally artist’s rendition of what it will look like.

GEARING

The suspension kinematics that we asked Dave Weagle to create for the Ripley are optimized for a 32-34 tooth chainring. The Ripley has a high amount of anti squat for a very responsive feel, even sprinting out of the saddle. Although the suspension works best in the 32-34T range, it is fine with the larger sizes found on many triples and doubles.
We are shipping all of our kits except SLX with a 34 – 24 e-thirteen 2X crank, which gives excellent pedaling performance and a gearing range appropriate for the large wheels. Even on a fast downhill fire road, it’s difficult to spin out the 34 t on the Ripley.
We feel we built a better bike by designing the suspension to work best with the smaller chainring sizes that 29” wheels enable. This was unique at the time we made the decision, but has become more widespread over the time we’ve spent in development.

GEOMETRY

We’ve owned, ridden and tested a lot of 29ers over the last few years. Some of them we liked, some of them we really disliked. We found that geometry was all over the map with the different bikes and that none of them delivered the snappy handling we all love with our current bikes. So we set out to make them fun to ride, as similar to our current bikes as we could.
During the development process we made frames with different headtube angles and used forks with different rakes. Our testers unanimously and independently agreed on the geometry we finalized and are now using. You can read more about this process in the story section, one tab to the right.
The eccentrics allowed us to tighten up the rear end, making it shorter than a lot of comparable bikes.
A swingarm mounted derailleur allowed us to build a stiffer rear end of the bike.
The new short taper forks allowed us to keep the headtubes short, lowering the often too-high position of the bars. We even developed two sets of extremely strong carbon bars for the bike, a flat bar with a very generous 740mm width and a slight riser bar at the same width. They’re called Hi-Fi and Low-Fi. As in Fi-Bar. or Carbon Fi-Bar if you please. The X0, XT and XTR Ripley kits come standard with these bars (it’s a $70 upcharge in the SLX and X9 kits).
We designed the Ripley to work with either a 120mm or 140mm fork. We offer a 140mm Fox 34 stanchion fork as an option. If you tend to ride the rockier terrain, you might want to consider this. Substituting the 140 fork puts the head angle at 68.5º.
People who have ridden the Ripley describe it as stiff, snappy, nimble, light and plush. Those words are music to our ears because that is exactly what we were trying to accomplish.

MOLDING TECHNOLOGY

The Ripley 29 uses similar molding technology to the Mojo SL-R. We start by molding a sacrificial mandrel in exactly the shape that we want the inside of the frame to be. That becomes the 3D template for the bladder that holds all the carbon preform before it’s laid into the mold. This allows the lay-up to be done in one piece, with no joints anywhere. The result is a more precise lay-up that eliminates the need for additional foam or filler to mold the complex shapes. What that means for you is a lighter and stronger frame, critical factors in hitting our targets for weight and stiffness.
Another new technology we are introducing in the Ripley is found in the clevis and the swingarm uprights. We are using very lightweight syntactic foam glass microsphere cores in these locations. They add strength and rigidity at a very low weight in areas where you can’t remove the core from the hollow carbon parts. The new micro balloon cores are roughly half the weight of typical foam cores.

HEADSET

We like the tapered headset found on the Mojo HD and Mojo SL-R, so we’re using it on the Ripley 29 as well. It helps build a bike that is light and very stiff. The 1.5″ lower portion of the steerer provides an exceptionally rigid front-end platform. Combined with the through-axle fork, you’ll be amazed at the precision steering feedback you get, particularly when pushing hard.
You may use several different Cane Creek headsets or the Chris King InSet 3 headset.

TWO BOTTLES

We’ve made a provision on the Ripley 29 for 2 water bottles, one inside the triangle and one below the down tube. It’s best to use a side-loading cage if using a large bottle inside the triangle, such as this one from Arundel.

CABLE ROUTING

Internal cable routing is provided for derailleurs through the top tube, and for brakes and a dropper along side the top tube. It’s a super clean, quiet, no-fuss system.

HIGH DIRECT FRONT DERAILLEUR

The swingarm mounted front derailleur is always in the right place in relation to the chain and chainrings so front shifting is more consistent throughout the travel.
This mounting system provides increased compatibility with 2 x 10 drivetrains and less chain slap since the chainstay can be located further from the chain. Also since the derailleur is moving with the chain there will be no chain rub at the extreme ends of the travel, particularly problematic with lower chainstay bikes and the smaller chainrings found on many 29ers.

SINGLE RINGS AND CHAIN GUIDES

If you want to run a 1X system, we’ve got great news. SRAM XX1 is fully compatible with the Ripley. The Ripley builds up around 23 pounds with an XX1 group. We’ve tried it and we like it.
If Shimano is more your style, you have a good solution there. Shimano began shipping a new style rear derailleur call the Shadow Plus In June 2011. It uses heavier chain tension plus a friction stabilizer to dampen the cage and thus chain movement (dramatically reducing chain slap). It also reduces derailing of chains. Combined with either an e*thirteen XCX-ST D-Type or an MRP 1X, the Shadow Plus virtually eliminates the need for the lower half of your chain guide, plus makes your bike nearly silent. The Ripley comes with an outer bash ring on the e thirteen crank (all groups except SLX).

142 X 12MM MAXLE

The 142mm Maxle rear through axle provides gobs of extra rear wheel stiffness in an extremely lightweight package, and compatibility across most wheelsets.

BOTTOM BRACKET

The bottom bracket is the new press fit integrated style called the BB92, also known as PressGXP. Once again, it provides you with a lighter, stiffer bike, and is compatible with most popular cranksets.

The post Ibis Ripley 29 appeared first on The Elephants Perch.