Canada Cup Race – Canmore

The Canmore race was the final of the 5 round Canada Cup (national) series and there were some pretty big contrasts to the week before in Kamloops.  Firstly of course, the heat – while still not cool temps never exceeded 30 while I was on the course, and there was the added advantage of a lot of shade in the trees.  Secondly, altitude – just shy of 1500m on the start line, topping out at near 1700 on course – this definitely played a part in my week.  Thirdly, the course itself – just over 8km long with 290m of climbing per lap.  Doesn’t soundlike much compared to the 405m (from memory) of the Mt Vic course, but with no easy riding every inch was a challenge, and most of the climbing was done in the first 2km.

It was a real mountain bikers course – rough, rocky, rooty, singletrack galore, steep climbs, unridable climbs, tight and twisty descents, steep chutes – a highlight had to be the coal chutes just before the final climb; 3 sections of steep, loose chutes including tight turns and a drop in  rather than roll in to the middle section if you overshot the line (twice in practice, once in the race).  And it was literally coal.  Suffice to say, this was one place you didn’t want to hit the ground because there was no hiding the fact!  As I was heading up the start climb on my second lap the announcer (who did a sterling job all day) mentioned that one of the event sponsors did a specialist product for getting coal dust out of clothing, haha.

The race was hosted by Rundle Mountain Cycling Club at the Canmore Nordic Centre, which is where Canada’s cross country skiers and biathletes trainyear round.  Every day I went up I came across athletes out training, but of course there’s no snow at the moment so they are on super long skates, still with their poles.  It looks kinda funny but also really cool to see these dedicated athletes training so hard.

Race day was Saturday but by Wednesday the course still wasn’t marked at all and I was unable to find anyone who knew it to show me or mark it out on a map.  So I headed back up on Thursday afternoon and met Andrea in the carpark – she came 3rd at Kamloops – who offered to give me a guided tour.  This was day 4 in Canmore and every dayI felt a little bit better with the altitude but it was still quite noticeable – particularly as we reached the top of the first climb.  There were some Karapoti-esque efforts involved in getting there and I was amazed at my body’s reaction – for the first time in a long time I ran out of lungs before legs.  But then I was treated to the first descent and hooooolyyyyyy that girl can ride a bike down a hill.  I was keeping on her tail ok but really only because I was able to follow her lines.  This was great because I was getting a real feel for the downhill from the start rather than having to build up with each lap.

There was really too much to the course to describe it all in detail but it was definitely a worthy UCI course.  Kamloops would have been great for me if it had been about 15 degrees cooler, but Canmore challenged every aspect of my riding.  For those who know, maybe think Vulcaniser, only double everything.  My fastest lap was 37mins.

Race day…

Sunny skies with a little bit of cloud floating around that wouldn’t amount to anything.  It rained most days for 5-10 minutes fairly torrentially, but then was pretty hot and dry so the course stayed dry – thank goodness because that’s one course that would be INSANE in the wet!

Our race time was 1pm and the first task of the day for me was to find a feeder.  I started chatting to a couple (Anne and Doug) who turned out to be ex-pro downhillers and they agreed to feed me (and the boys – Brad Tilby was also at this race) which was great.  They’d spent many years racing Canada Cup’s and NORBA’s and when they said to me ‘coke on the last lap?’ I knew I had good feeders who understood the drill. 

Thanks again to my UCI points I was called up 3rd this time.  The field was only 14 again, but with a few new faces (with very strong legs and skills).  There was much less dust for this start but it went up, up, up straight away and the 2 girls who led all day showed they meant business right off the line.  I held mid-pack position up the very first part of the climb but dropped to very near the back as the climb continued.  About ¾ of the way up I finally made a place back by taking a hot line on a rooty uphill right-hander and it happened to be Mandy – my ‘hose-shower’ friend from Kamloops.

When I reached the top of the first climb and started the technical descent I expected to see some more girls (because that tends to be what I do).  It was about 5-6 minutes of tough descending and yet I caught no one!  I knew I was going to have to push my downhill here, and here was the proof.

For the rest of the first lap I didn’t see any other girls, but coming in to the stadium I saw a rider about 80m ahead and heard the MC call out a girl’s name, so I set my sights on her for someone to chase.  Going in to the first climb again I noticed another girl so my goal grew to catch them both.  Slowly, up the first half of the start climb, I reeled the first one in.  The second one took a lot longer but I managed to cut in front of her before the 2nd main descent.  I think I held her up coming down there but she wasn’t able to pass on the technical, and I powered up in the short breaks between sections of singletrack and was finally able to drop her up some climbs.  Around half way there was a short, steep climb which was a good land mark, and suddenly a girl came up behind me – Ididn’t recognize her as one I had passed so wasn’t sure where she had come from – possible a mechanical I had missed.  We had a tussle going up the climb with me holding her off, her getting past, me putting in an effort to get past her again, and her seeing and raising to get in front again.  She won that one and had more in the legs to power away on the false flat that followed but I was happy to have had a short battle going on.

About half way up the first climb of my 3rd and final lap I spotted Andrea not too far ahead, and another girl as well, but try as I might I didn’t have enough left in the legs to catch them. Andrea finished in 8th while I was 10th (rounding out the $$ positions) and Mandy had made up some places and finished 11th – right behind me again.  The girl that won in Kamloops came 5th.  I was 20 minutes back on the winner – 1st and 2nd had pinned it all day and everybody was commenting on it.  As for me, I felt I had a good race – I climbed both smart and strong, and lost and gained positions, didn’t stack in the coal chutes (did have one minor off just before them on the last lap).  It wasn’t only physically challenging but also a mentally fatiguing race – which was good because had it been a pure power/grunt course I would have suffered more. 

Anne was brilliant in the feed zone with very quiet , simple words of encouragement at each feed, and heading out on my final lap I heard and saw Kirsty(from England staying at the same hostel) cheering me on.  I didn’t see Patrice (French-Canadian from the hostel) but he was there too, and to top it off as I came towards the finish line on my final lap, with the MC calling out my name and ‘from New Zealand’ which got the crowd going, Team Canada (Janette and Jac from the Capitelle’s) were taking photos and cheering!  That was so awesome – they flew back home to Nova Scotia in May but were over this way for a wedding and raced down to catch some of the race – a fantastic surprise :o)