All right, welcome to another episode of the Pink Bike podcast.

Today we have special guest, Jesse Melamid,

local Squamish Enduro World Enduro Racer.

Jesse, you announced some semi-retirement plans,

but before we get into what's in the future,

we definitely want to talk about the past season and sort of any like experience and fun time, some favorite moments of the year, as well as the results.

Some segues into the downhill look into that world as well. I really want to hear about that.

And I guess we should also state,

you're just coming off of an injury too. So yeah, lots of chat about. Let's start with the injury

then. You walked in without crutches. I was also recovering from knee surgery. So both of us are

free of those sticks. How's the foot feeling? Yeah, not bad. It's actually come a long way in the last week, I would say. It was very slow going. It's an injury that I kind of hoped I would never have. I mean, there's a lot of injuries. You don't want any injury, but I've just always hurt. I think growing up skiing, like hurting your heel, I just, there's no getting around how long it takes. And as soon as I did it, that's all I went through my mind. I was like, shit, heels are bad. It doesn't matter if you break it or bruise it. That's the thing. It's like, the force that I put through the heel and the pain that I had, like, I had a buddy there. And he was like, I've never seen you in so much pain like I was just like

riding on the ground I was like oh this is not good and then I went and got x-rays I was in salt lake city well I was in Moab actually doing it and yeah so tell us what happened like we're you were on an XC like yeah I was just down there I was down there for a shoot and then stayed my buddy lives in Salt Lake City and I wanted

to take him to Moab because I grew up going to Moab with my family every spring for like 12

or 13 years or something so it's like a pretty special place for me and I've always loved

it and haven't been back and I think it's almost like 12 years which is crazy.

Okay.

And so we went back with XE bikes because he just had an XE bike. And it was like the last day, the last descent. Classic. We were just like, XE bikes are nice because you're not like doing anything. I wasn't like doing anything crazy. We're just riding down. And I guess something that we don't have here as much or like, you know, not riding jumps as much is I don't, I don't really, like, think about the wind ever.

Oh, yeah. And so we're just on the, on kind of a big mesa. And I guess I'd notice the wind earlier, but not just standing, just going down, whatever, like hit this little side hit. I was like, sick, jump, did it. And then I went in the air, and my bike just blew right from underneath me. and I was like, oh shit.

So put my heel out and it was just like straight leg heel, XC shoes, rock. Just, I just stopped dead. Like it was such a hard impact. Yeah, the wind is real in the desert. Yeah, it's crazy. Like wheels on an XC bike. So yeah, no sleep in that one. And that's the thing too. it's like all these things that I just have not ever calibrated for. So kind of like just very much JRA.

Like I said, I wasn in that one. That's the thing too. It's like all these things that I just have not ever calibrated for.

So kind of like just very much JRA. Like I said, I wasn't doing anything crazy. And it's been a long time since I've had an injury so out of nowhere. Like I wasn't doing anything. I wasn't doing a feature. I wasn't racing. I was just riding. Yeah. So it just kind of sucks. He's like, wow, I wish that didn't happen.

Yeah, well, that's a bummer.

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