'Tis the season.

The off-season, that is. Aside from twice-weekly jaunts down to the climbing gym, I've been doing a self-imposed boycott on "serious" bike rides since my last race in November. The polar vortex certainly isn't helping the motivation factor at all, but it's been refreshing not worrying about putting fenders back on, remembering to charge my lights, or worrying about sketchy drivers and/or black ice while doing monotonous park laps after dark. I was all set on staying off my bike until the new year, but knew I had to come out of hibernation, if only temporarily, for the second annual CXmas50.

The event is hosted by Joe and Christine up in Lynn Valley where access to a spectacular trail network is literally at their doorstep. The big question was what conditions were going to be like up in the forest given the snow and freezing weather that's blanketed Vancouver for the past week. The day's forecast called for a cold, dry, sunny afternoon, which was a (possibly) welcome departure from Last year's ride where everybody got soaked by continuous rain and then subsequently froze on the way back. The city of North Vancouver had also decided to close a good chunk of the Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve trails due to downed trees, so we knew we were going to have a shorter ride for this year. No problem; it just meant more time for admiring the sun streaming through the frost-covered forest and whiskey drinkin'.

Trail conditions weren't as bad as I thought they'd be. The gravel sections contained of a lot of icy sections, but as long as you kept turning over a steady gear without any sudden accelerations or abrupt changes in direction, you were able to keep things rubber side down. Richard Juryn and Circuit 8 trails were a bit more challenging due to the crusty-topped snowpack that had been pockmarked by hikers' footprints and more ice. The challenge was to find a tire pressure low enough to afford some tractions without getting low enough to pinch flat or roll your tire when things inevitably got a little sideways. When all else failed, you simply got off your bike and pushed/carried it until you could find a spot to get back on and try again.

In the end, I was probably over-dressed for the occasion:
- bib shorts with windblock tights over top
- Craft Active Extreme baselayer (best damn cool/cold weather base I've ever tried)
- Thermo-roubaix long sleeve jersey
- Puffy down vest
- Arc'teryx Beta AR Gore Pro Shell jacket for the layering room
- Black Diamond ski gloves
- Smartwool ski socks with toe warmers adhered underneath
- Giro VR90s with Endura MT500 neoprene booties over top
- Merino neck buff and cap

My body tends to run on the cold side and based on last year's ride, we'd spend plenty of time standing around shooting the shit and swigging out of hip flasks so I wanted to make sure I wouldn't get chilled when we stopped. The puffy vest overkill given the dry conditions, but I ran with my pit-zips open for most of the day and was able to regulate well enough. The biggest problem was with the gloves: while they kept my hands plenty warm, they were too bulky, resulting in some forearm cramps as I struggled to find the least awkward grip on the levers while getting rattled over the lumpy terrain.

In summary, an excellent day of bad decision making amongst good friends, fuelled by alcohol and peer pressure. A huge thanks for Joe and Chris for opening up their home and being the gracious hosts that they are.

Only 364 days until we get to do this again.

Bad decisions abound. . #cxmas50 #crossruinseverythingaroundme #blameroni #fringesports

A video posted by Hung Mai (@hungmaiphotography) on

Fashionable People Doing Questionable Things

Rarely has a song been more appropriate.

How do I even begin to do justice in my description of the anarchy that is Single Speed Cyclocross World Championships? After missing out on the opportunity to witness the 2015 iteration in Victoria, I knew I had to make the pilgrimage down to see this year's quote-unquote race at Kruger Farms in Portland.

Qualifiers were held on Saturday morning, but seemed to lack the feats of strength competition. I had no idea what was going on. Potato sack racing was apparently involved, but I got too distracted by the dual slalom course and the dude paddling around in a canoe in the flooded section of the field. I was able to catch a few people sending it off the jumps at the end of the slalom, but had arrived a little late to the party so things had mostly wound down.

As my friends and I were leaving the course, we spied a familiar face walking by with one of the riders from the American Trek Factory Racing team. Having been without data since crossing the border and really shitty/spotty wifi at our AirBNB when we finally arrived at close to midnight, I hadn't seen any of the social media coverage of Friday night's package pickup/party at this point. Could it be who we thought it was?

"Sven?" I questioned as he walked past. He looked up in acknowledgement and continued on, debriefing the Trek rider. Yep, definitely Sven. I asked a buddy who had come down from Vancouver to race if he knew what was going on and was told Sven had ridden qualifiers earlier. Interesting...

Fast forward to Sunday morning and after a decent rain overnight, the course had been moistened to a state that everybody knew would only get worse after the three PDX Trophy Cup races for those who'd brought geared bikes and the loser's race for everybody who'd failed to qualify for the championships, just in time for the main events.

I'll say it again: this race was total sensory overload for me as a first time spectator; I can't imagine what it would be like to be in the race itself. Let's see if I can rattle off all the ridiculousness:

  • Le Mans start (with a twist!)
  • Mud ranging in consistency from chocolate pudding to peanut butter, mixed with grass, leading to chain retention issues even for some of the proper SS setups.
  • The aforementioned dual slalom course
  • Optional take-off ramp into the pond
  • More mud.
  • Exercise-ball-pit of doom
  • Smoke grenades/machines
  • Snow machine
  • Foam
  • Smashed pumpkins
  • Ginormous water balloon slingshots fashioned from Yakima car racks
  • A drum line
  • Stripper bus shortcut with both male and female strippers.
  • Heavy metal Hodala corner
  • Copious amounts of free-flowing booze of every kind

There was so much going on and I feel like I spent all of my time running around trying to decide whether to sit back and soak in the atmosphere or try to capture it. Looking back now, it feels like I failed to do either to my full potential. Honestly, even if I had a dozen cameras on remote and maybe a drone, I'm still not sure I'd be able to do this event justice. If you're after a more comprehensive report, Anne-Marie Rook and Adam Kachman have done the best job I've seen so far of hitting all of the event's important parts on Ella.

Some random thoughts:

  • The Le Mans start was cool, but the organizers threw a wrench in everybody's plans by randomly hiding and relocating competitors' bikes. I get that this isn't a traditional race and that hijinx are to be expected, but felt that the random nature of this took a bit away from the competition. Maybe I just don't get the spirit of it and I'm guessing that there are only a handful of racers in each category who are for-serious racing for the win, but it would suck to have your race blown right after the gun goes off because it takes you a few precious moments to locate your trusty steed while your competition rolls away.
  • Somebody actually tried cheating in the men's championship race by hiding in the corn field while the rest of the group went back to the staging area to wait for the official start, but this story has a happy ending: two bad-ass ladies laid him the fuck out by tackling him mid-run while he was looking for his bike. Karma is a bitch.
  • The ball pit did not unfold the way I thought it would. I thought that racers would have to drop in and then simply wade through a muddy pit, but neglected to take into account what a few hours of day-drinking would do to the crowd. Remember the rubber dodge balls of olde (as opposed to the foam ones schools are now forced to use)? Now scale those balls up a few hundred percent and put them in the hands and/or feet of a bunch of drunken hooligans. It started off harmlessly enough early in the day, but became much more violent as peoples' BAC went up. See photo of Adam Craig tackling a spectator who got too enthusiastic in his kick ball game and took things a little too far.
  • I am sad that it's all the way in Verona, Italy next year :-(

 

Anyway, without further ado, here's the gallery. Photos will open in a lightbox if you click on them.

Aaaaand that's a wrap.

I think we can make it official now; I've pulled the plug on my 2016 CX campaign. My motivation has pretty much been drowned by the 28 days (out of 31) of rain during October and what I'm assuming will be a similar stat once November wraps up. Things didn't exactly go the way I planned this year and I'm ready to close the book and start planning for next year.

My season finished last weekend with Valley Cross Mill Lake, the venue of the first annual Valley Cross race last year. The organizers ran the course in reverse, but that didn't make things any easier on us. A paved start into a slight kicker of a hill then put racers onto some tricky off-camber including a 180 degree traverse. A paved downhill followed, leading into the flooded sand pit before forcing riders off the bike for the course's defining run-up and some tight 'n twisty stuff in the upper woods. The course finished with a fast sweeping left gravel downhill and a tricky multi-surface transition back onto the paved start straight.

It shouldn't come as a surprise that staying out and imbibing the night before would not be conducive to race performance, but I regret nothing. I thought I had done enough to re-start the hydration process before heading to bed, but was quickly proven wrong during my first pre-ride of the course. I blew what little energy I had on the opener and guzzled what remained of the fumes the first time up the run up. At that point, I switched to race plan B, which was essentially "how many hand-ups could I reasonably consume and still finish the race?" The answer, in no particular order:

  • beer
  • rum (I think)
  • marshmallow(s)
  • some disgusting chocolate covered cookie thing
  • mashed potatoes, possibly with some brisket mixed in. *FAVOURITE ITEM. MOAR PLZ*

At some point, the commissaires stepped in and shut the hand ups down (BOOOO), so I focused on not killing myself on the gravel downhill and finishing the race. Mission accomplished. For what it's worth, I was able to finish in the top half of the field (barely) and the bonus was having a few nice snaps taken by James Lissmore Photography.

So, what's next? I'll probably be shooting at provincials this weekend and will be down in Portland for SSCXWC in Portland next week to drink/party/heckle. There's still the season closer at Hastings Racetrack on December 10th, but that's something for future me to think about.

 

 

Light, camera, surprisingly little "action."

Some days, I'm OK with not racing. Sunday was one of those days, and I think it worked out for the best. On the drive out to Maple Ridge for this year's Pumpkin Cross, I was treated to a rural landscape draped in a layer of low-hanging fog. With a forecast calling for some much needed and much missed sun, I knew I'd be lucky to have any of it still around by the time the first race rolled out at 10AM, so I set out to make the most of it while I still could.

If you came here looking for hero shots of you deep in the pain cave or awesome costume, I'm sorry to disappoint you. There are plenty of other fantastic photographers who were at the race that should have something for you and a glut of images on Instagram, but honestly, I wouldn't bother. No matter how awesome you think you were, this dude already won the Internet on Sunday.

So, if you've made it this far or if you're a follower of my work, you'll know that I strive to capture something unique about each event. I think the themes under which I chose to document this race should be pretty self-evident from the gallery below.

Thanks to Local Ride Racing and Liv Canada for hosting another fun race this year and Mother Nature for providing conditions that made things tricky and fun, but not so much that people left with hypothermia as in previous years.