 I am walking out of the Boulder Police Department with the Trek 1120 that was stolen on Christmas Day in 2017, and I came home, went to the spot where I have my bikes locked up, and two of my amazing, beautiful bikes were gone. So this story is about two years in the making, and the reason why I have not made an update video in a long time is because the Boulder Police, who have been working on this case, said, no more YouTube videos, Ryan. Your past videos have way too many views, and we think the thief is on to you. Check it out, this video has 528,000 views. The other one has 300,000 views. People really must like stolen bike videos or something. So I let it chill for a long time, and now my friends, I can talk about what happened. Pretty clean, looks pretty good. Show this side. So I don't know why, but he took the cranks off, put different cranks on it. It was a brand new bike pretty much, so I have to deal with that. But other than that, the bike is in good shape. Mom has the racks. I'm gonna start with a little background and how this whole thing all happened. On Christmas Day, 2017, I came home late at night after celebrating with my family all day. I went to where my bikes are usually parked, and they weren't there. All that was there was a broken lock. They stole my Trek 1120 and one of my priority bikes. I was crushed. I was so bummed. I couldn't even believe it. Really, on Christmas Day, somebody stole my bikes. So I go to bed that night thinking that I'm never gonna see these bikes again. I've actually had bikes stolen from me in Boulder before, and usually, once they're gone, they are gone. There's guys that come in from Denver, from wherever else. They just go through Boulder, steal all the expensive bikes, and before you know it, they're 15 hours away, and you never see them again. The next morning, I post on my Facebook page that I've had two bikes stolen, hoping that my friends in Boulder might miraculously find my bikes, although I don't have a ton of hope. About seven days after that, I get a direct message from one of my contacts through social media saying, hey, Ryan, I typed in the names of your bikes, and I think I found a guy selling them in North Glen. Sure enough, I click on the link, and it goes to a site called OfferUp. I've never even heard of this site before, but it's one of those sites where you just sell stuff, kind of like Craigslist, and there are my bikes right there. It's a Trek 1120, which at the time was a brand new bike, and a priority continuum, which is a fairly rare bike in Colorado. There's no way that somebody just happens to be selling these two bikes, and it's legit. These are definitely my bicycles. So then I get all fired up. I'm like, what should I do? They're right there. I call my brother, who's a police officer, and I get some advice from him. I call him now. What do you think it's set up? Yeah, okay. And they'll do it, so that. So then I call the police in North Glen, because that's where the bikes are being sold, and it looks like that's where the thief lives. North Glen is a town about 30 minutes from Boulder. But the police there say, since the crime happened in Boulder, you should call the Boulder guys. Basically where we're at with this is that, yeah, as far as through the, through the. They're on the case now. They're gonna try to contact OfferUp, get a subpoena, get this guy's information, go to his house, do the whole thing. Meanwhile, and I don't know any of this is happening, one of my followers sends me an email, and the title says, I have your bike, brother. And I was like, what is this? Open it up, then there's a photo of a woman next to my priority continuum bike. And so it turns out this woman had been following all of the information that I was posting on my Facebook page. She went to the OfferUp link, said, hey, I live in North Glen. I'm gonna just go fake like I'm gonna buy this bike. She goes there, fakes the dude out, and just takes my bike back. You just took justice into your own hands. You said, screw it, I'm gonna go get Ryan's bike back. Yep. Tell me how the encounter went. I had asked to meet at a local park across from the police station, primarily because I knew I'd be safe, right? Yeah. You're pretty stupid if you're gonna pull something crazy in front of a police station. So, yeah. So you played along as if you were gonna buy this bike. That's what he thought, right? 100%. Did you ever at any point wanna punch him in the face or kick him in the balls? Cause that's what I would have wanted you to do. It's over to me. I'm like, dude, this guy deserves everything that's coming to him. Nothing is more satisfying than being like, all right, this is my buddy's bike. I know it's my buddy's bike and I'm taking it back. And you just looked him in the face and said that? Yep. That is so cool. That is so cool. So now I have one of my bikes back, which is great, but the Trek 1120 is worth quite a bit more. And I would love to have this bike back. So the first part of this story happens pretty quickly. This is within about two weeks of the bikes being stolen. The rest of the story takes a lot longer. And it just goes to show that it's really hard sometimes to nail the bad guy, even when you have quite a bit of evidence. To make matters a little bit more complicated, the thief had already sold the bike. So now the police have to track down the guy who bought the bike from the thief, which they do, they get it back. And now it's time to nail the bad guy. So they use the woman who got my first bike back because she met him in real life. She saw him face to face. And the cell, the guy who they sold the bike to. And they're like, here's a lineup of dudes. Which dude is it? Knock it off, get back. And now, ladies and gentlemen, today there is a warrant out for his arrest and he's gonna go down. Did you understand all that? I know it was a lot. Mom is driving me because I knew that I wasn't gonna be able to ride this home because there's only one crank arm on it. Feels good to be back with this bike. We had some good memories out there on Baja. I don't know if they've caught him yet. I have no idea. I haven't been in touch with them. Hopefully at least, you know, he slipped on some ice and broke his leg. Hopefully Karma has got this guy. I have no idea. All I know is that I have my bikes back. I'm really appreciative for all the work the Boulder police did on this. I'm also really appreciative of all the work my friends through social media did on this. They were the ones that found these bikes originally. You know, I had never heard of Offer Up. Yeah, I was just looking on Craigslist and other sites. But somebody out there found my bike. So this just goes to show the power of social media. It can be used for good. A lot of you out there are probably wondering, what are you gonna do, Ryan, to make sure this never happens again? Well, I have a solution. And it's called sleeping with my bicycle. I don't have a girlfriend right now, so I might as well share my bed with my beautiful Trek 1120. Keep it nice and safe. But seriously, I don't let my bikes ever be locked out on the streets of Boulder anymore. I just don't trust this town. There are way too many thieves. I've had too many bikes stolen. Nothing is safe and it's unfortunate. If you're not able to sleep with your bikes and keep them in your apartment like I have, I did make a video about how to properly lock your bike. I will link it below. There's also a great website called Bike Index. And what it is is you essentially register your bike and the serial number on this website. And it's a huge nationwide database so that if your bike does get stolen, there might be a better chance of getting it back. So there you have it. That's the story. It's an odyssey of a story. Two years in the making. And let's hope I never have to make another stolen bike video in my life. Getting something stolen from you is just so violating. It sucks. Let's stick to adventure videos. Those are a lot better, what do you say? So please like and subscribe, tell all your friends about my channel. I make lots of fun, uplifting, adventure content from all around the world. And oh yeah, I have a Patreon page now so if you'd like to support my channel, I have a link to that down below. And we will see you down the road, my friends. I'm impressed that it's right here in my hands. Feel so good.