When the ECR first made its debut, we referred to it as Something of a lovechild borne of our Krampus, Ogre and LHT. With the new updates to the ECR, we’re watching this baby lovechild grow up and take shape. The new ECR shares much of the same ability of our previous version with more know-how, agility and grin-inducing fun. This model is designed to carry you through the 6 hour ride you planned, and the extra 4 hours you didn’t.
In June, I stole away with the fam to Wyoming on a new 27.5 ECR. One week of dirt roads, 4-wheeler trail, not-so established campgrounds, swimming holes, mountains, moose and more snow than anticipated. Dotted line routing with only a rough idea of route and mileage. Enough food and appropriate clothing to handle whatever we’d encounter and enough experience to know that at some point this trip could turn into a bigger test of mental limits than physical ones. Some people have their beach vacations, ours are usually spent with wet socks and dirt under our nails.
The week consisted of an Eleven-hour Car Ride (… see what I did there?) and the following:
Easy Country Roads
Exploring Contour Ridges
Elevated Climbing… Relentlessly
Errored Course Routing
Exhausted Comedown. Redemption!
Erratic Cascading Rivers
When you’re unexpectedly post-holing through knee-deep snow atop a mountain and rain clouds are moving in, the last thing you want to be thinking about is if your bike is going to perform well on the way out. Is your gear still attached? Are your brakes still functional? Is your bike entirely waterlogged? None of that. Get over and down. Then put some sandals on, cause your shoes are probably going to be soaking wet.
As we’ve stated from the beginning, Wherever you want to explore, this is the bike that can get you there. Still true, maybe now more than ever. It’s the convincing yourself to turn home that’s the harder part.