2016: A Year to Remember

In order to get me motivated to do stuff, I often repeat to myself that I'm lazy, which works quite well to be honest. While I was gathering this year's achievements to put this post together, I coudn't help but be impressed by all that happened and all we've done during the last 365 days. I mean, we kept producing videos and all that jazz, but a lot of really amazing things happened aswell. The Homie Matt Macduff managed to realise a dream of his: build and ride a 40ft loop! As you probably know already, things didn't go exactly as planned and he ended up falling 40ft to flat. Thanks to a mix of toughness and luck, the fall only left him with a broken leg and completely destroyed wrist. After a fall like this, one could have easily called it quits on riding, but not Matt. This happened less than a year ago, and after a lot hard work to get his body in shape again, Matt is already riding again! This is one insane story well worth the read, so do yourself a favor and read on to see how a bunch of friends built a 40ft wooden loop with pretty much nothing: The Matt Macduff 40 ft. Loop Interview After years of riding, thinking, trying and improving, we finally released our own bicycle frame; The Partymaster! This is truly a dream come true for all of us, especially having the chance to work with all the great humans involved. The best part about it is that we stayed true to ourselves and made no compromise on quality. The Partymaster is Handmade in Canada by our friends at Altruiste Bikes, and the frames are beaufitul! More info: The Rise Partymaster Frame More Partymasters: Team Bikechecks in 2016, our awesome family grew even more awesome as we welcomed Nick Clarke and Ben Desjardins! Super stoked to have those 2 gangsters on board! Make sure to give another watch to their welcome videos: Nick Clarke - Welcome to The Rise Ben Desjardins - Welcome to The Rise With such a fun crew to shred with, it's hard to stay home and do nothing on the weekends. That's exactly why we do our best to ride as much as possible, and we somethimes happen to capture the action on Camera. Here are some of our best trip videos of 2016: Barcelona Days 4 The Rise at The Brose Jam The Rise Weekend Warriors Roadtrip The Rise at Highland MTB Park Nick Clarke's Backyard Party Unexpected Thursday 41 The Rise at Woodward Once again, we want to thank all of you for supporting what we do for all those years. Thanks to everyone involved in The Rise in any way and anyone that ever helped us out. Wether it's offering someone a couch to crash on, hooking us up with a free stay at the best park on earth or simply showing us around a new town, good people is good people and we truly appreciate all the help. And honestly, nothing has really changed for us; we just want to ride bikes, have fun, and inspire kids to do something fun with their lives. This being said, thanks again to all of you, and see y'all in 2017!