MTB Provincials

Sunday August 30th was the final mtb race in the SK series and provincial championship race. Having been crisscrossing the country in August, I was not sure where my fitness was or how I would do. I did know that it was close in the point series as anyone of 3 of us could take the crown in the Master Expert 40-49 category and that on a good day, several people could be provincial champion. A friend in Saskatoon hinted at racing and he would have been favoured to win. I also found out on Wednesday that Dean Etienne (a local speedster) was racing in my category. I also realized on Wednesday at the local city, I mean world mtb championship race, that my fitness was pretty good and maybe not spending time “training” left me well rested and keen to race.

The plan – gets on Dean’s wheel and hold on for as long as possible. I was really focused on Dean as the guy to beat and maybe my friend from Saskatoon and not overly worried about the rest of the riders in my category – not that I did not respect them, but to date I was equal to or better on most head to head competitions this year, therefore I was confident in my abilities to ride equal to or better than most. This would prove my undoing.

Having ridden this course last year with little success, I was focusing more on executing my plan than worrying about the course. The issues last year included crashing on a descent, losing front braking power and a tight twisty course that was troublesome for me. Going in I decided that the rewards of the day and good planning would triumph over my feelings about the course.

The race was 4 laps, which is longer than usual for our category, but in the end, about right time wise. However, at the start, I was thinking 4 laps (same number as many of the higher categories, expect senior elite – doing 5) might play to my benefit. Off the gun, I was looking for Dean and a couple of other guys in my category – my friend from Saskatoon was a no show, so one less guy to keep tabs on. Found Dean and Terry Zack and Tom Wolfe, right where I needed to be. After the first climb, I am right with Dean and Terry takes off, I think that I can let him go and hope he fades in laps 3 or 4 – I stay with Dean. Tom is with Dean and me as well. Laps 1 and 2 see the 3 of us sticking with each other and the odd gap open, but closed in quick order. No Terry to be seen, I was a little worried. Start of lap 3 and Tom has chain suck and needs to dismount to fix it. This gives Dean and me a gap on him that never gets closed down. In fact, I believe Tom has an accident late in lap 4 and has to run it in to finish. Meanwhile Dean and I are on Neil Clarke’s wheel and the 3 of us play cat and mouse thru laps 3 and 4. In the end, I struggle on lap 4 to keep the pace and work to close the gap that opens on the first climb. By the time I get on their wheel again I lose concentration on a narrow bushy passage and get caught up in the trees. This happens just before that last climb, which they have been riding and I have been running/walking. I basically knew that I was finishing third as Terry is up the road and rode amazingly for the win – congrats Terry. PS – Terry is a teacher, so had July and August to hone his ability and this is his home course. Still, he deserved the win.

Finishing third was not disappointing as I executed my plan and with better focus might have nipped Dean. I gave everything on the day and was happy with the outcome. I was thinking that I may have blown my chances at the point series crown with Terry winning and me finishing third. I had not played out all the scenarios to know if Terry or I had won the point series. It turns out, I did have enough points by finishing third to overtake Terry and become the 2009 SK point series champion in the Master Expert 40-49 category. It is satisfying to know that I finished second 3 times and 3rd once to win – no race victories required! Who woulda thunk!

I am looking forward to painting the exterior of the house as I have neglected my household responsibilities thru August. Then doing a 60K race at Buffalo Pound and some psycho-cross later in the fall.

Thanks Patti for your patience and understanding this summer.

August - What a Blur!

It has been a whirlwind month, I’ve been in Calgary for the Tour de Bowness (4 days), Ottawa for work (4 days) and PEI for the Canada Summer Games (8 days).

For the Summer Games, I acted as the Manager for the cycling team, competing in the mountain bike, time trail, road race and crit. PEI is a beautiful place with more roads to ride than one could imagine. And, there are hills and things to see when you are riding – not like Sask., where 10 or more K need to pass before anything of interest pops up.

The team perform as expected with good performances in the men’s mtb (7th place), women’s TT (6th place) and crit (4th place). There was also, Dave Brooks leading the crit for several laps and getting some air time and winning a sprint.

Overall, I think everyone took something positive from their time in PEI and I surely learned a few things, like:

· Not to assume that because the women’s bus leaves at 11 AM to transport them to a venue 40 minutes away, that their bike would leave at the same time. No their bike had to leave 2 hours earlier. Lesson learned. Thanks John Garnet for renting a van in PEI and transporting the bikes.
· You have to wear a shirt, a team shirt in the pit/feed zone – who knew!
· Relying on your mission staff is critical to getting supplies and misc needs on a daily basis – things like a cooler, sports drinks/powder and coke. In this regard, renting a vehicle for the team maybe a wise move.

Finally, the rides I did in PEI were phenomenal, I rode back from the mtb site one day – 50K and lots of hills and later that day rode back from the TT site – 50K and beautiful coastline and rode 110K and saw red cliffs lining a long sand beach as well as the Confederation Bridge – epic day for me. The roads are smooth pavement and well maintain – hardly saw any glass the whole time riding. Not to mention the hills and turns and sites to see every second of every ride. Beats SK highway riding.

Tour De Bowness

Left Regina Friday noon with six athletes and headed to Calgary for the Tour De Bowness stage race. I also picked up another rider at the airport in Calgary. Of the seven riders, 5 are Canada Summer Games bound. Saturday we did an easy spin for around 45 minutes at the road ace site – a 5.3K loop with one steady hill with the steepest grade at the end and one other hill. Later in afternoon headed to the Hill climb were Andrew Thomas finished 5th in Cat1/2 – our top finisher.

Sunday was a free day as the crits were scheduled for early evening, which was pushed even later due to parked cars on the course. I was doing the Cat 5 crit and was off at 4 PM. It took several laps to figure out the course, the corners and lines to take. The chicane and last two corners (see pic below) were over rough pavement and as a result I was tentative at first.

I found myself working from the back of the pack through my “learning” phase of the race. When I figured I was done learning, it was the “practise” phase, where I tried to get the lines right while riding in the pack. By about 25 minutes into the 30 minute race I was starting to feel comfortable and had worked myself into the middle to front half of the pack. I had missed starting my timer so I really was not sure where in the race we were until I could see the counters going from 5 to 4 to 3, etc each lap. I thought we were getting close to 5 laps to go, but when I heard the bell, I knew we were on the last lap. Likely I was working and staying to the front of the pack. I stayed on the guys ahead of me and onto the final straight away I managed to pass one guy ahead of me and as it turned out I finished 6th. I was hoping for a better result, but I took too long getting comfy on the course and really was not aware of where the race was as time progressed. Oh well, it was more challenging than I expected. C’est la vie!

The best result of the day was Andrea Bunnin finishing 2nd in the Women A race. Tough luck beset Andrew as a broken chain would finish his day early.

The RR on Monday was a cooler cloudy day, but good weather for racing – I think as I wasn’t racing. Once again Andrea had a good race, finishing 5th and placing 4th overall. Andrew also had a good race finishing top 10 and would have been in the money if not for a broken chain in the crit.

A few of the better pictures I took are below.

Sask Cup Series – MTB #4

Wascana trails were host to race number 4 in the MTB Sask Cup Series. This race is on home turf and as such I was staking a “take no prisoners” approach to the race. I expected the usual suspects to be present and a wild card in the form of Mike Livingstone – visiting SK/home for a month as he and his wife work in China. Mike won the Blackstrap race and I expected him and Tom Wolf (2nd at Blackstrap) to be the main protagonists in the race. Mike won, I was second and Terry Zack third. Tom was not feeling well and finished 4th.

The real story is that I gave away the win again. Although I must commend Mike for a great, error free race – which was the difference. My story is the mistakes I made on my way around the course. Three in particular stand out.

heading into mistake number 1

The first one was a mental lapse (I think all of them are) where I clipped my pedal on tree as I negotiated around a west coast jump/drop off. As my foot caught the tree I was sling shot off the bike quicker than one can say – fuck. I picked myself up and regained my composure. Although this error was not obvious to the gap between Mike and me (me leading at the time) it was the beginning of the end. Mike slowly reeled me in as I made a consistent error on all three laps on this one climb – mistake #2. Each lap I knew I was having issues at this spot, yet still managed to screw it up each lap. Once again a mental error of looking at the trouble spot and not focusing on the line I needed to take. Doing this three times in a race is unacceptable. Each lap I was passed by one if not two riders at this spot. I think on lap 1, this is where Mike passed me and I never made it up – mostly little errors and one more major one.

Mistake #3 - on the final lap, I knew I had some ground to make up and as I was passed by Shane McNaughton, I realized I had a chance if I could hold his wheel to close the gap to Mike. However, this was short lived as we approached a downhill Shane got in front of a rider and I did not. I knew this was a mistake. And like an idiot I tried to force the pace down the bottom of the hill only to over cook the turn and ride right into a clump of trees. I was ass over handle bars with bike in tow. It was like slo mo except for the landing, which was a hard THUD. Oh my back, oh what a mistake, oh I got to get up and get going. No major pain and no damage to Sweetness, but I realized I was done for first and needed to ride safe to ensure second.

The result was not what I wanted, but the consensus at the end was – the final race and Provincial Championship would be winner take all. He who wins the Provincial race would take the Provincial crown as well as the Series crown – barring more wild card entries.

I am comfortable in my endurance, but still need to work on technical skills. Not having ridden very much MTB this summer to date, I know what I need to do to win. Ride, ride and ride even more on my MTB.

Later Hommies!

Columbia Icefield's Trip - Picture Essay

From June 13 to 18 Patti & i hiked and biked along the Icefield's parkway. These are the the better pictures, but you can view them all here.



First afternoon and out on the bikes. Absolutely beautiful day and the scenery - amazing.






First hike - to Glacier Lake. An amazingly dull hike with little or no enjoyment factor. And it was 3 hrs in and 3 hrs out.

This clump of flowers - name escapes me - was growing right in the creek.

Hiking thru snow along the way to Sunset Pass. Dull dreary day, but an amazing hike. First 3 K are switch backs and up. Then thru this meadow with lots of water and snow still in it. We never made the view point of the pass as the weather seemed a little nasty around us, still it was a 6-7 hrs day.

Type of Orchid we saw on the way down from Sunset Pass.







Rampart Creek Hostel buildings. To the right is the mess hall, far left is the mgrs cabin, and dead centre is one of the guest cabins - each of the 2 cabins has two rooms with six beds in each room.


Rainbow, first night at Beauty Creek Hostel.


One of the many falls along the Stanley Falls hike, which is basically unmarked and without word-o-mouth would be even less visited.


At Mount Edith Cavell - one of the more readily accessable areas and the one with some natural energy/mojo. In the background is Edith Cavell Glacier, but Angel and Ghost Glaciers are easily visible from this area.



Wildlife near Athabasca Falls.

15!

15, that’s the minimum number of times I was off my bike at the 3rd mtb race – Blackstrap Biter – in the Sask. Series. I believe 15 is the conservative estimate - more likely I was near 20 and amounts to at least 5 times per lap. No frigging way you can win with that kind of performance. So, I should feel good about finishing 3rd and a minute out of 1st? Can’t rationalize it! Limiting the number of mistakes to 10 might have been enough to win. And given my performance last week in Canmore – see details below – I can’t even begin to accept that performance as anything but crapola. So, I should try to find something positive and maybe the best thing is that the heat (mid 20’s temps) did not impact my performance, nor did I have a post race headache or upset stomach. This on only water and 2 gels. I guess, I could improve performance with some electrolytes during the race. I have two weeks to put this behind me and learn from it.

Canmore Canada Cup

Recall last year’s pathetic performance at Canmore (click here and scroll down) and the following will seem like a miracle. On Friday, pre-riding the course, I knew the race was going to be much improved over last year.
During the pre-ride I took all the descents carefully and did redo’s as needed to make sure I at least tried all the downhills.

Sprinting to the line - great way to finish!

After clearing all parts of the course in a 2 lap pre-ride I had a feeling I was going to achieve my goals of riding all descents and not finishing last in my category.

Geoff Kabush in the coal shutes.

Well, true to the pre-ride I rode all three laps with just 2 or 3 foot dabs. A major improvement and makes Blackstrap a major disappointment. I did not finish last as well. Quite the race and may be one the highlights of 2009.

Conversely, Blackstrap will be – barring major catastrophe – one of the lowlights of 2009.

Later!