The first trick Christian Rigal ever learned on a BMX bike was a tree ride, at a Burger King in Moraga, California. Twenty five years later he rides mountain bikes for a living and, in his words, all he is doing is driving around looking for cool trees to ride his bike on.

Christian spent a decade as a pro BMX rider, earning X Games Real Street medals and filming video parts on both sides of the lens. Then Brandon Semenuk put him on a mountain bike and it changed the trajectory of his career. In this episode we get into what it means to carry a street rider's eye into the mountains, why he took a conscious step back from filming other people to focus on his own riding, and how he learned to stop measuring himself against friends who have been mountain biking their entire lives.

We also go deep on the trail he built on the Oregon coast near Pacific City. Thirty six days straight of building through the winter, roughly six of them spent hand placing moss and ferns so the trail would look like it belonged in the forest, and so the hillside would not wash out into it. Then we get into what happens after a project is done: why he insists on premieres and printed photos, why he gave away tires and pumps and helmets like it was Christmas, and why a video that only lives on Instagram never felt like enough to him.

Christian Rigal is a professional mountain biker and filmmaker who runs Rigal Visuals. He came up through BMX riding for United Bike Co, earning X Games Real Street medals (silver in 2017, bronze in 2018 and 2019) and appearing in video parts including Markit Zero. He moved to mountain bikes around 2018 and his films include Redemption, By The Homies, the Five Ten short Crossover, and Long Story Short for Specialized. He is supported by Specialized, Scott, Fox Racing, and Five Ten.

Follow Christian:

Instagram https://www.instagram.com/christianrigal/
Rigal Visuals https://www.instagram.com/rigalvisuals/

Outside Is Magic is a podcast about the intersection of creativity and the outdoors, hosted by Christopher San Agustin, founder of Broken and Coastal.

Website: https://www.brokenandcoastal.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brokenandcoastal/

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#OutsideIsMagic #ChristianRigal #MountainBiking #BMX #MTB #TrailBuilding #RigalVisuals #Filmmaking #PacificNorthwest #Podcast

outside is Magic is hosted by Christopher San Agustin.
Produced by Broken and Coastal.
Follow us on Instagram @brokenandcoastal
Help spread the magic. Hit follow, drop a review, or share the episode with someone who gets it. You never know who it might inspire.

Matt Quann spent his design career being asked to make the logo bigger. So when he started his own cycling brand, he took the logo off entirely. Thirteen years later, Ornot is still made in the USA, still small on purpose, and still one of the most quietly loved brands in cycling.

We go back to the early Grinduro days and trace the whole arc: the personal project that turned into a real company, teaching himself the business side one Google search at a time, why he chose Bay Area manufacturing when Asia was the easy route, and the two rules that carried him through thirteen years: I don't want this to be bigger than me, and I have this thing, I don't want to break it.

We also get into aging out of hands-on design and what saved him from it, how San Francisco shaped the brand, Tam Week punch cards, the floral jersey he refused to make, the logo-covered jersey he sold for less on purpose, and how to actually support small brands beyond buying their stuff.

Matt Quann is the founder and owner of Ornot, a San Francisco cycling apparel brand he started in 2013. A former bike racer and graphic designer, he built Ornot as the answer to billboard kit: minimally branded clothing, most of it made in the USA, designed around one question: is this something I want? Today Ornot is a team of eight or nine with its own storefront in San Francisco.

Follow Matt:

@mattqornot https://www.instagram.com/mattqornot/
@ornotbike https://www.instagram.com/ornotbike
Ornot https://www.ornotbike.com

Outside Is Magic is a podcast about the intersection of creativity and the outdoors, hosted by Christopher San Agustin, founder of Broken and Coastal.

Website: https://www.brokenandcoastal.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brokenandcoastal/

Subscribe for new episodes. If this one hit, share it with a friend.

#OutsideIsMagic #Ornot #Cycling #MadeInUSA #GraphicDesign #SmallBrand #BikeIndustry #Podcast

outside is Magic is hosted by Christopher San Agustin.
Produced by Broken and Coastal.
Follow us on Instagram @brokenandcoastal
Help spread the magic. Hit follow, drop a review, or share the episode with someone who gets it. You never know who it might inspire.

Spencer Kadas quit his data science job at 31 to be a ski bum for a year. No grand plan, just one question: will I regret not doing this? A year later he bought High Above, the Seattle company behind some of the most bombproof, USA-made mountain bike packs out there. He'd never sewn a stitch. A month after the papers were signed, a ski wreck on top of Mt. Baker nearly took it all away.

In this episode we get into what it actually takes to buy a beloved, founder-built brand and make it your own: learning bag construction from High Above's original founder, moving the shop from Bellingham to Seattle's Pioneer Square, designing packs in CAD with a CNC fabric cutter, and why doing your own repairs teaches you more about durability than any spec sheet.

We also go deep on the new Cascadia, the hydration hip pack High Above spent almost two years developing, with a custom UHMWPE/nylon fabric designed from scratch, roughly four times the abrasion resistance of a standard pack cloth, and a magnetic buckle from a small Olympia, Washington company. And we close on the thing that grounds it all: the pressure to be “super rad” online, and why the real reason we ride has nothing to do with it.

Spencer Kadas is the owner of High Above, a Seattle (Pioneer Square) bag company known for bombproof, USA-made mountain bike hip packs. Spencer bought the company in 2024 with his friend Kyle, learned to sew on the job, and has since led the design of the Venture 3D, the Supernatural vest pack, and the new Cascadia.

Follow Spencer:

High Above https://highabove.net
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/fromhighabove/

Outside Is Magic is a podcast about the intersection of creativity and the outdoors, hosted by Christopher San Agustin, founder of Broken and Coastal.

Website: https://www.brokenandcoastal.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brokenandcoastal/

Subscribe for new episodes. If this one hit, share it with a friend.

Broken & Coastal on Patreon

I started a Patreon. It's where I share the behind the scenes of everything I make — animation, design, the podcast, sewing bags, printing zines, vibe coding. Most weeks I post a video of me building something, unedited, start to finish. The first one's already up: 44 minutes of me making the intro animation for this episode, side quests and all.

The podcast stays free, always. This is the rest of it.

First 25 to join lock in their price and get the first zine.

👉 https://patreon.com/BrokenandCoastal

#OutsideIsMagic #HighAbove #MTB #MountainBiking #MadeInUSA #HipPack #PNW #BikeIndustry #Podcast

outside is Magic is hosted by Christopher San Agustin.
Produced by Broken and Coastal.
Follow us on Instagram @brokenandcoastal
Help spread the magic. Hit follow, drop a review, or share the episode with someone who gets it. You never know who it might inspire.