Thebrysonclan’s Blog

The course ended up right in the Village for all to see

This past weekend riders from BC and Alberta gathered at the Kinking Horse resort in Golden BC for the Western Cup Mountain Bike race. This was the second bike race of its kind and not to be the last. With the numbers almost doubling from last year I can only imagine what they will be like next year.
Picture of the pits – Wish I didnt give Buckwheat any time off

For those that haven’t been to kicking horse (like myself) its one big mountain. With an 18 minute gondola ride right into the alpine its decent is probably one of the longest in BC. I’m not to up with the vertical feet at kicking horse vs. the vertical feet elsewhere but it’s pretty long. The trails start out very rocky open alpine single-track and then flow into just about any trail you would like. If you are into the skinnies they’ve got that, if you are into fast open trails with jumps they’ve got that, if you like the steep tech they’ve got that too. For just under $40 you can ride all day, or until your body tells you it’s time to stop.

Since Buckwheat wasn’t there look who I had to help me with my bike

Practice day started at 10 in the morning just like any other race, with long line ups. It’s not that the line up is long it’s just that you want to ride your bike so bad it seems long. Since the mountain is so big you had to ride about half way down before you get to the course. This had its positives and negatives. The positive being a 10 minute warm up and the negative is too much time spent warming up so it takes time from the actual riding course in which case you get fewer runs in.

Kicking Horse rents Specialized

There wasn’t too much pedaling at the top of the course. It started with a couple pedals into a left hander and then it was time to hold on. It was a single-track ride pretty much the whole way down. For those who know Kicking Horse, the track starts in Pioneer and by passing all the big stunts go right into Claim Jumper, then finish off into a new section of trail called Prairie Rose built by a bunch of Albertans. The new section of trail was built to join the bottom part of the track into Kicking Horse Village. I thought it was great to incorporate this new piece of trail, mostly because I think there should always be a bunch of pedaling in a DH race and it was a long traverse. This new section was built to combine to bottom of the course to the village.

In the end I think the BC riders won with the3 fastest times but that isn’t how it all added up. We had a Golden local get the fastest time and won the junior category, the 2nd and 3rd fastest times were 1 and 2 in the pro category. First place was Luke Nelson and myself in second place. They end up adding up points from the results using the top 5 in each category. Alberta ended up with 105 points and BC ended up with 47. I think after I finish preaching to everybody I know BC will be in full force next year.

All the Albertan’s that helped beat BC

I thought this event was really well put together, the organization was top notch, the course was top notch, the party/race meeting on Saturday was top notch and everyone seemed like they were having a great time except the commissioners. For some reason they can never smile, I guess you’ve got to be grumpy to be a commissioners I’m going to be back next year with a BC contingent ready to race.

The clan 2 and 3 on the podium

I wanted to give a shot out to the second place woman – She crashed, broke her wrist, smashed her bars back into place and finished the race

bryson