Kokanee Crankworx 2011/Canadian Open DH Race Day

     Today was the day of the Canadian Open DH.  The Canadian Open is the biggest DH race in all of Canada outside of a World Cup.  Many of the top riders in the world attend this race.  Steve Smith, a Canadian, won the race with some serious competition from riders coming from all corners of the globe.

    The track was muddy and very slick with gnarly roots and smooth greasy rocks.  It has been raining for weeks up here and the conditions favored the locals, although I am sure everyone had a bit of a wild ride on their race runs.

     One of the craziest places on the course is Hecklers Rock.   Around a thousand people mass on or near the rock and heckle racers and chairlift riders.  Nobody is sacred as everyone gets the treatment.






     My race run was going well, but I caught up to the girl in front of me and she did not yield until she went over the bars.  This caused me to have to slow substantially and lose focus and as a result I crashed.  Even though my race was over I pinned the rest of the course.

On the hot seat but not for long.....

     Once I got to the bottom my dad asked me all about what my race run was like so I told him.  He said I should protest for a re-run because the girl got in my way.  I got my re-run and ended up 5th.  Not that great of a result, but I have plenty of races to go in the future here at Crankworx.

     When the pros were going down I met up with Luca Cometti.  He is a very fast 15 year old from Southern California......... who can pedal like mad. We rode some A-Line/Crab Apple Hits/A-Line laps, he is very fun to ride with.  I thought he was going to die a couple of times but he managed to pull off some super sick airs.  Ended up riding from 2 p.m. until the lifts closed at 8 p.m. mostly sessioning the crab apple hits and A-line.  Another sweet day in the books.

Crankworx 2011 Day One/Dual Slalom Race Day

     Today started with a Canadian Open DH practice run.  I stopped lots of times to look at the course, and I accomplished my goal, which was to begin the process of learning the course.  There are many lines in most parts of the course, but few turns.  Its pretty much straight down the hill with tons of roots.  With all the rain we have had, it has gotten pretty rowdy, rough and fun.

After the DH course scope out it was time for Dual Slalom qualifying.  It was wet and greasy and I ended up qualifying in 6th place out of 12 kids, which isn't so hot.  It was, however, good enough to get me into the brackets.

Getting over the techie spine at the start of the Dual Slalom

Johannes Fischbach and Guido Tschugg during practice

Next it was back to the Canadian Open DH course for more practice.  This time I used a spike tire (Maxxis Wet Scream) on my front wheel and the course felt more manageable.  After a couple more DH runs it was back to the Dual Slalom for the finals.

      In my first heat I raced a local boy and got beat by a pretty big margin down the first run.  Dual Slalom is more about being consistently fast than being a one hit wonder.  On the next run we switched courses and the racer with the smaller composite time wins and advances.  During this run he slipped a pedal and pretty much almost died.  I advanced on which meant I was in the top 4.  I got beat both times in my next heat, which meant I was in the small final racing for third place.  My two final runs were pretty fast but not fast enough to take third so I ended up in 4th.  Both the van Steenbergen bro's looked way fast and they both won along with Jill Kitner.  Tom and Bas van Steenbergen as well as Jill Kitner race for the same bike company as myself....Transition.   It is always nice to see some Transition's up there on the podium.  Dual slalom is not my cup of tea so I know I can do better in the future races.

Soooooooo........the mens Pro Dual Slalom was sick with Mitch Rip aloto, the local Utah boy taking the win.  Way to represent Mitch. 
        

First Full Day in Whistler/Crankworx Dual Slalom Practice

Today was a really fun day here in Whistler.  A couple of warmup runs, then dual slalom practice, followed by an unbelievable after dinner freeride sesh with a bunch of great riders.

The day started with two runs down Dirt Merchant and lower A line.  I am going to do 6 races while here so after the warm up runs I met up with my dad and we went to athlete registration to get our race packet.  On the way to lunch we ran into Cody Kelly and Mitch Ropelato unloading their van.   

After lunch I got my 4x bike and headed up to practice.  I started out working on the top part and slowly worked my way down the course.  I'm still having trouble in one section, but I should be able to get it down in practice tomorrow.  The van Steenbergen brothers are looking very fast.

Bas van Steenbergen looking fast and smooth

Me working out the bugs

Kyle Strait squashing a double

Andrew Neethling and Danny Hart/Giant Factory Team Riders

     Next I went back to our condo to eat then headed back out to have some DH runs.  At the bottom of the lift Troy Brosnan got a huge group of like 35 people to go ride Crab Apple Hits.  Crab Apple Hits is a strait trail with 5 or 6 perfect 40 to 50 foot doubles that kick you 15 to 20 feet up in the air.

     It was crazy once we got to the start of Crab Apple Hits.  Nobody would go but then everybody went at once.   People were bumping bars but by the time we got to the first jump we all got into a very tight single file line.  It was the most fun I have had on my bike in a very long time.

     I ended the day riding with Cody Kelly, Mitch Ripalotto and Elliot Jackson a Yeti Team rider ....  I cased a 20 foot step down to a big roller, crashed, and broke 2 spokes on a set of practice wheels.  Day over and in the record books fun fun fun.          

A Training Week in Late Winter

  Since the February Bootleg Canyon Race I have tried to step up my training, preparing for the up coming race season.  My approach to training is diverse, which some people call cross training.  I play lacrosse, workout at the gym , dig new trails, and of course ride the bike.

  Lacrosse has started, and I have practices on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  Practice is fairly easy but I use muscles and neurological-paths that would not get used doing anything else.  This takes up two days that I would otherwise be going to the gym.  One time I went to the gym after Lacrosse practice, and it was not so bad.  Now I don't really have specific days when I go to the gym but just go when I get the opportunity.  But really, its been hard to get to much training in due to all the other things going on.





  Back in December Mr. Anderson came to me with a proposal to build a pump track at the school.  I told him that I would like to build one, and so he and my dad started to talk about it through email.  Nothing happened with the pump track for quite some time, until about 3 weeks ago.  We ended up getting approval from the principal and the vice principal.  We began construction without Mr. Anderson because he had surgery on his shoulder  and he was down for the count.  So with a little digging and then a little more and a ton more we finished the track.  It took us all of about a 2 weeks to complete it. 

  After about a week of riding it, we where notified that it was going to be torn down now, because it is a liability.  It is kinda hard to make a case that it is a liability when Mr. Anderson's five year old road it great, and to get going up to any speed you have to be quite the bike rider.  So as usual, it is people that don't have a clue about what a pump track is that decide that it is too dangerous.  My dad tried to fight it buy notifying polititions such as the Mayor, to try to get them on our side.  Sadly though the track was destroyed before we could take action.





     Some of the trails are dry enough to ride most of the time now so I can finally sharpen my skills back up on the bike.  I Street has drained out quick lately so you can ride it even a day after a storm.  Sections of I Street are better now than they were all of last year, but a few spots have not been smoothed out yet so it can get a little moto like on a hard tail.  Someone put a lot of work on both the step down to step up and the I Street line.  Over all I Street has been quite good.

The Future of Gravity Mountain Biking

     My dad and I headed down to Bootleg Canyon for a race on 2/18/11.  Bootleg is a bike park that is 30 minutes from Las Vegas, Nevada just outside of the town of Boulder.    Prior to the race I spent a few days sweeping the snow off my pump track and doing general track maintenance.  I got one day of pump-tracking in and doing drills, and then we were off.  Not much practice but it is a low priority race and we went to learn more about the bike and our race preparation.   
 
       When we got to the race venue I was amped to go ride.  After I survived the sketchy shuttle and a 10 minute hike, I was at the top.  Right off the top the course is a steep and gnarly section.  I was trying a new Leatt neck brace which was too tight and it made it so I could not look up.  It took a long time to get down but I got down none the less.  My new Transition TR450 was feeling really really good.  About 5/6 of the way down my dad was standing on the the side of the trail and I dropped off my Leatt  with him.   I took three practice runs which were focused on exploration of the track and lines.   It was really surprising how well the TR450 rode.  My old bike (Turner DHR) was smooth in the rough but it was pretty much just going were it wanted to. With the 450 the rider is able to put it where they want it to go.  Being able to put your bike where you want it is super key in a DH race so you can get on or create the best line.
 
     The next day I met up with Cody Kelly, who is an amazing BMX, 4x, and dual slalom racer from Utah.  He is just starting to really get into DH racing, and he is quite skilled.  Really his only weakness is that he only weighs 120ish pounds so he has a hard time keeping his momentum over the flats.  We took quite a few runs together and spent about 20 minutes examining the top section, looking for the lines with the most exit speed.  It was really nice having someone with me to bounce lines and ideas off of.
 
     On race day I had a plan to make one practice run to see how the track has changed, and spots that were getting blown.  A couple of berms were pretty blown out, by my race run they would be really blown, so I made some mental notes.

     As soon as I got down to the bottom I went into total chill mode.  I plopped myself down on our chair and began to look for food.  When my dad and I were chilling and talking about race strategies he noticed that the people parked next to us had a lot of electronic gear.  We watched as they unpacked what turned out to be a remote control helicopter, and a nice one at that.  They were there with sicklines to film the race by air.  I will be checking up on sicklines every once in a while to see if the video is up.

     I did a bit of a warm up at the bottom, then went to the top for my race run.  I do not remember much from my race run, except that I caught a kid and he let me pass, which was nice.  I placed 5th out of 5 but the 2nd through 5th times were all within less than 4 seconds.   Had I raced my lighter wheels I could have been on the podium.  The kid in first smashed it and was about 19 seconds in front of me... I need to start ramping up my training. 

     One of the reasons why gravity mountain biking is not a popular sport in the US is because it is hard to film, the riders are here one second then gone the next.  Helmet cameras are good for filming the whole course but do not show an accurate depiction of how scary, steep, rocky, and fast the course is.  Zip-lines are also used but they are not realistic in a race scenario.   The prospect of being able to follow riders down the course with a RC helicopter is a cool idea and I really think it could push the popularity of this sport to new highs.

So....the people unpacking the heli and photo gear next to us?  Turns out that their names are Luke and Crissy Waters and they are from Jackson Hole, Wyoming.  Check out their website Onlocationaerial, its pretty cool.  When you look at the heli footage you are seeing one of the pieces that will increase the popularity of our sport.

                                Crissy setting up the camera.

                                 Luke working on the chopper.

              
  Here is a quick video of the helicopter on a test flight over the Bootleg parking lot.





And finally the sicklines video with some of the heli footage edited in.  You can see how the perspective helps the viewer intuitively understand the severity of the terrain.

Nevada State DH Championship 2011 - Bootleg Canyon - SickLines from Sick Lines on Vimeo.

A Wasatch December To Remember

     This December has been the best skiing/snowboarding of any December that I can recall.  My dad, who has been ripping up Snowbird and the Wasatch since 1976, agrees that this has been the best December.  Prior to the solstice my dad and I were able to ride North Chute at Snowbird.  To put this into context, North Chute was never open during the 09/10 season.

     A major storm cycle started the same day as winter break, and lasted 17 days, until the day school started back up.  That is more than 2 weeks of day after day,  foot plus deep pow.  The first day of the year that we rode the entire day, from first tram to 4:00 pm Peruvian to 5:00 pm Chickadee was December 29th.  There were low crowds, and lots of wind.  Each run we would go to the same spot, and it would be filled back in so we could not see our tracks from the previous runs.   At two in the afternoon we dropped into Candleabra and the left side was mid chest deep with no tracks.  Unbelievable. 

     On our  last run on P-dog, we stopped for a second and watched some bro bras huck some cliffs on Baldy.  Further down the mountain a couple of the same baldy bros were stomping around on their skis in the woods to our right.  They were packing out a jump.  We sat and watched them for about 5 minutes, then they hiked up, and hit their jump.  It was pretty minimal.  More bros came and hit the jump as well.  I traversed over and hit the jump, then proceeded down to the bottom of chickadee. The day was so good that my dad and I took two chickadees which had about 5" of new snow on it.  The idea was floated around of staying up the canyon because it was fairly obvious it would close.  By the time we got home the canyon had already closed and did not open until late the next morning.    

     My favorite day of the month was the 30th, the day we went up north, (Which I can not tell you specifics).  The day started off with a long car ride, north ward bound.  We packed five of us into our truck, and we were off.  When we were driving up the canyon, we checked out all the good lines, and they looked sick.  Mental note for later in the day and yes we got them fresh fresh fresh.

     Exiting the car we were met by a very chilly wind, and I was grateful for my down jacket.  It was a bit of a goat rope getting our tickets, and our fingers nearly froze trying to get our passes on our jackets.  There were lots of people.  My dad said it was the most people he has ever seen there.  No worries though, we were dialed into the rhythm and the lines.  We bombed down a cat track, and got some fun pow shots on the edges.  Riding up the chairlift, we talked to a Ice coast tourist, who was an interesting fellow.  My dad and I got off the lift, rode down a little ways, popped off our boards, and with a little hike turned a regular day into the dream.   The whole day was amazing, we got a lot of good snow, every run untracked.  We continued to ride commando road shots long after the resort was closed making for a very long day.

    The new year brought an end to the storm cycle and we decided a little bc kicker action was in order.  On New Years day we went up to the land of no snowboarders and built a kicker on Flagstaff Ridge.  My dad has been snowboarding all the south facing terrain across the road from Alta for more than thirty years but if Oh-no has his way that will come to an end.......sad.  Oh-no wants to build a lift in the most popular backcountry access area of the entire Wasatch.  Here is a short vid from that little kicker session.
         

Mr. Anderson visits I Street

     During the spring and fall, one of the physical education teachers from my junior high school, organizes a series of Friday mountain bike rides.  The teachers name is Reid Anderson.  What makes these rides special is the opportunity is open to all students regardless of experience level or even if the student owns a bike or not.  If a student does not have a bike one is provided by the Salt Lake Bicycle Collective.

     Normally after school on Fridays a bus takes all the students up to Red Butte Gardens and we ride the shoreline trail .  This provides plenty of options so we can split up and ride different trails, based on ability level.  My best riding buddy, Christian Wilson and I, convinced Mr. Anderson to try a different launch point for one of the rides, I Street.

     On the day we were supposed to go to I Street it rained and the contact from the bike collective canceled the ride due to the possibility of mud.  No worries though, my dad came through and we loaded up our bikes into the back of the pickup and headed off to I Street with Mr. Anderson.

      While Christian and I went straight to the jumps, my dad and Mr. Anderson did a quick trail ride over to the bobsled.  Mr. Anderson had never had the opportunity to ride the bobsled before and my dad decided that showing him one of the best trails in Utah was a high priority.

   When they returned to I Street we showed Mr. Anderson around all the different jump lines and he was impressed by all the different lines and the work that had gone into making the place.  He had his camera with him and below is a short edit of the clips he filmed.

     Mr. Anderson is an example of an outstanding educator and community servant.  He dedicates hundreds of hours of his own time every year expanding opportunities for kids.  In the winter he runs a cross country ski program similar to the bike program.  Our community is lucky to have people like Mr. Anderson and I am grateful for his efforts as well.