Canmore Race Report

Done and done. First pro National Championships out of the way. The day was wild pretty much right from the get go based on the sheer volume of waffles that Adam and I consumed (Not to worry, gluten free so no ‘poofy-ness’). With that out of the way it was off to the Nordic Center. Rick Batty and Zach had gone a bit early to set up the tents so it was all business with we arrived, or in other words it was pure chaise lounge time. We had spend a bunch of time all getting our bikes ready the day before and I had decided to change tires to something a bit slicker than my Karma’s. The course was still really bumpy though and flats were a definite concern so I decided to go with Continental Race Kings. They are a fast rolling tire but have big volume so they still soak up lots of impact and on the super bumpy stuff were a huge bonus. Those of you who raced Buckwallow would appreciate them a bunch, they would be perfect for that course assuming its not a mud fest like a few years ago.

I got called up about 4th row in the Elite Men’s category. There were 36 of us in total so that put me somewhere smack dab in the middle of things, if not slightly towards the back of the group. The start loop was short and stupid. We blasted off at mach 10 up the feed zone climb and hit some bumpy doubletrack for all of 30 seconds before we were spit out in a group onto the road. Round again, we went up the feed zone climb again and then back down in front of the nordic center building and then back up another open climb (that’s right, again) before we started the real climb into the singletrack. If that all sounds confusing, it’s because it was. As it was Nationals, the organizers wanted to give the spectators something cool to watch which I can totally understand, but it was boring doubletrack climbing and well we have to start mountain biking at some point. If my description makes it sound hard, that is also true. All that big ring climbing totally KO’d me for the first lap and it turned into one of those survivorman type races. Second lap I had recovered on the totally awesome descent and started catching people on the climb when I could go at my own pace. A lot of other people were gassed from that start pace too. The rest of the race went down with little excitement and I rode with Matt P to the end. Finished 25th or 26th in all. There were a few DNF’s that were inevitable either from exhaustion or the downhill eating parts of your bike.

Even though the start loop was silly, the rest of the course was actually super awesome. 200+ meters of climbing was probably a bit much per lap but it was super super fun to go down with the singletrack being super fun to ride. Look for next years Canmore course to blow this one out of the water though.

Post race was all about recovery nachos. Went out with Emily, Adam, Zach and Rick to the local establishment and ate too many jalepenos. Photo documentation will probably surface on the interweb somewhere.

Sunday’s race was wicked, as I wasn’t racing and could go down to set up and leave all the chaise lounging to Zach who was great to us the previous day and watch him completely destroy the expert men’s field. Putting a 100 foot gap on your field in 10 seconds isn’t easy to do. He ended up winning by something like 2:15 so watch for him to put tons of hurt on the pro field next year. Jon Barnes was having a great race until he unfortunately crashed out and ended up with a concussion. I can definitely sympathize there so I hope he is fully recovered asap.

Currently driving back home to Toronto and are sitting somewhere between Winnipeg and the Ontario border. When we haven’t been driving, Zach and I have been making slide shows of the trip on Imovie so we will each have up our own in a day or two.

Last but not least I want to throw big thanks out to everyone who was there this week. Zach especially but all the Trek Canada/World team were super fun to stay with and also Rick who volunteered his time to help out at the races and feed me during mine too.

Good luck in Europe everyone who is going/already there!