Road Trip pt II - Panorama

This weekend is round 3 of the BC Cup Downhill. Having crashed in the first race (Kamloops) and got 4th in the last race (Arduum) I was keen to do well but had no idea what to expect other than Tim's description of the "80kph roller jump"



We stayed in one of the resort condos - pretty good except the standard of cleaning - no-one wants to find tissues and condom wrappers under the bed when they arrive!

There was a big crew up for the race - including most of the oldies that are my competition!

(pic by Tim)




Beer
(pic by Tim)

















Tim and I stayed with Danielle Baker - photographer extraordinaire!

, Kevin - sorry Kev, no lifestyle photo for you


(pic by Tim)











and the newly weds, Ryan and Kat
(pic by Tim)


















some random pics of the resort














ski lifts - yay!














Dawn's dog












here's that roller jump I mentioned - the track wound down through trees and blazed across the occasional ski-run before popping out just above the village. Next came a long straight fall-line descent into a gentle left hand corner and over this crest - at about 40-50mph - enough to send riders into the air for about 50ft just before crossing a stream bed - exciting stuff. The challenge was to pedal down the big hill and not touch the brakes - pretty scary at those speeds




Ah, Kevin, there you are - and there you are again just to make up for it! The jump didnt send you very high but you sure went a looooong way!









Team 203.... or was it room 220? I cant remember but you get the idea

(pic by Danielle)









It was record tempretures in Panorama this weekend with a high of 40! Fortunately they have excellent pools to cool off in, complete with 2 waterslides - the Dunbar boys managed to have the slides shutdown after they got a little too competitive and developed the running-start to to win the race down the pipe! There's something very appealing about a bike race with a nice pool...
(pic by Tim)




So how'd the race go? Well, in practice I'd been getting pretty fast but was still dragging my brakes a bit on the ski runs. In my race run, I stayed off the brakes in the first two open sections and was having a pretty stella run when.... phsssstt! I got a flat. I was only a quarter of the way down so no point in carrying on so I just peeled off my armour and started the long walk down in the blistering heat - little did I realize at the time just how blistering! The next week of blistered shoulders under body armour would teach me (yet again) about sun protection. Damn it!

(pic by Tyler Maine)







Danielle looking very fast as usual

(pic by Tim)










Kat suck ing up the landing of the jump across the 4X track (pic by Tim)











...and Kev. This is his race run - he lost his pedals on the creek jump after the roller jump and in this pic he's doing 30mph through the grass trying to find them again! A scary moment for everyone watching but he carried on to finish safely (pic by Tim)







And the legendary Tim Coleman
(superbe photo by Ryan Potma)











the signature panoramic shot of the final section of the track with the village in the background

















With race day out of the way, Tim and I spent the following day exploring the rest of the Panorama Bike Park. As you can see, the views here are stunning

(pic by Tyler Maine)








don't mind if I do!













The park has some really cool bits in it. This section of "Punisher" was pretty fun - a steep rocky line that weaved between the trees - it also helped me get some steep riding practice before next week's madness - the Mt 7 Psychosis!
(pic by Tyler Maine)














We'd arranged to ride with Darcy - the Bike Park manager (amongst other things) and also Tyler from Pink Bike

Here's Darcy


(pic by Tyler Maine)














(pic by Tyler Maine)

















(pic by Tyler Maine)























(pic by Tyler Maine)

















(pic by Tyler Maine)















Here's me just before flatting for the 2nd time in two days - and only the 2nd time since getting the bike in December! Does that mean I've had good or bad luck? Hmmm?

That put an end to my day and after 3 days of ski-lift assisted riding I was pooped. You might think it would be easy with a ski lift to defy gravity but you'd only be partly right. With the effortless uplift comes a bazillion downhill runs which can really take it out of an old fella like me.

Anyway, off to explore somewhere new tomorrow before heading to Golden.

For more on Panorama, take a look at Tim's blog on TimColeman.ca (look for Mad Trapper) or Tyler's professional write up on PinkBike

Road Trip pt I - The Rockies

BC is a big place and with two races scheduled on the eastern border only a week apart it was the perfect opportunity for a road trip.

My co-pilot for the trip was Tim, the original Element driving, Norco riding immigrant although he hails (hales?) from South Africa.

Element loaded and we hit the road Friday bound for Panorama near Invermere on the edge of the Rocky Mountains.

This was also a great opportunity to drop in on my boss, Genn who moved up to Revelstoke over the winter. This is here new house - pretty nice eh? I think she'll be seeing me again come ski season ;-)

The drive was boring - nothing to look at ;-)










































have Element will travel... this is Tim's one, I left mine at home

















boring












nothing to see here, move along.....









Once over the beautiful Roger's Pass the terrain took a slightly flatter shape as we headed across the shallow valley that is the source of the Columbia River - slightly misleading as the valley bottom itself is over 3000ft above sea level









With only a stop in Revi we made it in 9 hours and change. A quick stop for groceries and we were set and finished the day with a midnight stroll up the downhill track by cellphone light - after all, we dont want people seeing our lines!!









awww look at the sunlight on the power lines, so priddy

Arduum BC Cup

The BC Cup is made up of six races, Arduum is race two and is held at Red Mountain in Mission, behind the shooting range!
The track was first raced last year and you can tell because there is still a lot of loam on the track.

Here am I in a less loamy section

Photos courtesy of Corey










Rich

Its a very hard track. Even the start ramp is perched on top of a rough rock roll! After some really tight, steep and techy rocks and roots there's a 6-10ft drop off a big rock - now if the drop was the only thing to worry about it would be pretty much ok BUT the run in to the drop had riders squiggling over a few feet of seriously off-camber roots just 4 feet from the edge - not much room for corrections!!


Jenn slaying it as always but this time on her little bike with big forks borrowed from the big bike


















Jenn, like me took the Chicken-Dinner line round the rock drop - all the best people were ;-)



There were also a couple of gap jumps near the end of the track that claimed many a back wheel - the course marshalls stopped counting a little after 20! Jenn and I once more took the Chicken Dinner line










Brian O


















Brian B - next year I'll be relegated to the 40-49 category so I'll be up against my team mate Brian - or Bottom Bracket as we like to call him. Not sure how I feel about racing with the REALLY old boys. And no, before you even think it, I'm not 40 yet but next year is the year of my 40th birthday so I have to race the whole year in that category.






Here's me again. I was a little out of it again at this race - couldnt seem to get my head into riding so didnt manage the gaps or the drop and therefore felt quite down at the prospect of coming dead last. I figured out later it was my new tyres and lack of sleep which put my head in a strange place. I was trying to be ahead of the game by putting on wet weather friendly tyres knowing the track is almost always wet but as it turned out it was dry! The lack of sleep was because I was up at 3.30am watching the World Championships online - Well done to Danice for coming 15th IN THE WORLD!! Nice job :)

As it turned out, I had a clean run (around everything) and finished 4th su-weet!!

I'm really looking forward to the next BC Cup race at Panorama next week :)

The Woodlot

Rich, Derek and I thought it'd be a good idea to sample the woodlot in the dry as an alternative to the snow and rain we usually see there. I wasnt having a great day - just wasnt on it - but Derek certainly was. Armed with a new Trek Session 8 on test with him for NSMB we hauled up the huge climb to the top of Platinum...

Here's Derek starting as he meant to go on with the first gap




Rich on the first berm before the tricky hip (complete with special effect bendy trees!) - no-one made this one although it was the only one Derek didnt hit!


















Slightly less odd looking trees with Rich - these two pics are of course made up of two photos each, spliced together courtesy of Photoshop

















Some close up action of Derek


















Rich




















Derek




















Derek














This one was a little crazy - jump up over a gap, over a ladder, over another gap and onto the landing (which was completely blind at takeoff)

Nice work D-rek









Derek sussing out the final (substantial) drop which minutes later he hit as the last feature of a run of about 6 - superb!



















more ladders to get out. Well done to Derek for stepping up to virtually everything on his first run down - and on a new bike too! Crazy!










Just a quick Whis shot from the next day - the bear got a bit flustered in the middle of the bone yard - 100 metres from the lift line at the bottom. The photographer in the foreground was chased off seconds after this was taken - awww, cuddly Whistler bears!