This is the recap from stage 3. You can check out Stages 1 and 2 here: http://www.ridemonkey.com/forums/showthread.php?t=186913
The rest of the race kinda went like this:
STAGE 3, The Yeti Cycles ‘Drifter’ DH
Tension was a little high on Sunday morning as the remnants of a thunderstorm that had raged throughout the night threatened to hang around, keep the course greasy and throw a serious monkey wrench into the plans to host a hypothermia-free event. At the start of practice at 10AM the clouds began to burn off and as the first riders came through the finish it became apparent that mud tires weren’t going to be needed. The top half of the course was mostly rock and sand. That fact combined with the quality of the build and a bit of rider pressure quickly turned it into ‘hero-dirt’. About halfway down the course that rock and sand turned to soil and there’s where the fun really began. Kain Leonard described it best when he said “Imagine the best powder day you’ve ever had. That’s what this dirt was like.” After a pause he followed up with “this is the best dirt I’ve ridden in 10 years”. Or was that Telluride he was talking about. Can’t remember. Too many good courses.
Racing was tight throughout the day as some categories were separated by less than a couple hundredths of a second. Riders were doubly stoked that CJ Timing was back on board to finish out the season for the remaining G3’s and Mountain States Cup races. Cath and John had results up within seconds of each category’s finish and had their usual setup including time clock and real-time results announced for everyone at the finish line. ‘Mr. Mouth’ Mike Kreger kept things lively with an audacious and entertaining running commentary throughout. (If there’s another gravity promoter out there reading this, get in touch with me if you need an announcer and I’ll pass Mike’s info along – I’ve never heard better announcing at an event. He’s that good. But don’t say anything to him ‘cuz right now I’m paying him in t-shirts and 10-year-old Oury grips.)
Racing started at noon and by about 1:50 we were sending our Vet Pro/Old Bull/Jedi Master Pro/Am field down the course. Big Crank rider Matt Thompson put up a fast time early and took his place on the hot seat, but shook his head from side-to-side when the announcers wondered over the mic if it would hold. Nobody was more surprised than Matt (who had left Whistler to attend the SolVista G3 and had arrived with 2 lungfuls of the Canadian Crud) when the final rider in the Old Bull category and the overall leader Dan Weinman (Paradise Power.Net) rolled through with a 2:26.39, .65 seconds slower than Thompson’s time.
Weinman did enough to win however, and his combined time of 9:42.55 placed him just over 4 seconds up on Mojo Wheels’ Troy Cooperman who nailed down second. Rounding out the Jedi Master podium were Thompson, Better-Ride’s Gene Hamilton and Mojo’s Josh Baden. After three stages less than 15 seconds separated 1st through 5th.
Next up were the Semi-Pros where Orbitt Racing’s Mr. Mouth Mike Kreger held a 1.35-second advantage over riding bud, Mojo rider Szymon Kowalski. Within view of the finish Kreger lost control of his bike over a small rock drop and for almost 75 yards tried to rein it back in, the whole time looking like the proverbial monkey makin’ sweet love to the football. Rein it in he did though, but not quite in time as he blew through the tape at the upcoming corner, then blew back through it from the other side to get back on course. A quick consult of the NORBA rulebook (c’mon USA Cycling! – 279 pages for road racing and a page-and-a-half for the entire sport of mountain biking?) Kreger was handed a 3-second relegation that ultimately figured heavily in the overall.
With Kreger’s relegation, Taylor Hatton (Paradise Power.Net) from Angel Fire, NM (and winner of the opening DH round of the 2007 Mountain States Cup) took the overall. Strong and consistent riding won the day in Semi-Pro with Kowalski (Mojo Wheels), Huntington Beach, CA’s James McNeill (The Path) and Feral Terrier Racing’s Joe Hanrahan rounding out the overall podium. 14.99 seconds was the official time gap between 1st and 5th after three stages.
In the Pro Women’s field Myklak and Hippely had crawled back into contention with strong Super-D results. Buchar currently sat in second place in the overall, but a serious crash by Myklak and an unsurprising return to form by Buchar erased all doubt who the fastest rider was on this weekend. Buchar grabbed first on the stage and first in the overall taking first place in the overall by 17 seconds. Rounding out the podium were Harmony in second, Hippely in third, Elworthy in 4th and Carolyn Yeaton in 5th. A few words on Myklak's digger: ever been stunned? Myklak went down hard. Most men would have laid there until the stretcher arrived. Lisa shook it off and rode the remaining portion of the course with a seriously contorted cockpit and an only slightly less serious blow to the head and upper body. There's a short list of notable performances that rise above all the rest for the weekend. Myklak's gritty display is pretty near the top of it.
And then there was one. One category that is. Pro Men. All eyes turned uphill as the Pro Men were fired downhill in 60-second intervals in reverse order of their standings in the overall. The hotseat must have changed hands at least 10 times in the last 15 riders and in the end, .51 seconds separated 1st and 5th. Van Dine, the third-to-last rider ended up putting together the most complete run of the day (so far), posting a top time of 2:19.04 and sat in the hotseat. The crowd waited to see what nastiness Kovarik was going to throw down and was in shock as 2:19, then 2:20 rolled by and still no sign of Kovarik. At last he rolled around the corner and even from the announcers’ table you could make out the sketchy front-end – Kovarik had blown up his front wheel. Chris finished with a 2:36.49. His overall podium spot severely damaged, he still wowed spectators on-course as he boosted each and every feature. Including a triple. With a flat tire. Stud.
In the end, Van Dine’s margin of victory wasn’t enough to pull him into first in the overall. Mr. Consistent, Todd Olsen (Recycled Ski and Sport) from Silverthorne, CO ended up on the top step of the podium and with the big-ass check in his hand. What did Olsen have to say? “For the first time ever, I’m going to make a mortgage payment early.” Sweet. Kain Leonard landed in 2nd, just .07 off the lead. In third sat Kovarik, just 1.8 seconds off the pace even after his stage 3 wheel meltdown. 4th place went to Van Dine, just 3.5 seconds off the lead and 5th place went to a resurgent Dave Camp from Big Crank Racing.
In closing…I try not to use this word at all. In a community like Breckenridge it seems like it’s the third or fourth word out of every slacker, grommet or park rat’s mouth, but…
SolVista was SICK. There. I said it. Sick, sick, sick, sick and SICK. Free lift, flowy trails, hero dirt (especially on Sunday), amazing courses and format, free beer, free food, sweet tech expo and some of the best riders in the world to watch. Add to that long list the fact that the resort folks were incredibly gracious hosts. There are pics to be had if you care to see ‘em. Head to VastAction.com.
It seems as if we’ve put the ‘year of crazy timing’ behind us now that CJ is back in the mix. I think that there have been some thoughtful improvements in the MSC Series this year, not the least of which is adding the G3 to Bigfoot’s list, but I know that we vastly underestimated CJ’s contribution to growing the series and I for one look forward to MSC Series Finals in Keystone and the upcoming G3 at Angel Fire with a lot less anxiety.
Big thanks-yous go out to:
Santa Cruz – for supporting Rocky Mountain Racing
Dale’s Pale Ale – For the beer. For the Chicken. For being committed.
Spike Shooter – For keeping us going. For underwriting all of racing.
Static/DopeBMX – for the sweet, sweet number plates
Shimano – For believing. For listening. For getting on board.
Fox Racing Shox – for Mike Van Linden
SolVista Basin at Granby Ranch – for allowing us in. For being great partners and hosts
And in no particular order, Hayes, DT Swiss, Manitou, Maverick, Sun Ringle, Titec, Accelerade, Smith, Control Tech, e.thirteen, The Fix, Wheat Ridge Cyclery, Mountain Bike, Liquid Inc Design, Rocky Mountain Roastery, Vast Action Photography, Pearlizumi and Kenda. Something as cool as the SolVista G3 just doesn’t happen without all of your support.
Hope to see you in Angel Fire. We’ve got $10,000 more dollars to give away.
MikeMac
Bigfoot Productions
Breckenridge and Golden, CO
mikemac@bigfootproduction.com
970-333-1159
The Rocky Mountain G3 Gravity Series and The Mountain States Cup regional Championship Mountain Bike Series are the property of Bigfoot Productions. Which is owned by Yeti Cycles. Which is in Golden, Colorado. We believe that great racing helps grow the sport of cycling. We believe that it grooms future champions that will one day stand atop podiums in remote parts of the world wearing stars-and-stripes jerseys. We think racing should be competitive, but not at the cost of being un-fun. We also believe that there’s room at the table for all bike manufacturers, not just us. For more info on us please head to www.yeticycles.com, www.racemsc.com or www.g3gravityseries.com. Or just call or email. As Kreger would say, “whatever, dude”.
The rest of the race kinda went like this:
STAGE 3, The Yeti Cycles ‘Drifter’ DH
Tension was a little high on Sunday morning as the remnants of a thunderstorm that had raged throughout the night threatened to hang around, keep the course greasy and throw a serious monkey wrench into the plans to host a hypothermia-free event. At the start of practice at 10AM the clouds began to burn off and as the first riders came through the finish it became apparent that mud tires weren’t going to be needed. The top half of the course was mostly rock and sand. That fact combined with the quality of the build and a bit of rider pressure quickly turned it into ‘hero-dirt’. About halfway down the course that rock and sand turned to soil and there’s where the fun really began. Kain Leonard described it best when he said “Imagine the best powder day you’ve ever had. That’s what this dirt was like.” After a pause he followed up with “this is the best dirt I’ve ridden in 10 years”. Or was that Telluride he was talking about. Can’t remember. Too many good courses.
Racing was tight throughout the day as some categories were separated by less than a couple hundredths of a second. Riders were doubly stoked that CJ Timing was back on board to finish out the season for the remaining G3’s and Mountain States Cup races. Cath and John had results up within seconds of each category’s finish and had their usual setup including time clock and real-time results announced for everyone at the finish line. ‘Mr. Mouth’ Mike Kreger kept things lively with an audacious and entertaining running commentary throughout. (If there’s another gravity promoter out there reading this, get in touch with me if you need an announcer and I’ll pass Mike’s info along – I’ve never heard better announcing at an event. He’s that good. But don’t say anything to him ‘cuz right now I’m paying him in t-shirts and 10-year-old Oury grips.)
Racing started at noon and by about 1:50 we were sending our Vet Pro/Old Bull/Jedi Master Pro/Am field down the course. Big Crank rider Matt Thompson put up a fast time early and took his place on the hot seat, but shook his head from side-to-side when the announcers wondered over the mic if it would hold. Nobody was more surprised than Matt (who had left Whistler to attend the SolVista G3 and had arrived with 2 lungfuls of the Canadian Crud) when the final rider in the Old Bull category and the overall leader Dan Weinman (Paradise Power.Net) rolled through with a 2:26.39, .65 seconds slower than Thompson’s time.
Weinman did enough to win however, and his combined time of 9:42.55 placed him just over 4 seconds up on Mojo Wheels’ Troy Cooperman who nailed down second. Rounding out the Jedi Master podium were Thompson, Better-Ride’s Gene Hamilton and Mojo’s Josh Baden. After three stages less than 15 seconds separated 1st through 5th.
Next up were the Semi-Pros where Orbitt Racing’s Mr. Mouth Mike Kreger held a 1.35-second advantage over riding bud, Mojo rider Szymon Kowalski. Within view of the finish Kreger lost control of his bike over a small rock drop and for almost 75 yards tried to rein it back in, the whole time looking like the proverbial monkey makin’ sweet love to the football. Rein it in he did though, but not quite in time as he blew through the tape at the upcoming corner, then blew back through it from the other side to get back on course. A quick consult of the NORBA rulebook (c’mon USA Cycling! – 279 pages for road racing and a page-and-a-half for the entire sport of mountain biking?) Kreger was handed a 3-second relegation that ultimately figured heavily in the overall.
With Kreger’s relegation, Taylor Hatton (Paradise Power.Net) from Angel Fire, NM (and winner of the opening DH round of the 2007 Mountain States Cup) took the overall. Strong and consistent riding won the day in Semi-Pro with Kowalski (Mojo Wheels), Huntington Beach, CA’s James McNeill (The Path) and Feral Terrier Racing’s Joe Hanrahan rounding out the overall podium. 14.99 seconds was the official time gap between 1st and 5th after three stages.
In the Pro Women’s field Myklak and Hippely had crawled back into contention with strong Super-D results. Buchar currently sat in second place in the overall, but a serious crash by Myklak and an unsurprising return to form by Buchar erased all doubt who the fastest rider was on this weekend. Buchar grabbed first on the stage and first in the overall taking first place in the overall by 17 seconds. Rounding out the podium were Harmony in second, Hippely in third, Elworthy in 4th and Carolyn Yeaton in 5th. A few words on Myklak's digger: ever been stunned? Myklak went down hard. Most men would have laid there until the stretcher arrived. Lisa shook it off and rode the remaining portion of the course with a seriously contorted cockpit and an only slightly less serious blow to the head and upper body. There's a short list of notable performances that rise above all the rest for the weekend. Myklak's gritty display is pretty near the top of it.
And then there was one. One category that is. Pro Men. All eyes turned uphill as the Pro Men were fired downhill in 60-second intervals in reverse order of their standings in the overall. The hotseat must have changed hands at least 10 times in the last 15 riders and in the end, .51 seconds separated 1st and 5th. Van Dine, the third-to-last rider ended up putting together the most complete run of the day (so far), posting a top time of 2:19.04 and sat in the hotseat. The crowd waited to see what nastiness Kovarik was going to throw down and was in shock as 2:19, then 2:20 rolled by and still no sign of Kovarik. At last he rolled around the corner and even from the announcers’ table you could make out the sketchy front-end – Kovarik had blown up his front wheel. Chris finished with a 2:36.49. His overall podium spot severely damaged, he still wowed spectators on-course as he boosted each and every feature. Including a triple. With a flat tire. Stud.
In the end, Van Dine’s margin of victory wasn’t enough to pull him into first in the overall. Mr. Consistent, Todd Olsen (Recycled Ski and Sport) from Silverthorne, CO ended up on the top step of the podium and with the big-ass check in his hand. What did Olsen have to say? “For the first time ever, I’m going to make a mortgage payment early.” Sweet. Kain Leonard landed in 2nd, just .07 off the lead. In third sat Kovarik, just 1.8 seconds off the pace even after his stage 3 wheel meltdown. 4th place went to Van Dine, just 3.5 seconds off the lead and 5th place went to a resurgent Dave Camp from Big Crank Racing.
In closing…I try not to use this word at all. In a community like Breckenridge it seems like it’s the third or fourth word out of every slacker, grommet or park rat’s mouth, but…
SolVista was SICK. There. I said it. Sick, sick, sick, sick and SICK. Free lift, flowy trails, hero dirt (especially on Sunday), amazing courses and format, free beer, free food, sweet tech expo and some of the best riders in the world to watch. Add to that long list the fact that the resort folks were incredibly gracious hosts. There are pics to be had if you care to see ‘em. Head to VastAction.com.
It seems as if we’ve put the ‘year of crazy timing’ behind us now that CJ is back in the mix. I think that there have been some thoughtful improvements in the MSC Series this year, not the least of which is adding the G3 to Bigfoot’s list, but I know that we vastly underestimated CJ’s contribution to growing the series and I for one look forward to MSC Series Finals in Keystone and the upcoming G3 at Angel Fire with a lot less anxiety.
Big thanks-yous go out to:
Santa Cruz – for supporting Rocky Mountain Racing
Dale’s Pale Ale – For the beer. For the Chicken. For being committed.
Spike Shooter – For keeping us going. For underwriting all of racing.
Static/DopeBMX – for the sweet, sweet number plates
Shimano – For believing. For listening. For getting on board.
Fox Racing Shox – for Mike Van Linden
SolVista Basin at Granby Ranch – for allowing us in. For being great partners and hosts
And in no particular order, Hayes, DT Swiss, Manitou, Maverick, Sun Ringle, Titec, Accelerade, Smith, Control Tech, e.thirteen, The Fix, Wheat Ridge Cyclery, Mountain Bike, Liquid Inc Design, Rocky Mountain Roastery, Vast Action Photography, Pearlizumi and Kenda. Something as cool as the SolVista G3 just doesn’t happen without all of your support.
Hope to see you in Angel Fire. We’ve got $10,000 more dollars to give away.
MikeMac
Bigfoot Productions
Breckenridge and Golden, CO
mikemac@bigfootproduction.com
970-333-1159
The Rocky Mountain G3 Gravity Series and The Mountain States Cup regional Championship Mountain Bike Series are the property of Bigfoot Productions. Which is owned by Yeti Cycles. Which is in Golden, Colorado. We believe that great racing helps grow the sport of cycling. We believe that it grooms future champions that will one day stand atop podiums in remote parts of the world wearing stars-and-stripes jerseys. We think racing should be competitive, but not at the cost of being un-fun. We also believe that there’s room at the table for all bike manufacturers, not just us. For more info on us please head to www.yeticycles.com, www.racemsc.com or www.g3gravityseries.com. Or just call or email. As Kreger would say, “whatever, dude”.
