For one of the first times in my adult life, I felt an urge to “fit in”.. wear baggies.. wear pads.. a full-face hemet.. ride a bike with more than one gear (although I prolly only shifted three or four times all weekend)… suspension out the yazzoo (and I went out of my way to hit rocks, roots, bumps, drops).
Out of the desire to improve our overall riding technique, to learn some new skills, to see what it’s like to ride down a mountain without working to get to the top, Em and I checked out the Dirt Series training camp finale at Whistler. Big plans, another big weekend trip for us (the write-up for last weekend’s trip to the Chilcotins is on the way)… camping near Whistler, riding, smiling, .. it has to be good… then the Friday rush hour traffic sucked around North Van, but we’re flexible; we decided to just grab a bite in town (and a few beers) before heading out. It’s easy enough setting up a tent in the dark (and this weekend won’t be raining like last weekend, again, more to come in the Chilcotin write-up), besides, we would’ve eaten anyways. Then, in the interest of efficiency, we stopped by the grocery store to get camp food (car camping is so easy). well, too late to make a short story shorter, but we managed to convince ourselves that we should just go ahead and sleep in our comfy bed Friday ngiht and just head out early in the morning to the camp.. Truthfully, it wasn’t very hard to convince ourselves of that. not hard at all. in fact, it was disturbingly easy..
Saturday morning (after more delays than we expected), we were finally up on the mountain with a coach (Julie) learning the proper way to do drops (big compression before going off the edge, loose body, elbows out, absorb the landing with your legs, in the neutral position over your bike).. Easy enough, except that yours truly has spent too many years, dropping off anything in the “racer style”.. meaning that I move my hips back before hitting the edge, and generally return to the neutral position prior to the landing. fast. efficient, not a way to get big air. not a good technique if your hit a drop without sufficient speed. So, most of the morning resounded with Julie’s screams of frustration “Scott.. Keep your hips forward!!!!!”, at least until she showed the class how to drop “racer style”. I was pretty good at that… Of course, Emily’s technique was nearly flawless…
we also rode a few trails, and descended a few steeps.. the class looks on as Em makes it look easy..
The afternoon was spent in a group below our skill level (one of our complaints about the weekend), we rode some fun trails, but they weren’t very challenging and were way too slow. In all, Saturday afternoon pretty much sucked, until the last run of the day, after class. Em, myself, Jay (from NY), and Daniel from Vancouver took advantage of the lift running an extra fifteen minutes for a great set of trails..Hitting some of the steeps from earlier, and descending a black (shleyer).. a most excellent way to end the day. afterwards, while waiting to sign up for Sunday’s sessions, we took advantage of a large cooler full of adult malted beverages (signed up for dirt jumping in the morning and technical riding (with steep shit) in the afternoon..
then, forgoing the burritos provided by the camp (but grabbing them for breakfast the next morning), we chose pizza and beer at Caramba in the village, and then headed out to the campsite to pitch our tents. Funny thing, while registering for a site (we decided to stay in town instead of the provincial park down the road), we opted for a cabin rental instead of a tent. Nice and comfy (again)
Sunday’s toy.. Rocky Mountain Slayer (Saturday I demo’ed the Rocky Mountain Flatline Pro)
The morning was spent learning to jump.. fun stuff, again I have the bad habit of moving my hips back. old (and bad) habits are hard to break, but as we were practicing I was able to see my shadow while landing, giving immediate feedback on my technique, but I was able to consistently clear the tabletop and land smoothly..
as demonstrated by Em…
then we were off to Crank it Up.. a blue run totally pumped on jump steroids.. jump after jump after jump.. the first few on it suck (meaning that they have short ramps, steep lips, decent sized table tops, okay knuckles and steep trannies), but the rest are good fun. a bit too many and too fast for me, but I was able to get after every third jump or so. I think that I would’ve jumped more of them on my Walt, I was still not too comfortable on the flat pedals, but it was good. Overall, the morning jump session was great, a lot of fun, a lot of instruction, a lot of things to practice..
Then, after too long of lunch, and swag give away, and group photo, and tie to fill hydration packs, and receive final instructions..blah blah blah blah.. we were finally under way with the afternoon group. coincidentally, it was us, Jay and Daniel . a well matched group. Kevin was the coach, and local Mark was the sweep. The afternoon was incredible!!! a quick descent down some little techie stuff.. a quick warm-up, some instruction on elevated manmades; instruction as in the West Coast Dismount.. if something goes wrong and you’re losing your shit.. brief trackstand, scan either side of the manmade for the least deadly landing spot, and leap off your bike to the ground, preferable while shoving your bike to land on the other side… then we were off again.. Ninja Cougar, Karate Monkey, Samurai Pizza Cat; short, twisty, tight, rooty, muddy section of trail. It was my turn to lead with Kevin following to offer tips and critiques.. as we’re rocking through he commented that I was riding with “good flow”, I thought that he said “too slow”, so I tried to pick up the pace, only to slide on a few wet roots, caroming off a few trees..
more..more..more..
long set of elevated manmades on Old School
another run down the lower half of the mountain..asking for steeps, we rode shleyer again, and then Crack Addict (which had a few moves too big for us, particularly after watching another guy launch from the top of a drop, land poorly bounce from his bike and narrowly avoid headbutting an immovable object). Heart of Darkness and Devils’ Club..Old School
more more..more..
Let’s go to the top..
Original Sin..Angry Pirate (aarrrrggggghhhhhhh.. “Prepare to be Boarded!!!”")..Duffman..Too Tight..Lower Whistler Downhill..Upper Joyride… Blacks, double blacks, blues.. damn it was good..
The view preceding Original Sin
Em on Shleyer
Kevin suggesting a different line, before nose wheelying down the off-camber steep immediately after the drop (the coaches were damn good!!!)
viewpoint along Original Sin
In all, another phenomenal weekend, new skills, new things to work on. I don’t know that we’d do the camp again, not sure that it’s the best approach for us, but we will go back to Whistler with our bikes, or big bikes, consider getting private lessons and work on bigger air..
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