Snowshoe racing. Yep that's a thing!

So I heard of a weird and crazy thing happening in the next town over, called a snowshoe race. Let's think about that for a second.

and 

plus

Yep, it's basically a perfect combination of awkward footwear, keeping warm by any means necessary, and high risk racing with lots of falls. 

I had been thinking of getting to the snowshoe race on the weekend but I decided not to because I was busy with lab work, Popeye's chicken, bowling, and then out at the bars until close. I woke up though (a direct result of the fried chicken) about an hour and forty minutes before the race start, and it was a beautiful day. Plus I don't believe in hangovers. I tried calling a friend who was going, but they didn't answer so I did the logical thing; ate two Clif bars and started to run toward Westbrooke. 

To give a bit of context, that morning wasn't too cold (maybe -15C), but it had snowed the whole night before and as a result the roads and sidewalks weren't properly plowed. I figured that the run was probably about 15km, but that someone going to the race would pick up the guy who is running along the side of the road with snowshoes tied to his bag, right? Wrong.

This is not the face of a guy who may not be happy with his choices

People tell me frequently enough that I'm "crazy" when I tell them of some of the stuff that I do outdoors. This time I thought that I was a bit crazy or stupid too. I realized that to get to the race with no help I had to run at basically my race pace because of the snow. This sign was probably the best thing that I could imagine:

..but I still had a couple of Kilometers..

I got to the race just on time to sign up, but not with enough time to have a bathroom break that I desperately needed. Seriously that chicken.

When I got to the start line, the race organizers was just explaining that some crazy guy had run all the way from Queen's University, and was just in the bathroom so the race would start as soon as he was out.  I realized that there wouldn't be time for the bathroom, so I just got to the start line in time to hear the end of this. I raised my hand and let him know that I was there and the race could start. This was when I knew that I was in a good place - all of the racers (about 50) gave me a round of applause. It almost made the explosive pain in my gut go away. Almost. It did however give me the confidence to be quite assertive at the start of the 6.5km long race. Which looks exactly as funny as you hope it does.

I'm the guy in the white sleeves and green vest slotting into second place. I realized immediately that this was an ambitious thing to do, and if we hadn't been running through farm fields I may have actually pulled off to hide behind a treeline and relieve myself. One guy who I definitely knew to watch out for was my friend (who didn't answer his phone) Derek Snider, a very accomplished runner (having competed and raced internationally) and skier. He's also a pretty nice guy, so when I heard him come up behind me I just got right out of the way. This left me in third place, amazed at the pace of the guys ahead of me, and concerned about the real snowshoe racers behind me.

A snowshoe race obviously must follow a trail of some sort, so there was a very skinny trail packed through the bush. This is pretty hard to navigate on snowshoes, but you definitely want to stay on the trail, otherwise the more snow you're fighting through the harder it will be. In my rush to make it to the start line on time, I put my shoes on the wrong feet, which meant that the binding release was on the inside of my legs. Now, I either have massive calves, very little coordination running in snowshoes, the trail was too skinny, or some combination of all of these but I kept charlie horsing my calves on the snowshoes, causing some pretty serious brusing, and of course loosening of my snowshoe bindings. 

Bruised calves and fantastic PJs

I had fun being in a race situation again, and it was nice to be assertive and own that third position in the race. There was a guy trailing me, but I was in 3rd and the next closest person behind him was too far back to catch us-as long as nothing bad happened.

I talked a fair amount to him, trying to figure out what snowshoe racers were like and what other sports they do. After some fairly one sided conversation he asked me if I did ultra marathons which are basically day long races on your feet. I told him that I did if I felt like it, but not officially (planning on doing one this weekend). I was promptly informed that he's an Ironman Triathlete, and he does ultra marathons too. I guess that these snowshoe racers are pretty hard core!

I tested him by accelerating my pace a few times, and found that I could create a gap between us quickly enough, but I wasn't interested in holding that pace if I didn't have to (remember I had run an hour and a half in the snow just to get to the race). So I held down third place and enjoyed talking at my fellow competitor. I was too tired for my heart rate to go high enough to get me to the point of breathlessness, and I was enjoying what I was doing. No pressure, right?

Looking the part of a guy who's falling asleep in this one (thanks Robby Breadner for emailing the photo)

With just over a kilometer to go, I felt my left snowshoe completely come loose, but I figured that for that distance, I could get away with kind of dragging my left foot, and may still keep my podium finish. After a minute of foot dragging, we were caught by 5th place, and another 30 seconds or so later I totally lost my snow shoe. It was pretty sad, but I had to stop and re attach my snowshoe with my cold hands, and watch the other two run towards the finish (we probably had 800m till the finish). I still came in strong once I re-attached my snowshoe, with a good race smile on my face.

(thanks again Robby Breadner for the photo)

The race was a great experience, I was shocked that there were so many people taking part, and was more than happy with my 5th place finish - if I had wanted to win, I should have taken it more seriously; I went for the fun and enjoyed not being too competitive (and doing well) at a race where nobody knows me. One thing that struck me was just how challenging it is to run in snow with snowshoes. It's tough to balance, it's insanely hard on the calves, and the quads. Just so that everyone is aware, I have since built up a tolerance for Popeyes, so I can exercise and eat it, please don't judge. The real moral of the story here though is that sometimes we all have to do things and if you push yourself really hard, you may find a new sport or do something that you never really thought that you'd be able to do. Now I've got the taste for these races, and I've done more since.

Keep posted for more updates!

The person who caught me at the end of the race and place fourth was Lindsay, Derek's girlfriend and another very fast runner. Yep I got chicked, and I was lucky to have stayed ahead of her so long anyway!

Compasses, maps, and initials all day long

I'm sure that most athletes who have an almost unhealthy focus on a seasonal sport get into a routine in the off season that can seem a bit mundane at times. We all crave that exercise and competition, or even just something to do until it's time to compete in our respective sports again. For me, I just can't wait to ride bikes, my strategy as such is to book myself up entirely for every weekend until bike season is upon us again, and I have varying success in my endeavors. Last weekend I tried out for the Nordic ski team, but it's a very small, pretty elite race squad, and I'm quite new to the sport, so that was a flop. This weekend however, I had the opportunity to take part in an orienteering race through the snow.

A cool landmark in the race, I wonder how long it's been stuck for? (Brad Jennings Photo)

The concept is simple, one hour before start we are all given maps - this race spanned farm fields, forests, canals, creeks, ponds, swamps, rivers, drumlins, hydrolines, and even a university campus. The race format is teams of two, navigating in our own chosen order to try to make it to all of the 20 checkpoints and back in 3 hours. There are only 2 ways to get penalties - being late (penalty of 10 points per minute past the given 3 hours), and losing your punch card (penalty of 100 points). The 20 checkpoints in the race were worth anything from 20 points to the biggest which was worth 70 points, with their value assigned based on how far from the start finish that they are, how technical the terrain was that they are in, and how hard they are to find. Seems simple, right? Right. 

Measuring distances so that we can count steps and get there precisely

My buddy Kelsey and I were team Gnarvest, and friends Matt and Nichola joined as a co-ed team called Matata Hakuna. The race started off pretty well, and almost all of the teams went to checkpoint number 1 first. Then Kelsey and I deviated from the pack and ran straight down a steep ridge to start searching for checkpoint 3.  After number 3 we were the first to make it to checkpoint 20 (worth the most points) and as such I left a yellow C + K unavoidably close to the checkpoint as a calling card. This was a trend that I somehow managed to uphold for 5 of the 20 checkpoints, though admittedly the initials got smaller and smaller. 

Team Gnarvest - also did I mention that I"m always somehow #31? (Brad Jennings Photo)

We got a bit mixed up and lost in the northern boundary of the map for what seemed like forever, but eventually got our bearings and got up to checkpoint number 5, which was inside a massive cedar tree. This is where things went bad for us
"Hey Chris, pass me the punchcard"
"Dude you had the punchcard"
"You're right, Uh oh."

Now we were on the hunt for a white punchcard in the snow, which could have been anywhere as we had run probably 2km since the last time that we punched it. We gave a solid effort of backtracking and scanning the ground, desperately looking for the punchcard as the other teams kept finding checkpoints and filling in theirs. Eventually we just had to call it and get back on track, we figure that we could just punch the map, and if we went really really fast we may be able to still cover a lot of ground.

We may have screwed things up, but at least our uniform was on point
(Just had to get rid of the turtle necks) (Brad Jennings Photo)

This extra pressure brought Kelsey and I to another level of speed (our fastest km in the 3 hour, 20km race was 4:18 on snow and ice) and focus, using the compass and map to pinpoint our next destination with surprising accuracy.

Teamwork and interpretive dance (Brad Jennings Photo)

With Matata Hakuna, teamwork never looked like so much fun (Brad Jennings Photo)

Teamwork was necessary in a lot of different ways during this race; and we did a great job working together. When the bush got too thick we would leapfrog and point a bearing to a tree if we couldn't keep a straight line, re adjusting as we went. Kelsey even helped me up some of the icy hills (his shoes have carbide spikes in them, where mine do not), these were fun times because we got to hold hands and run up hills together <3.  We crossed over frozen water, through the locks north of Peterborough, over tall barbed wire fences, through thick bush, and back to Trent University to be the second team back, managing to get to all checkpoints with 11 minutes to spare. Being the second team back, we got to cheer our friends in.

Kels and I aren't that cute

After the points were tallied (and our 100 points were deducted), it was quite close, but Kelsey and I came out on top with a 10 point lead over second place. Matata Hakuna explored their way into third place for the day, and we all felt pretty great. We worked hard for it, and it was pretty sweet to get to do such a fun race like this, Sure we got soakers, and it was a bit frustrating sometimes being unable to find the checkpoint or being too far off, but we didn't give up and were the only team to get to every checkpoint. Afterward we had a massive sushi lunch at an all you can eat sushi place in Peterborough, and I can't think of a better ending to any story.

Early winter Adirondack trip

I'm sure that everyone has a couple of friends that tend to get them in over their heads. I mean we always have a crazy good fun time, and it's always worth it, but lots of lessons are learned along the way. There was of course the last Adirondack trip, or the impromptu obstacle race, and now backpacking in the snowcovered Adirondacks again. It was another one of those Thursdays, you're not quite sure what you're doing this weekend and you get the call. We had been thinking of doing a trip to the Adirondacks, but there's that transition season between when it's cold, but still traversible with regular gear, and when there's enough snow that you an grip the mountain side again. That window in between is just icy, and not ideal for a big trip.
Luckily for us, the Adirondacks were just getting tons of snow, and conditions were prime for a winter camping and backpacking trip in the mountains. My friends came up Friday night to Kingston and did the responsible thing of going to a party and being DD. After a late night, we got up quite early that morning and headed straight for the border in Kelsey's new car. The border guard was less than impressed with the vomit all over the side of the car (by-product of being DD), but I guess that really wasn't a good enough reason to keep us out of the country.

Cleaning off the side of the car upon arrival just outside of Lake Placid

The first day of hiking we managed 3 different mountains, and had fantastic conditions. Sure it was quite windy at the top, and the fresh snow led to a soaker only an hour in for me, but at least it wasn't too cold to manage!

Nicer conditions when you're still in the tree cover

Hanging out in these winds at the tops of the mountains was fun, but cold!

Coming down these trails was some of the most fun and hard to control hiking/running that I had ever done. The goal is always speed, and the trails are so steep that running down the hills ends up being almost like freefalling down the mountain, planting your feet where you get the opportunity to steer yourself and slow down a little bit. Then having a big pack loaded on your back puts you a bit off balance, so it's all about calculated risks and trying to keep up I guess! 

Walking up the creeks made for extreme danger of soakers

the trails that we had planned to tackle to get up the summits of the mountains had a general trend: they were partially frozen creeks. The area that we were is a conservation area in the mountain range, so as opposed to cut a lot of nice big trails up the mountains, some trails follow creek beds. This makes for the added challenge extra steep and unpredictable trail, as well as the odd wet foot hole. But the views were always worth it.

Stretching it out on the mountain top in front of the stunning scenery

After a couple of different mountain climbs we were all still smiling, not really wearing out too much yet, and Kelsey mentioned how we had had such a great, relaxed day. Matt reminded him that we had been almost running through snow for about five and a half hours, wow, time flies. 

We hunkered into a "lean to" for the night, and I wasn't sure what I was expecting. I knew what I was afraid that a lean to would be, but surely it wouldn't be so bad. 

Cute, right?

And with a view! 

We were starting to get cold after close to 8 hours of hiking in the snow, stopping only to eat chocolate bars, and this didn't seem like a very warm place to be. Luckily I had some dehydrated food and Jack Daniels to warm me up.

It turned out that I was sorely unprepared for the sleeping part of winter camping. JD led me into a false sense of warmth, but my sleeping mat had a hole in it which didn't help, and my sleeping bag was a 3 season bag, plus I only brought stuff that keeps you  warm while you're running, and a flannel shirt. We hunkered in for sleep around 6pm, and got up at 7:30, which is a long time to be in the cold without moving. Precautions that one must take when they've sunken a boot into water, or are doing crazy endurance stuff is to make sure that the boots are not a frozen block in the morning, and to do the same for your water bladder. This means that inside my sleeping bag was me, my boots, and my water bladder. Outside my sleeping bag was the great outdoors, and something like -20C.

By the time the dawn came up I had waited patiently, contemplating every possible piece of gear that I would bring to the next winter camping trip - or just to go bury myself in the snow for the night. I got us up a the crack of dawn, and we got ready to make some oatmeal and get moving. Unfortunately we forgot the oatmeal, so it was another day of eating chocolate bars, my favourite!

We walked down to the nearest creek, broke through the ice and started filling our bladders with water for the day. my hose froze in a couple of minutes, so in order for e to have access to water that day, I had to keep the whole bladder inside my coat next to my body. Once we got moving, it took several hours, but my right foot stopped being so numb! This was a bonus.

Watch the ledge! Cool canyon that we hiked alongside in the morning.

It took us more than 40 minutes to hike to the sunlight, but it was a beautiful clear day!

The thing about such a wonderful, clear day is that it is inevitably cold. And windy. It was so exciting to actually see around me this day, and not have whiteout conditions, and the 100km/h gusts at the top of the mountains were something that I hadn't experienced either.

Kelsey leaning into the wind, Matt looking the other way

Bros on the top of a mountain

Looking forward (we climbed this steep stuff for an hour)

Looking back (so steep of a slope that the trees aren't really in the way of nice pictures)

I seriously enjoyed this trip, and the frost bite and lost toenail are a small price to pay to be introduced to such a great winter passtime. I've invested in some proper stuff to camp with and backpack in the winter, and next time, I'll be ready! 

Canadian National Championships

The past week and a half I've been travelling around with my lovely girlfriend and our bikes, with the goal of finishing inside the top 20 at Nationals. First we set off for Sudbury, which is close to 8 hours drive from where we live in Kingston. The visit to Sudbury was great, I got to hang with some of my all time best buds and the trails were phenomenal, my racing however left something to be desired. I was super strong in flat and uphill sections, but for some reason, I couldn't find my mojo in the rest of the course. Friends said that I looked strong technically through the descents and spectator sections, but I just wasn't going fast enough. To me, the bad race didn't really matter - I was having problems gripping my bars without my gloves, I had to get off and fix my bike once, and most of all, I felt strong again. Any uphill or flat section where I could lay down some good effort I accelerated away from riders nearby, this means that I was in good shape for Nationals 6 days later.
I got down south and practiced the nationals course until I had it pretty well dialed in. I would be racing the elite, 6 lap race at Hardwood Ski and Bike on what will be the Pan American course for the upcoming competitions in 2015. The course had a lot of really cool and intimidating features, and plenty of places to hurt yourself...

This may seem over the top, but it's great!

Unfortunately, Thursday night just before Tori was participating in the Eliminator race, I took a bit of a spill. I came at a feature called "Endo Rock" at a way higher speed than I should have and got off balance mid air. I crashed down about 20 feet after I took off, smashing my chest on my handlebars, and skidding my head along the ground until I hit a log. This left me gasping for air for what seemed like an eternity, and my helmet was cracked in 14 places. I managed to get back on my bike and ride it down the jump track somehow, to make sure that I wouldn't miss Tori's race. When I got there everybody could see that something was wrong; I had blood down the side of my face, my eye was swollen almost shut, I couldn't stand up straight, and breathing pained me a lot. I had the medics on my case right away, checking to see if I had broken my neck, and trying to get me somewhere more stable. I had to watch Tori's race, however so I was a bit of a pain for these guys. I agreed to get out of my spandex, sit down and ice my ribs, but I was not leaving the action until all of my friends had finished racing.
After the racing had finished, my girlfriend and her mother took me in to the big hospital in Barrie (about 20 minutes away), and this was an ordeal. They rushed me straight to the trauma unit, and took 3 vials of blood, got a urine sample, and hooked me up to IV. This was all even more complicated that it should have been because I was quite dehydrated, and the nurses had to work hard to get the needles and tubes into my small blood veins. But I was not allowed food or drink, so that's just that. I was like a child in the hospital, arguing a bit over the IV especially (I don't like morphine), but I've learned that nurses, no matter what, get things their way. This massive intrusion was because they were pretty sure that by the sounds of things I could have damaged my liver or other organs in the area.

All smiles all of the time

The doctor finally got me X-rayed and decided that my organs were fine. Upon looking at the X-rays he showed me what looked like a cracked rib, and explained that the x-rays that he used weren't the highest quality, so we can't really tell what's broken or not but he figured that I'd cracked a couple of ribs and done lots of damage to my cartilage and musculature in the area too. Turns out that they don't really treat cracked ribs anyway, so I just had to wait for a nurse to take my IV out and I would be on my way. The nurse was a no nonsense kind of girl, and when I made mention of the size of my IV tube, she admitted that they put the biggest one in me and pulled it out quickly.
I got talked out of competing in the Nationals race by some good friends, but was pretty bummed to miss my chance, and to come so far and train so much without racing, but at least I could still support my friends while they raced! I'm just really bummed that it shoes a big DNF for "Did Not Finish" beside my name on the results, I hate those..
The next day I was actually recruited to help Pedal Mag with live feed of the race to their website, and got VIP media treatment for the weekend! It was nice to have something to do, and great to be involved, this way I could cheer (though yelling hurt), and do help the magazine all at the same time!

Vous êtes dans la mauvaise province!

The past week and a half have seen a major bike project and a surprisingly fun bike race, so first, the project: to build my own set of carbon wheels. I had broken my rear race wheel with one bad hit while "Gnarvesting" for a weekend with Kelsey at Sir Sam's and was in need of wheels that were once again round. Hopefully some that would stay that way for a long time, but still be light enough to be competitive at the highest level of cross country competition. Also this had to be done on a budget since all costs related to biking basically go into the pile that is the debt that I'll be paying back after I graduate. Chris right now wants good wheels, future Chris who's paying them off may not be so impressed, that kind of thing. So I optimistically bought some carbon wheels from China, and patiently waited for them to be built and to arrive.

The first criteria of a cheap wheel rebuild was that I was only replacing the rims; spokes and hubs had to come from my old wheels. Secondly, I can't afford to pay someone else to build them for me - so I had to do the labor myself. To use the same spokes and hubs I had to get an oversized 30 mm wide set of rims, they're seriously badass, and bigger means better right? At least they're stiffer and should hopefully last longer. It took me most of my Canada Day weekend, but BAM! I have some sweet sweet wheels who's street value may be close to $1600 if they had a name brand on them, and I'm happy about that!

As for riding the new wheels, well they're still round! I love how firm my bike feels when I'm doing technical bits of trail and going off drops or high speed turns or any combination thereof. The bad thing is that I already have one of the stiffest raciest frames on the market (Trek Superfly SL), and with these new carbon rims, I feel the trail a lot! Sure they're fast, but in flat trail where I'd like to sit down that has lots of roots and stuff, my back really takes a pounding. I'll have to grow into them I guess?

Living in Kingston, Ontario has me within a 2 hour drive to the Quebec border, and I needed to tune my legs up and get a feel for them after the problematic month and a half I've been having. I packed up the car, brought the best support I could get, and went to the Camp Fortune Quebec Cup.

Tori gave me a new bottle every lap, and stood out in 30 degree sun, thanks!

The course was super fun - not really much double track, just wide technical trail where you could make some tactical passes - but I saw a few that didn't go so well. I got to the race start a bit later but I heard them calling names so I figured that I'd be called up the same place no matter what. I heard my name said with a thick french accent and thought, "Finally, some respect!" as I grabbed my bike lifted it up high and began to make my way to the front of the group. Everybody stared at me and nobody was making way, when I heard "Do you understand french?" This is attendance." I guess that I wasn't going to get that call up after all...

Once the race had started I wasted no time in getting into the top 10 and riding quickly up the trails alongside the ski hill.

Sneaking up the side

Through the first lap it became apparent that the guys who had raced this course before knew a lot more about how to work the course through the race, and which lines were best to ride. I lost track of the guys ahead of me and was playing cat and mouse with someone trying to catch from behind, trying to keep my pace up through the downhill. By the end of the first lap I had been passed by someone, but I was going into the second lap (of 5) in good position. As I started working my way through the incredibly hot switchback section, unfortunately I had a bike malfunction which took a minute to fix, and lost me a couple of positions.

Keep reading to find out about the dirt on the shoulder, the blood on my knee, and the hole in my shorts!

After fixing my bike and riding on my own for a bit, I noticed that a couple of junior (17-18yr old) riders were catching me from behind, so I slacked my pace and let them pass me so that I could have some riders to pace with. The juniors were a treat while passing me; there was a small section of trail that was maybe wide enough to pass somebody, followed by a 90 degree turn to a steep, wide uphill section. As I was in the first section that I had just mentioned, one junior snuck by me, while the other was yelling for me to get out of the way. Obviously my plan was to wait for about 3 seconds to where the trail widened up enough for the 3 of us to ride side by side and then let them by and ride as the 3rd rider in a train. Junior #1 however in his great rush and excitement fell down in front of me as we were turning into the steep hill, I handily dodged sideways, but junior #2 behind me hit the other kid on the ground, and they took another few minutes to get by me.

Once they had caught me again I was surprised to see that these were not the smooth riders to follow that I was hoping for, but their panicked and excited style of racing kept me going quick - I just needed to give them their space. As we were sprinting along a slightly downhill and rocky section of trail, my chain magically popped apart, and I went down HARD. I pulled the seat out of the left side of my bum and found my chain, wrapped around a tree about 4 feet off the ground. I put the chain back on the bike and realized that it was my quick link that had come out - the one special link in my chain that could be taken apart by hand with no tool. I was a bit confused by his but took my time in putting things back together, got on the bike, and decided to ride a high tempo for the remainder of the race (the weather was 30+ degrees and the following 2 weekends are national level races, no need to over stress my body).

I rode in to a solid 13th place, and had a great time racing at Camp Fortune. It was also great to have some additional support from my buddy Alan, who  brought his super cute 1 year old boy

Hard training can make for a hard time racing!

Much has been happening this summer, life is a little different now, during my first summer as a grad student at Queen’s (taking a two year master’s program in Civil Engineering). Of course I’m finding the time still to train on my bike, and this year I’m training with a power meter every day, which helped me to train this winter and get the speed that I had found in my legs for the first O-Cup. The downside however of being a super motivated guy with a few good results in the bank is that I was pretty sure that I knew everything: I knew that I was fast, I knew how to train really hard, and I knew that I was invincible. Looking back on my training I’m not sure how I did do so well in the first Ontario Cup of the season, but with my boosted confidence I began to train like a madman, pushing myself to my max sometimes four days in a row watching my power output and designing workouts to push myself. I adopted the attitude that if I wasn’t getting to the power I needed, I simply needed to push harder through the pain and keep training, I was on the cusp of racing at pro speed after all, right?

Pretty soon I'll be simulating rivers in this flume!

Tremblant Canada Cup

This attitude led me to some rough racing. There was the Tremblant Canada Cup, a mudslide of an event – and the race to end all bikes. The weekend was fantastic; I rented 3 condos for all of my buddies and I and we had a great long weekend. My nervousness/sore legs showed the night before the race as I was doing an ice bath, I didn’t ride a fast lap (which I always do the day before any race), and I wanted to go to bed early.

I wanted some company in the bathroom to keep my mind off the cold water, then this happened. Good thing I'm the best man at his weeding, right?

On race morning I pushed myself and stayed in the race for two laps, but my fork was totally seized (I was riding an incredibly technical and demanding course with no suspension), making my bike hard and dangerous to race, and I didn’t see the point in racing the whole race because I was damaging my bike, I was letting people pass me in any technical section because it wasn’t fair to slow them down, and one simply can’t race properly if they’re only treating 1/3 of each lap like it’s a race. I dropped out after 2 of 4 laps, and didn’t think much of it. I did however write in my training diary “Not on point” and that was all.

"Racing" up through the village, sometimes a facial expression speaks volumes!
Thanks Joe Bailey for the photo

Check this video my buddy Kelsey put together of the Tremblant descent last year (imagine this with more mud and no suspension)

Mansfield Ontario Cup

The following weekend was the Mansfield Ontario Cup. Historically this has been a fast course for me (it was my top result last year – 18^th place with two flat tires), and I had 4^th call up (meaning that of the racers at this O-Cup only 3 had beaten me in the first one). I had a great day with my buddies the day before, and was very sure of myself in my ability to handle the course at speed. I had a freshly rebuilt fork (thanks Trek Toronto), and loved being called the 4^th fastest guy of the day (before the race). The race begins with a long hill, which I made sure that by the top of I was 4^th, and by the time we came through for a spectator section of tough drops and turns, I was sitting in 3^rd position – ready for my time in the spotlight. I was racing one of my favorite sets of tires, the Bontrager XR0 tires – they have minimal tread but work well and roll fast if you know what you’re doing with them even though my friends thought that it was a bit bold to use them on the sandy course. Anyway, after making it though the intimidating drops and smiling for the cameras, I totally slid out on the corner right afterwards (still in the middle of spectators), and lost 4-5 positions just like that.

Droppin like it's hot (thanks Hannah Clarke for this one)

 I got back on my bike and tried to bridge the gap back to the leaders, and just couldn’t gain any momentum. I watched my power as I was pushing hard, and even my best efforts up the big hills were about 30% below where I should be. I was pretty disheartened the next lap, and even considered dropping out of the race as people kept passing me who I knew I could beat. By third lap I knew I wouldn’t drop out (rather Dead F****g Last than Did Not Finish show up on the results), and in the 4^th lap I began to have fun again, and found my pace for the day. Ironically a spectator can tell my mood during a race by how done up my jersey zipper is. I rode into a 16^th place finish, a far cry from my 4^th place expectations, but still a very good result.

Undone jersey, unimpressed look on my face (Scotty Toucanlife photo)

After I pulled myself together and deciding that I'd better look presentable (Scotty Toucanlife photo)

There was this beautiful surprise though, and she even took me out to dinner with her race winnings!

That's my girl in 2nd place!

Sir Sam's Ontario Cup and Eliminator

Fast forward a few weeks, I’ve had bloodwork done, I’ve been on my own in Kingston (Tori had been at conferences in Halfiax and Portland, Oregon), I’ve been not training much (but also not sleeping much without Tori), and was hopefully fresh ready to race again. I had even practiced the course, on a special weekend training camp with the Mansfield Ontario Cup champion Kelsey Krushel, shredding the course and camping and swimming.

Sir Sam's Jamming

 It was a great course at Sir Sam’s in Haliburton, and though I knew I wouldn’t be close to riding my fastest yet, I was ready for a weekend of fun, camping and swimming, and maybe some racing, including the eliminator.

Good times on the beach with the crew, next OCA calendar cover photo for sure!

Eliminator racing is a short course and it’s a knockout style of race: 4 go into each heat, and two move on until there is one final heat and one final champion. There’s a qualifying round where everyone rides the course (about 2 minutes long) and then we are assigned our heats accordingly. I was somehow ranked 5^th after the qualifier (which surprised me because I didn’t go quite as fast as I could), and was in a great heat with my nemesis for the year Scott L., good buddy from Guelph Will C. and the up-and-coming Theo (who is about 10 years old and half my size). 

Qualifier over the rocks Jim Cassel photo

The eliminator course started in a small straight section then turned 3 times into a pump-track with rocks, then led us out and back in some fast open trail. Unfortunately for me, I didn’t quite get my shoe clipped into my pedal quick enough, and Theo got the holeshot on me! I could have bowled him over to get into the race with the other guys, but really, I’m not about to ruin some kid’s first ever race with some big fast guys. I bided my time and waited until it was safe (by which point the other guys had close to a 100m lead on me (in a 900m course), and called a pass to Theo once the course straightened out. I shot off with an acceleration that even surprised me, and actually caught the other guys pretty quickly. The problem is that I used my “race winning effort” at the start of the race, where Scott and Will both had some gas left in the tank, and handily beat me when it came to the point that mattered; the finish. I had a great time regardless watching the heats go by and I gave Theo a high five, told him good job, and even stuck around to watch his race and podium the next day. Is there any point in being good at a sport if you can’t be a good sport? I don’t really think so.

Bringing up the caboose in the eliminator Jim Cassel photo

The race started with a bit of a mess, and I was not in good position to climb the hill (well all look like ants climbing up it). The hill is about a 5 minute ordeal of zig-zagging up, which was a good opportunity for me to do some hard work and make my way up toward the front of the pack. I had a great first lap jamming with long-time friend Alex Lefebvre (you really impressed me on the downhill buddy!), and bridged away from him up to the next group on lap 2. Lap 3 I spent my time riding with Robin W. and it took me most of the hill on lap 4 to pull  far enough away from him, but then I rode most of the lap on my own. By midway through lap 4 I was beginning to feel the heat, and I was completely aware that I had not had enough to drink (shivers mid-race is usually a great indicator of dehydration/heat exhaustion), but I had no idea what was how bad this was going to get. By the end of the climb on my 5^th lap I figured that I had a good distance on the next guy back, and as long as I rode clean and safe and didn’t fall I’d have 16^th position in the race secured for another week.

It can be a lonely ride up sometimes! (Hannah Clarke photo)

On the technical descent however, I realized what dehydration on such a technical course could mean. The backs of my arms were seizing somehow, along with my quads. Ever get a footcramp? Picture that in your triceps and quads in the middle of a technical race – I’ve had more fun on a bike that’s for sure!

At the end of the downhill I was shocked to see that Mike H., the Norco XC/Downhill rider had ridden like a bat out of hell to catch me, and that I wasn’t so guaranteed that nice 16^th position after all. I had two notable sections to keep him away; a few minutes of technical twisting uphill section, and then the long downhill into the finish area. I picked up my pace as fast as I could through the uphill, and kept him at bay, but once we had gone down a bit of downhill, he was right on my tail again. I shut the door on him a bunch of times, being as wide as I could in the trail so he couldn’t get by, and right before the last technical downhill by the finish I yelled

“NOTHING STUPID, OKAY? WE’LL SPRINT THIS OUT.”

Signifying that passing me on the downhill would get us both hurt and that we had enough flat space down at the bottom to sprint to the finish though the crowds.

No shennanigans on this hill, thanks Hannah Clarke for making my legs look so great in this photo!

Just as I was about to lay down all my force on my pedals to sprint the finish, my chain popped off. It was as simple as that, no sprint for me. I yelled “awwwwwww!” Mike yelled “awwww!” clearly he was looking forward to the sprint finish too, but not enough to wait for me.

Running her through, bike held high and proudly! Jim Cassel photo