Team nsmb 2008

 Mitch rocking it out at Qashqai in Milan.

The man has got talent and this portrayal of his commitment shows how he developed that talent. We look forward to seeing a whole lot more from Mitch as he pursues his career as a professional mountain biker.



 Mitch Chubey atop the podium at the Red Bull Round Up with teammate Curtis Robinson on the left and Graham Agassiz on the right.

One of the benefits of the AirPrentice contest is our exposure to young up and coming talent. Usually we are stuck having to choose only one new team member. Last season we had a roster spot open up when our talented team member Ryan Newman retired from the team to pursue his career in education. We knew AirPrentice runner-up Curtis Robinson would be the perfect fit for this spot. Curtis has many of the same characteristics of Newman: a love for big air, a bag full of tricks, sick racing skills and a friendly and fun disposition.

We welcomed Curtis, or Cutties for his styling cutty turns, to the team in August of last summer and he has been representing NSMB brilliantly. Curtis starred in a section he built for Kranked 7 with NSMB team videographer Dylan Dunkerton. He is currently following up with Bjorn Enga building and filming for Kranked 8 as well as building Jamie Goldman's Kranked 8 segment.

Curtis teamed up with Dylan and Kyle Jameson to make this most excellent instructional video. In addition, Curt raced up a storm placing 1st in Sr. Men with a first overall time at the Canada Cup DH final (beating all the pros) at Sun Peaks, two fourths at the Super D and 7th Secret Rippers, 6th with a dislocated shoulder at the Rat Race and a big 3rd place at the Châtel Mountain Slopestyle in France.

 Curtis spent much of 2008 in low orbit.  Scroll down for more on his season.

The 2006 AIRprentice runner-up, Ian Nelson, signed on with NSMB in 2007 in similar circumstances to Curtis's signing. Ian had a fantastic year as a rookie culminating in an awesome 10th place finish in the Crankworx Slopestyle.

 Ian Nelson storming to a tenth place finish at Crankworx 2007.

At this year's Crankworx Slopestyle Ian put together two solid runs gaining a 20th place finish  against the best pros in the world.


Ian has had another great season riding for NSMB, its sponsors and Transition Bikes, shooting stills and video, building new lines, learning new tricks, going to his girlfriend's high school parties, racing and riding every chance he got.

Our cagey veteran Jerry Willows has been doing his usual routine of building, filming, shooting stills, riding big gnarly lines as well as being one of Specialized's prestigious bike testers.


 Jerry gets new frames from Specialized before everyone else because he's on their R & D team.  Here's his new SX Trail.


 And here is Jerry's secret rock face that has been shot and filmed on numerous occasions

We were all quite impressed with Justin Wyper at this year's AIRprentice.


Wyper goes big with a whole lot of style, he's an outgoing personable guy who we look forward to working with. He had a great start to his NSMB season finishing 9th at the Claymore Challenge at Highland Mountain Bike Park.


Justin then headed to Crankworx Colorado where he impressed the judges and the crowd and came in 9th place.


 Moving on to Whistler for Crankworx Justin was on fire during the VW Best Trick Contest winning $500 and pumping the crowd up with his super flips off the Kokanee drop.

He was riding hot during his warmup and first run. Unfortunately he crashed hard, overshooting a 360 off the Giro box on his second run. He broke his tibia and fibula so badly the bone poked out of his pad and jeans. His first run was good enough to get 17th place. After surgery and a bunch of hardware in his bones he is recovering at home, planning a winter trip to Cam McCaul's place.


 Justin Wyper down and out at Crankworx.  He'll be back better than ever.  With a new pair of white girl jeans.

Our resident party boy, the shirtless wonder Eamonn Duignan spent a lot of the year finishing his teaching degree, hitting tropical vacation spots with his student loans, writing articles for NSMB and throwing himself down super steep high speed trails.  He's also spent some time coaching the Sutherland High School Mountain Bike Team - hopefully with his shirt on.


 Here's Eamonn on a shoot with stock photographer Daryl Leniuk. Look for him on the box of some sugary cereal soon.


 Here's Insanemon's Dennys card shot - riding down the infamous gutter box on GMG.

This year marked the retirement of our star Vancouver Island ripper Neil Meier. Neil won the AIRprentice 3 years ago and has been representing NSMB in videos, magazines, TV shows, coaching and riding. Unfortunately Neil has had four major injuries (two ruptured spleens, both knees and back). Because of this he knew it was time to step back a notch and he retired from the team. Neil will be missed and we wish him the best of luck as he continues his electrical apprenticeship.


 Neil styling the skatepark after his knee surgery healed.

I have had a fun year being team captain: helping manage the team, riding in Rippers, doing catalogue shoots, teaching biking to groms, building trail and riding a ton. In my opinion this has been the best year for the NSMB team ever.


 nsmb.com team captain Trevor Hansen in his happy place.


 Shooting with Jerry Willows for the 2009 Syncros Catalogue

It is an exceptional experience to be involved with such a fun and talented group of guys. Thanks for a great season boys. We could not have done it without the support of our team sponsors: Pete Roggeman and Marshall Cant at Syncros, Brent Armstrong at Dennys, Jeremy Schaab and Dean Butler at Toyota, Mark Fitzsimmons and Elayna Caldwell at Fox racing, Tyler Morland and John Dawson at Sram/Avid, Chico Bukovansky and Dave Bisset at Dakine, Rob McSkimming, Brian Finestone and Jeremy Roche at the Whistler Bike Park, David Weisenhoffer at Adidas, Graham Archer at Kintec Footlabs, Kevin Menard and Kyle Young at Transition and Nic Riddle, Brandon Sloan and Jason Chamberlain at Specialized.