Updated SSCXWC08 Results and Provincial Championships

Before I get into the dirt (bad pun intended and acknowledged) of this weekend, check out the updated Single Speed Worlds results, after they found my missing lap, I ended up 4th in Sunday's race behind Sue Butler (current champion), Wendy Williams (previous champion), and Megan Farris.

This weekend found us in Surrey on Saturday for BC Cup Finals and Burnaby on Sunday for BC Provincial Championships.

Surrey's race was put on by SORCE bike club and was a backwards version of the previous Surrey bike park course. Although the course was well marked, I didn't seem to have the same flow as the first course...but the race was great all the same! The women's fields have been getting smaller and smaller each weekend, so this weekend we left the startline with 4 girls. Jean Anne McKirdy took a decisive lead within the first 1/2 lap and stayed gone throughout the race. Melanie Vaughn and I battled back and forth throughout the race. Melanie rode a very clean race and passed me during errors, and I would chase back on during the two climbing sections.

The course started on an uphill paved road, took a right into a succession of gravel, grass, muddy corner, grass, gravel and then around through some sketchy loose gravel, into grass and barriers, around more muddy grassy corners, down last races run-up, then up a sometimes-rideable climb. From there we headed around more corners, up a gravel climb, ducked into the trees for open fast singletrack, across the road with wheel-eating curbs (for those of us not so skilled at bunny hopping), up an off-camber ride/run section, through more tight turns and slippery sections, down a walking path and then around a 180 degree turn that dumped us back to the starting area.

The race was well organized and a lot of fun, a great warm-up for Sunday!

Sunday's race, BC Provincial Championships, was put on by Escape Velocity in Burnaby's Foreshore park. The park is located in an industrial area on the river and created a cross course that was a relatively flat course with a mix of smooth singletrack, fast walking trails, rough grass sections, two rideable sand pits, and one running sand pit. Within the terrain the course designers embedded lots of turns and terrain changes in the middle of these turns. The course forced you to get off the bike 4 times a lap and constantly turn your brain from fast-twitch reactions to slow-technical skill.

This season we haven't had as many double header weekends as last year, so I wasn't sure how my legs would take the double-duty. Off the line they were slow to react and I stayed in the back of the 6 person group to warm up a bit. When Dawn Anderson and Jean Ann McKirdy surged I moved up in the group to sit behind Melanie Vaughn, hoping that we would jump in behind them. Dawn and Jean Ann surged ahead and stayed together battling it out for the rest of the race while Melanie and I pulled away from the rest of the girls. Melanie gapped me and settled into a pace that kept her consistently in view. In the 3rd lap I tried to catch back on, caught on to her, but couldn't pull ahead. I sagged back a bit in order to take my own lines through the corners until the final lap. I spent the first half of the final lap closing the gap between Melanie and I, finally passing her on a straight stretch of walking path. This allowed me to go into the final barrier in front, leading into a straight stretch, and then into the sand pit. Coming out of the sand pit I focussed on clipping into my pedals (which I'd been struggling with all day--I need more practice with clipless pedals apparently!) and sprinting as hard as I could to the line to come in in 3rd place.

Sunday's race was by far the hardest race of my season, my legs never felt great, but never felt terrible either...waffling in between lactic screaming and promises of strength. One of my biggest weaknesses all year has been in the tactics of racing and Sunday's race was one of my best tactical races--hang on, know when you need to get in front, and use all the will power possible to get there.

This weekend we are home and next weekend we are off to Portland for my last two races of the year--the USGP's!

Shiny, Pretty Things!

In my last blog I alluded to the new stuff Shimano hooked me up with last week. Previously my bike had a mix of 105, Ultegra, and Ultegra SL and some Chris King wheels--It was basically a bombproof bike. The durability of everything on it was wicked, but not necessarily the lightest.

Just before leaving for SSCXWC08 I got a box with new M300 Mountain bike shoes which are custom fit so no break-in time! I was able to wrangle Gerry into fitting them for me before the weekend and wore them for the first time at the SSCXWC qualifying event--no blisters!

The most exciting part of the box, however, almost made me skip SSCXWC--a full Dura Ace 7800 group with WH-7850-C24-TU wheels--In English: a 2008 Dura Ace group with low-profile tubular carbon rims!

I had to wait until after SSCXWC to build up my bike with gears, but as soon as we got home (and after our Remembrance Day mountain bike ride up to the Cairn on Mount Prevost) I tore the World Champion away from rebuilding his bike and setting up mine. My bike dropped close to 1.5 pounds with the switch, and gained a huge amount in performance!

105 Shifters are great because they are double and triple compatible, so it makes them very adaptive--key when you maybe don't know exactly how you'll be using the bike in the future. So if you want to go from a double chainring to a triple all you have to change are the crank and the front derailleur--which is way more affordable than having to change the shifters as well. For a race machine though, the Dura Ace shifters are ultra-smooth, light, and take away a few extra clicks. The group is designed (like all Shimano products) to work the best when used together, so having the complete drivetrain makes the bike shift and ride like a dream.

Onto my favourite part...the wheels. Drew taught me early on in our relationship that wheels are close to the most important part of the bike--they determine how much/how little/what type of feedback comes off of the road (or cross course!) and are one of the easiest ways to save noticeable (rotational) weight. These wheels are a cross-rider's dream come true! Out of the saddle sprinting they are stiff and responsive, they weigh in (with Tufo Cubus 32 tires and D/A skewers) at 2290 grams (1250g w/o tires and skewers), and they are built to be durable and strong.

Getting more techy with them, they employ proprietary Shimano carbon construction--Shimano does a brilliant job with their XTR rear derailleur in making super light, super tough carbon cages and for the new Dura Ace 7900 group they take their carbon skills honed from years of application in fishing technology and apply it throughout the group for one of the most aesthetically pleasing, lightweight, durable, and functionally gorgeous groups ever. Period. Back to the wheels though, the rims are 28 and 24mm sections to cut through air, and mud, like a dream, and the hubs sport wider flanges for stiffness and strenth. The rear hub has a titanium freehub body that engages faster than the older hub models for better power transfer (it is also lightweight, but more durable than aluminum bodies against cogs digging into the body). Beyond that, the hubs use Shimano's bearing technology which have been proven throughout their component lineup and make their hubs and bottom brackets some of the most reliable in the industry.

Basically, what this all boils down to is an amazing 17.5lb race machine! (Thanks to the team at Shimano Canada) I am looking forward to racing it this weekend in the BC Cup finals back at the South Surrey Bike Park, and BC Provincial Championships on Sunday in Coquitlam.

Racing, and more Racing!

I have, admittedly, been terrible at posting this month...I think I did this towards the end of mountain bike season as well--the racing and working fatigue tackles me and drags me away from the computer (and oh, the bike maintenance!). The last few weeks have been filled by bike makeovers from geared to single speed, then back to geared....but on some fancy new components from Shimano!

First off, the Surrey Bike Park BC Cup. This race was put on by Team Peninsula Cycles. The venue was relatively small, but they did an awesome job using all the space they could to make a twisty, off camber, technical race course with some of the best "flow" of the season--they even inadvertently added in flying softballs that were landing on the course from the adjoining bear league! This race was my best race of the year, I felt great from the whistle and rode a really technically sound race. Melanie Vaugn and I chased Kelly Jones for most of the race until finally I tried to bridge to Kelly. I didn't make it, but felt great about the ride! Drew battled it out with Kevin Calhoun until the final lap when he rode in for the win!

We booted it back to the ferry and home and, taking advantage of the workstands at Straight Up Cycles we transformed our bikes into Single Speeds to practice for Single Speed World Championships at the Fletcher's Farm Island Cup on Sunday (the next day). Drew decked his bike out with moustache bars and I kept mine traditional with drop bars and Shimano R600 brake levers.

The next day's race was held just outside of Parksville at a farm. The course is technical with a gross, peanut-buttery mud field, a mud hole that threatens to swallow your front wheel on every lap, and a creek crossing that, in years past, has been above BB height. Luckily this year the field was mostly rideable (but the switchback in it was slow and painful), the creek was just a trickle, and the sinkhole kept its hands off of my front wheel (though others were less lucky). Off the gun we ran up the field on the course, zigging and zagging....a Le Mans start--cyclists are typically not the prettiest runners out there. When I got to my bike, the fun began, I spun out anywhere that was flat or mild descent, and any climbs or mud (i.e. the whole course) were a grunt. The real fun was in the technical where I forced myself to ride obstacles faster than normal knowing that momentum was going to be my only friend in the game. Midway through the race, with a mud-covered face, I informed Drew how much I was suffering...but loving every minute of it. By the end of the race I came 4th against all the geared girls, but had a blast and learned a bit about my technical skill. Drew, per his usual, showed me up as he single-speeded his way to the finish in first place, comfortably in front of the rest of the geared guys.

I spent the rest of the week trying to recover my blown legs and back, and then on Friday we headed down to Portland for SSCXWC08. Saturday morning we rolled out of bed, got breakfast, and headed to the Chris King factory to meet for the time-trial qualifier for the race on Sunday--it was pouring rain! Once there we checked in, figured out our start times, and got ready to go. As we were riding to the ultra-secret TT course Drew and I started recognizing where we were...we had ridden there last March on our vacation in Portland. The course was a hill climb followed by a technical mountain bike-ish descent. The starts were 15 seconds apart, off my start I concentrated on the girl in front of me and reeled her in, over the 15 minute time trial I caught around 8 girls, some on the climb, some on the descent, and felt great...although the legs were burning! According to the results, I finished the time trial in 3rd behind Sue Butler and Emily VanMeter, but several race reports had me finishing up in 2nd, either one was a great way to start the weekend! Drew finished off the TT in 2nd to Kevin Hulick and Tyler Trace finished up in 14th.

That night we headed to the Vanilla Bicycles workshop, which is as tasteful as the bikes, simple, understated, but inviting. Walking around checking out all the well-spec'd bikes, Drew mentioned several times "I want one of these." After Vanilla we headed out on the town and ended up having a bowling competition at The Grand Central Lanes where they have great food and servers for every lane. Not a family-friendly venue, but great fun. Drew and Nick showed their skills while Tyler and I battled it out for 3rd place. Nick and Drew tied by the end of the night, with me settling into 3rd (seems to be a pattern). A bowl-off between Nick and Drew will be soon to come! (USGP's?)

The next day we lazed around and then headed to the race. It started off with a (I'm ripping this comparison off from someone else's blog...but it really is appropriate) Braveheart starting line of people 70 wide and 3 deep. The women were supposed to start 30 seconds after the men, but at the gun everyone went. After 50 feet it went from football-field wide to freight-elevator narrow and quickly (for those of us mid-pack) became a parade of sorts. I used my lack of height and sobriety to stealthily pick my way through the pack, over the barriers, onto my bike...then through the foam wall....yes, foam wall....we blew through that every lap hoping that there was no downed riders or small children on the other side. After a corner and a brief straight-away we were headed up a run-up with a triple barriers (I would hate these by the end) and, at the top, the Yakima windmill with 4 blades. The crowd controlled the blades and you had to time your run through the windmill perfectly or risk getting hit. Into a slippery off-camber corner, a straight-away, more mud, more off camber, and back to the beginning. The course was very different from anything we see in BC, but really fun and fast. My gearing was a little on the light side and I was spinning out all over the place, but was riding the muddy, off camber sections well. I rode just behind Sue Butler and Wendy Williams for the first 2 laps, but lost them on one of the straight-aways. I didn't get passed by another girl, but battled it out with a few different guys, some better at technical elements, some more fit/bigger gears. The results had me listed as 19th, but next to some girls I lapped...so I am guessing that in the confusion of people at the race, one of my laps got missed--but the race was all for fun!

After finishing I found out that Drew won--which means he gets his tattoo, the golden speedo, and a SpeedVagen frame from Vanilla. He gave a brief interview and geography lesson when he informed people that Canada "is a small republic above the U.S." and then retreated to congrats from the guys he was racing around.

I've posted pictures on my Facebook, but here is a link to one of the better collections from the weekend:

http://pdxcross.com/2008/11/11/sscxwc08-sunday-photo-slideshow/