Mountain Biker Joy Rides on a $13,000 Carbon Road Bike

Pro­fes­sion­al cycling has cer­tain­ly seen bet­ter days. Last week, the Inter­na­tion­al Cycling Union for­mal­ly stripped Lance Arm­strong of his sev­en Tour de France titles. This came after Arm­strong refused to con­test an evi­dence-filled case pre­pared by the U.S. Anti-Dop­ing Agency, and after Arm­strong’s for­mer team­mates start­ed con­fess­ing to dop­ing one by one. (On that note, Tyler Hamil­ton, once a domes­tique for Lance, gave a rather reveal­ing radio inter­view this week, along with Daniel Coyle. Togeth­er they co-wrote a new book, The Secret Race: Inside the Hid­den World of the Tour de France: Dop­ing, Cov­er-ups, and Win­ning at All Costs.) Any­way, this is all a long way of say­ing that cycling fans could use some­thing to smile about. And maybe this fits the bill: Above, we have Mar­tyn Ash­ton, a well-known moun­tain bik­er, tak­ing a $13,000 Pinarel­lo Dog­ma 2 out for a very casu­al rad­i­cal spin. Enjoy.