Road T to Cali!

I tried finding work for the fall but the bush scene has dried up so I have had to resort to plan B, A Road Trip to California! Yah, life is tough in this economic downturn so it looks like the fall is going to be full of spinning pedals, not planting trees. Tommorow its off to the west coast to pick up my Bro and then southward we go. Theres only one thing guranteed for sure on the trip and that is getting stopped at the boarder and being pillaged by the boarder patrol for having hemp seeds on the dash and a sketchy looking black truck.

The unknowns include trying to scalp tickets to a monday night football game in Oakland and racing in the USA Marathon 100 miler finals in Nevada. The race is the main excuse for the trip and has me pretty stoked as its 100 miles through the mtns up and down gold miner trails and down old outfitter trails. They call it the most wild and remote of the 7, 100 mile races and it sounds like an adventure in the making for sure.

After the XC Provincials last weekend it was back to Jasper for the week to ride some local trails I have yet to hit up this summer. After the last 5 days of sweet riding I have confirmed that Jasper is the #1 place to mountain bike in Canada. Other places such as Fernie, or Squamish come close but being able to ride a different trail full of wicked flowing singltrack for 2 weeks in a row without crossing the same line is pretty tough to beat. Add in the road rides up to Cavell, Marmot Basin, Maligne lk or down the south highway through towering mtns and you have a smokin place to ride around. My oppinion may be slightly biased but I was pretty pumped to get out to explore around my own backyard for a while after travelling around for the summer. Later on in September once the races are done it will be time to scale some peaks and check off a few epic rides i've had in the books for a while.

Race Weekend in the Foothills

The Provincial XC race was pretty sweet on the weekend. Thanks to Crazy Larry, the Froehler family and all the other volunteers that showed up things went off pretty smoothly. Having a black bear with her cubs on course chasing racers the day before the race added to the weekend although it seemed a little dangerous so I called the fish and game warden to chase them away. He showed up 26 hrs later, sunday evening as we cleaned up the course. He walked the course with a rifle trying to find the bears. I'm pretty sure he was probably off duty and actually hunting as the last racers had gone home 3 hrs before and nobody is probably gonna ride the course again until next yrs race.

As for the race the local Freewheel Jasper team did pretty good as Loni Klettle won the Elite Womans Race and I won the Elite Mens race. Andrew Bovard was second in Master Sport, Derek Anderson was third in Seniore sport and Angus Jenkins won the U15 Novice mens race. All and all not bad day for the small town of Jasper. Being the race organizer I didn't think I was going to get to race but thanks to all the helping hands I was able to hop on my bike at the last minute. Cody Canning kept things close for a couple laps before I gapped him on the climbs as I was pretty motivated to get my first Provincial Jersey. Pretty stoked to be able to win a race so close to home and have the chance to wear the Provincial colours next yr!

After the race Crazy Larry kept everyone entertained giving away swag and tossing out comments from left field that only he could think of. Sunday night Larry and Brian Bain stayed at my house. We were all bagged but Larry iniated a midnight game of glow in the dark frissbee with a bunch of 15 yr old girls in the middle of the street and then a strobe light dance in my living room (without the 15 yr old girls). Spending the weekend with Crazy Larry was memorable to say the least. On Monday he set off from Jasper with a 50 lb backpack on his way to Banff with a random lady from Australia. They were hoping to make it there by Tuesday morning. Haven't heard from them yet but I'm sure they made it or are out there swinging off a bridge somewhere along the way.

One of Crazy Larrys many dreams is to be able to bike to races across the province to announce at them. If anyone has any ideas to how we can get him a decent bike to do this let me know as he is a great guy with a heart of gold and the ability to make a chess match between two 85 yr old blind men more exciting then any superbowl or world series game. Crazy Larry will be at next yr's event as we hope to fill the weekend with a xc race, night crit, marathon race, midnight game of glow in the dark ultimate frizzbie and dancing Costa Rican girls!

XC Provincials

This weekend is the Alberta XC Provincials in Hinton. Nathan Froehler (Hinton race organizer from 2002) came up a few days ago and we've been sprucing up the trails he built over a decade ago into what is becoming a kick ass xc course. People will suffer tommorow on the relentless course, especially in the 30 degree heat. If your sitting at home this weekend not sure what to do you can still show up tommorow morning and sign up on race day and transform a non eventful weekend into a biker riders ecstasy. Go to www.albertabicycle.ab.ca for more info.
Rumour has it Crazy Larry will be on site heckling riders as they ride through in pain.

The 9.5 km course is wild and rugged with a super sweet 7 min technical decent followed by a cruisy 18 minute climb back up to the start all of this taking place in the middle of the wilderness with moose and grizzlys around as we saw both yesterday. We will be putting out jars of honey along the course to insure more Grizzlies are out to watch the race tommorow. Tune into TSN or CTV Sportsnet TV tommorow night for full race coverage or if they don't make it out you'll be able to check out the post race report on www.pedalmag.com.