Last night about 15 riders assembled at Hampton Park ready for what Grant had on tap: whisky, a jug of hot tottie, and an exciting race course. Blinding lights mounted to heads and bikes, we toured the course and quickly became befuddled by many an unmarked turn. Ok, cyclocross meets Itidarod meets orienteering, I can get down with that, even if some refer to me as Surch and Rescue. Not because I do the searching and rescuing....
The format was simple: clomp to the centre of the baseball diamond, stand there. Wait for a false start, then go again for the real start that seems false. Jump the fence. Get on your bike. Proceed to stunt #1, the skinny, a bench ride. Sweet, ride that and you save doing the ride-around. Out into a field, tight turn, try to ride a ribbon of grainy snow; extremely challenging. I think Rob alone cleaned it. Turn, turn, drop into the pool and hit the snow ramp to exit. Head into woods, singletrack, down a bank, back up, more singletrack, descent to a bumpy ribbon shortcut, icy road climb, singletrack, down and up the same bank again, singletrack, wide open through the park back to the baseball diamond. Rinse (every other lap, whisky or hot tottie), repeat.
After a slow start, my heart rate was spiked and stayed that way, 84% of max acerage the whole time. Why? 'Cause Rob, Neil and Jim were pinning it, and I didn't want to navigate! Or get dropped; lets be honest.
Jimbo's vintage Stumpjumper with DH tires rolled well, but he might have succumbed to ice, as Rob, Neil and I shed him after a lap, and continued on with Martin in pursuit. Somewhat surprisingly, we all stayed upright, though Neil managed to come off the pace one way or another. Next time lets start at the back, ok guys? I don't want to taste blood in the winter.
While Neil took a shortcut through the ball diamont to regain contact, Rob waited for me to tie my boot, and we were off. Neil came unhitched again (heart-rate monitor malfunction, he claims), so Rob and I headed into the last two laps together, Rob leading. I knew it would be extremely difficult to come around for the finish, but tried anyhow, crashing and bashing over ice ruts as Rob powered on. He nipped my by 6", then dynamically dismounted and hopped over the fence while I did my best not to run him over. WTF? Ohhhhh, LeMans finish too. Right, didn't catch that. Rinse.
Martin came in next, followed by the rest, all smiling. Definitely a success, and I'm sure everyone is looking forward to the next race.
Video By Yariv
Photos, snapped by Will, can be found here.
Keep an eye on the event site, http://lowpressureproductions.blogspot.com/ for more.
Don't forget about the Fat Bike Demo on Saturday at Mooney's Bay!
2 comments:
For the record, most of us refer to you as Surch and Destroy...
I like that better than Surch and Rescue....
Post a Comment