Category: Yakima

Getting good doesn’t just happen. Winning takes work. A whole lot of work.

Cyclist Brianna Walle, introduced here, has the skinny. Check it out.

What is your typical training schedule?
The road racing season runs February through August. At the peak of my training, I’m commuting to work 3-4 days a week and going for a long ride on the weekends. If I’m racing on the weekend, I reduce my miles in preparation for the event. The average miles range from 100-300 miles/week depending on the week and the event I’m training for.

Training in the wet, cold winter months in Oregon must be rough. How do you do it?
Great question! It can be really daunting to train in the cold and wet months. The secret? Take more friends! I usually ride with a group of friends once every two weeks for about 60-100 miles during this time of year.

We’re fully equipped with rain gear and good food and to keep it fun, and we often bring a bag with speakers and an iPod to blast our favorite tunes as we ride along.

Don’t worry, we take turns carrying the bag.

How do you train in the off-season?
September really is my “rest month.” That means two full weeks to totally chill out and hang out with friends I haven’t seen in MONTHS. There are parties, dancing, and other non-biking activities. In between I’m still commuting to work 3-4 days a week.

Once October hits, I’m out trail running, racing some cyclocross and mountain biking in southern Oregon. I’ll also throw in some weight training.

Come November, I begin three months of training for the next season!

Got a truck? You’re in luck. Yakima has three brand new products just for you. The BedRock, a new truck bed rack system, uses a no-drill clamp mounting system. It will fit on any size bed, is compatible with all Yakima accessories and leaves room for storage once the bikes are mounted. The BikerBar, a removable truck bike mount, comes with all you need to transport two bikes. Available in two models tailored to mid- or full-size trucks. Finally, the CrashPad, a foam and nylon pad that conforms to your tailgate, lets you transport bikes over the tailgate scratch-free. Simple, but genius. For how long this transportation trend has been around, I’m surprised the Crashpad is just hitting shelves now.

If you missed the Off The Map series this summer you need to check out the whole series! But if you saw the first four episodes check out the final episode:

Episode No. 5 in GearJunkie.com’s “Off The Map” video series, sponsored by Yakima, they gear up and head into the woods for an endurance event. Watch as Team GearJunkie/WEDALI bikes, paddles, treks, and navigates its way through 100+ miles of northern Wisconsin’s deep forested terrain on the annual “Stubborn Mule” 30-Hour Adventure Race. —Stephen Regenold

In Utah last month more than 1,000 brands and tens of thousands of attendees gathered for the twice-annual Outdoor Retailer trade show in Salt Lake City. GearJunkie editors and reporters met with a large percentage of the represented brands to seek out “Best in Show” products, the most innovative and unique items put out by the industry this year. Take a look below. We’ve crowned these products, most of which will hit shelves in 2013, as winners for part I of our “Best in Show” coverage. Congrats to the brands and the designers behind this great new gear!

Rack Art — Whispbar, a new line from Yakima, offers high-end aerodynamic rack bars

and mounts that seem to scream the words “premium and sleek.” From the Whispbar

line, which includes multiple products ranging from crossbars to ski racks, a bike

mount, the WB200, stood out.

The fork mount connects to a Whispbar rack bar in seconds via adapters that cam into

a T-slot on the bar. Its tray is a solid swoop of aluminum, and the front adapter is so

refined it looks like sculpture art. A bonus, this bike mount works with standard 9mm

forks as well as 15mm through-axle forks without adapters. A premium car-top

accessory but with a premium price tag, too. $249.

Learn about all the ways Yakima can help you take more friends.

If you are in Salt Lake City today for Outdoor Retailer stop by the Yakima Booth (#35071) this afternoon for the Yakima Garage Party!

As you head out on the great outdoors this summer take more friends with you! Yakima can help you get what you need to allow you to reclaim your car and take more friends.

Check out Yakima’s all new website!

Pick up a copy of Mountain Flyer for a great review of the Hold-Up from Yakima, a hitch mounted tray style bike rack.

Yakima – HoldUp 2

With so many different types of bikes (and front axle configurations) on the market, it’s increasingly difficult to find a rack that can accommodate them all, and more and more, I’m finding receiver hitch racks to be preferable over roof systems for the day loading convenience and versatility.

Yakima’s HoldUp 2 is a hitch rack that makes transporting bikes easy. With the HoldUp 2’s simple two bike tray design, a bike is easily set in the adjustable wheel tray as an extendable arm is tightened over the front wheel of the bike. The rear wheel is then strapped in place, and you are off to the trailhead. An optional two-bike extension increases rack capacity to four bikes but doubles the rack’s length. A separate cable lock is included to keep bikes secure for short periods of time.

Built from steel, the HoldUp 2 is a solid (and very heavy) piece of equipment. Its stout design makes it trustworthy: the bikes are securely fastened to the rack and, another benefit of a hitch rack, kept out of harm’s way for those who occasionally pull into garages and forget that a bike is on the roof. When not in use, the HoldUp 2 tilts upward, and the trays and arm fold into themselves to minimize the width of the rack.

Traveling with bikes can always turn into a bit of a headache without the right rack system, and if your ride time is suffering due to bike hauling problems, the HoldUp 2 will get you on the trail in a snap.

–J. Carr

For more from Mountain Flyer

For more on the Yakima HoldUp

Pull-Behind Gear: Trailer offers ‘Massive Capacity’

By GearJunkie’s Stephen Regenold.

We had four grown men and a stationwagon. We had mountain bikes, backpacks, paddles, life jackets, shoes, and all the food and extra gear required of a weekend away.

We had 200 miles to drive. Fortunately, we also had a trailer.

The RackandRoll trailer from Yakima, a unique gear-hauling creature, offers massive capacity for bikes, boats, and other bulky gear.

Two wheels, an aluminum chassis, and a trailer tongue comprise the skeletal system. Yakima includes a set of its rack-mounting bars, which affix on the trailer to create a blank slate of a platform for attaching carriers of all sorts.

Our trailer, a loaner from a local Yakima sales rep, came ready to go with four bike mounts and a large gear box in the middle. We rolled our mountain bikes onto the trailer and cinched them on for the ride.

When empty, the RackandRoll weighs about 160 pounds — light for a trailer. My immediate concern was with bumps and high speeds on backcountry roads. If we hit a rut would the trailer bounce or go airborne with our bikes and gear taking a jarring hit?

Happy to say that did not happen. Yakima includes independently adjustable suspension on each wheel with about 4 inches of travel. The company uses motorcycle shocks that offer “about twice” the cushion of what’s used on standard trailers, Yakima cites.

On our drive, a four-hour journey to an adventure race, more than once I winced when we hit a bump. But looking in the rearview mirror I could see the trailer sucking up the bump and keeping our bikes stable at high speed.

You can haul up to 300 pounds of gear with one configuration of the RackandRoll trailer. It comes in two sizes and allows for the attachment of not only bike racks and gear boxes but boat mounts, ski racks, and most any other accessory that normally sits atop a car.

Convenience and extra gear capacity are the advantages. You can easily mount six bikes or multiple boats on the trailer.

But all the capacity will cost you. Starting at $2,149, the Yakima trailers are a major investment. This price gives you the trailer and crossbars, but all mountable accessories are extra.

The trailer is about 6.5 feet wide and 11 feet long. It mounts to a vehicle hitch with a 1 7/8-inch tow ball and includes a standard electrical hookup for stop, turn, and running lights.

On our trip, the RackandRoll performed as advertised, tracking straight, rolling smooth, and hauling our equipment so seamlessly we often forgot it was there.

—Stephen Regenold is founder and editor of www.gearjunkie.com. Connect with Regenold atFacebook.com/TheGearJunkie or on Twitter via @TheGearJunkie.

For episode No. 4 in GearJunkie’s “Off The Map” video series, sponsored by Yakima, we travel to western Minnesota in search of some of the most obscure rock climbing on the continent. The episode, “Bouldering the Great Plains,” highlights the unlikely and rare rock — and the rare climbers who pursue it! — on a landscape dominated not by mountains but wheat fields, dirt roads, and old farms. Climb on!