Back in The Game!
Posted on 17. Nov, 2009 by Jordan in Nicole
Nicole Duke of The Gear Movement Pro Team - hitting the barriers
Here I am, and I find myself back in the game. The racing game that is. After taking some time off to have my second child Canin , I am energized, recovered and ready to hang with my girls on the cross course.
My career started back in 1995 as a Professional Downhill and Dual Slalom racer. I raced for teams such as Giant, Mongoose, Intense, and others. In 2000 I decided to retire as I was broken and tired from all the expected downhill racer crashes. For years I didn’t ride—burnt out!! I started a new career as a hairstylist and eventually met my husband Ben. Then came Ryder our first child—the wild thing. I found myself missing the chase, the race, and time with the girls. In 2007 I decided to give cyclocross a try.
My first race was on the only bike I had, a hard tail mountain bike. I really had no idea what to expect and to my surprise I finished 3rd in the Womens’ Open field. All right, game on. I headed to Boulder Cycle Sport to talk with my friend Brandon Dwight. I knew he had been doing this for years and could show me the way. He hooked me up with a bike, jersey and I found myself now racing for their local team.
A sand pit - Nicole Duke on her way to a sweet 5th place finish in the Woman' Pro Race
The season went well and I was making friends fast and racing well. My only problem was I never watched the lap counter. Yes, I was passed several times at the line and left wondering. My lesson for the season, yes I know its obvious, but I wasn’t used to racing on a lap count. Racing DH, it was always the fastest one to the bottom.
Excited now and ready to get serious for the next season I started talking to a few local teams about sponsorship. I had decided to go with Mafia racing, ready to represent. I mean they were sponsored by PBR, they had to be fun. Two weeks later, we learned baby Canin was on her way. Racing had to wait.
Canin was born on October 30th 2008 and I wasn’t sure I would be able to race again. Two kids, a part time job, and not a lot of free time wasn’t conducive to training or racing. I approached the next summer with no expectations of racing and wanted to ride just enough to keep up with my friends. My friends are mostly professional athletes, I had to try pretty hard!
Now, I find myself racing the 2009 Cross season for our new company The Gear Movement and I’m giving it another go. No expectations, I entered the first race and much to my surprise finished 5th. Every race I have gotten stronger and cross-race wiser. I’m now consistently finishing 3rd and sometimes find myself hanging with the likes of World Champion Allison Dunlap and National Champion Allison Powers. Every weekend the family (thanks to the hubbie) looks forward to cowbells, bouncy castles, kids races and sticky mud. A retired racers’ family dream. I’ve found a way to integrate family with racing. My son now “cyclocrosses” his bike over every curb, I am so proud!
Nationals are in my sights. Sounds like fun and I could use a little girlfriend time away from laundry, diapers and screaming kids. Cyclocross, I’ve discovered is actually 45mins of painful freedom!
Mud Time!
The new location
Posted on 10. Jun, 2009 by Jordan in Ben, Jordan, The Gear Movers
The new space at - roll up warehouse door - pre tuneup
We don’t want to jinx anything before it has happened but we wanted to let all of our fans and current clientele know that we might be moving out of the cramped basement soon!
Duke and myself just did our first tour of commercial and industrial retail locations around Boulder. For any of you who have never done this, even if you don’t have a business that needs a new location, I would recommend setting out on one of these trips with a realtor. Try not to tell them off the bat that you are not really looking for a space!
Hanging bike racks from the rafters - Ben, and Mike Dunn
We met with Kimberly Baldwin on Lee Hill Dr. looking at a place in the Holiday part of town. There are some pretty cool buildings over there, but the floor plans are quite limited. We next traveled down to a spot over on Old Pearl Pkwy between 47th and 49th. This location was super cool with huge ceilings, a bathroom and tons of space, but the location is just a little off. Any of you who have ridden the bike path around this area can attest to that…
Painting with Ryder Duke - he was awesome!
Next was off to a location on Walnut at 4745. The building is a three-unit space with the back unit being the old shipping dept of some former business. This place seemed to be a perfect fit for our biz! The property comes chalk full of bonuses – the old Boulder rail sign on the railroad behind the back of the property, a loading dock, basketball hoop, ample area for a grill, table and chairs, and premium location just off the bike path!
Our final stop on the day was a building adjacent to Graham Watson’s studio on Central Pkwy just off of 55th. Great location but the building just wasn’t right for our purposes, too many sectioned off offices and too little warehousing space. Hopefully we will be able to have some negotiations with the owners at 4745 Walnut and sooner than later we can sign a lease and move into the spot, wish us luck!
Nearing the end - painting the floor, phew bad, bad fumes!
Starting a new Business in an “upside down” economy.
Posted on 17. May, 2009 by Jordan in Ben, Jordan, The Gear Movers
The beginning of it all. The motherload from a great shop in CO
So when Ben and myself started to devise a plan to do an upstart new business in the early months of ’09, we obviously decided to put our knowledge of current affairs, the economy and our business degree to great use, hint the sarcasm.
Believe it or not, this is almost the perfect economic climate to create a new venture devoted to helping people “Move Their Gear.” We created a company where individuals, pro teams, pro athletes, independent reps, industry insiders, and independent retailers can sell their unused, used and even abused gear to the masses through eBay. With a slow economy and the lack of time everyone now has on their hands having to fill in spare small jobs on their calendars to make ends meet – enter The Gear Movement.
Pack it all in! A 22ft box truck full to the brim, ohhh yeahh!!
What we didn’t anticipate was the steady and increasing amount of growth we have seen in just a few months of business. Although the business is still run out of my increasingly cramped house in NoBoCo we are feeling the effects of the growth pretty steadily. Numbers are jumping and new clients are coming though the doors, a few days ago this meant a new phone plan (new iphones) for Duke and myself. Apparently Duke had been using the “free with plan” phone for about 3 years, finally we hooked him up!
The one and only - Mr. Ben Duke, uhh hows the mocha?
Another cool thing about owning our own business is that Duke and myself have been able to make our own hours and be responsible only to our selves, well actually Ben has a few other mouths to feed, but for the most part…
Heres to more bike rides and working towards what we call, “something cool!”
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