King of the Rockies - The Legendary Tiperary Creek

This was the sixth and final race of the 2007 winter park race. The course was on the legendary Tipperary Creek course which was the first winter park course ever raced on. The race was an epic 25.8 miles long with over 4,000 feet of climbing. The course map can be seen here (follow the dashed white line) and the course profile can be seen here.

This course was a lot of fun. It started out with a huge climb in the beginning, followed by a huge descent and then some up and downs with some pretty technical sections to the end. The overall course gained altitude, so that was good for me.

I completed this course in 2 hours, 19 minutes and 58.7 seconds which put me in 4th place, just 32 seconds off of the podium. The full results are here. I was very happy with this finish however because it gave me enough points in the series to capture 2nd place overall! I ended up with 236 points for the season whereas the 1st place finisher had 247 points and the 3rd place guy had 231 points. The complete series rankings can be viewed here.

I had a great time competing in the winter park mountain bike series this year. The courses were challenging, the scenery was beautiful, and the competitors were all very cool and friendly. I hope to take part in these races again, I guess I will have to upgrade to expert next year though. So much for podium finishes. I'd also like to try more of the Mountain States Cup series races.

Winter Park #5 - Cross Country

This was the fifth winter park race this summer. This one started near Fraser and finished at the base of Winter Park. A map of the course can be seen here and the course profile is here. This race was 24 miles long and it had a huge climb at the beginning to start of the race. The first hill was over 2,000 ft of climbing and over 6 miles long. This was to my advantage since I am a better climber than descender. It was pretty cool that morning and I wanted to be nice and warmed up by the time we started so we parked in Fraser and Kendra and I both biked the few miles out to the start line. Right before the start of my race I rode up the road a little ways to see how the incline was after the start, but I went out a little too far and almost missed my race start! At got back to the start line right before the gun went off. When it did most of us started nice and easy since we had a long day ahead of us and a huge climb right in front of us.

There was a mile or two lead out on a dirt road before we hit the singletrack and the incline wasn't too bad. On the approach I chatted with the guys that I normally race against and are about the same speed as me. Before we hit the singletrack our group moved up towards the front. Once we hit the singletrack I let Brian lead us and we kept the pace pretty steady. Half way up the climb there is another dirt road that is relatively flat and short. I decided to attack right before this road and got a small gap. On the road I caught the guy that was in second place in our category (James Mack) and asked him if we could work together. I drafted him for a minute and then we traded pulls for the rest of the flat section before we hit the "wall". This next singletrack section was extremely steep and rocky. I did my best to just hang on James' wheel for the climb and was successful until the last half mile or so when it really pitched up and was covered with loose rocks. He pulled away from me and summited about a minute before I did. Once I started the downhill, I just hung on the the incredibly fast descent. Shortly after the start of the downhill I passes James who had unfortunately crashed on a water-bar in the trail. There were already medics there so I kept on going. I crashed on one of the couple tight switch backs, but was going slow enough that I didn't get hurt too bad. This allowed Andrew to catch me though and he passed me. I worked hard to catch him and was able to by the bottom of the huge descent.

Andrew and I took turns leading each other for about half of the race, but he pulled away from me on Vasquez Road right before we had to cross Vasquez Creek again. I didn't see him again until the finish line, but ended up in 3rd place! Here's a picture of me crossing the line:


I was pretty happy with my finish and had a great time on this course. It was definitely my favorite course of the series. It took me 2:17:47.7 to finish the race and I was 133rd overall. The complete results can be seen here. Here's a picture of me on the podium :-)

Winter Park #4 - Valley Point to Point

The fourth winter park mountain bike race this summer was the Valley Point to Point. This race started at the Winter Park resort base and finished just outside the town of Fraser. It was 18.8 miles long (the longest so far), the starting elevation was 9,080 ft. and the finish elevation was 8,830 ft. with 1,950 ft of climbing along the way. Which means this race was mostly downhill. There is a map of the course here. And the course profile is here.

The night before the race we camped just outside of the town of Winter Park off of Vasquez Rd. It is national forest so you can camp there for free. Here is a picture of our campsite and our new tent! It was nice spedning the night before up there so that I didn't have to worry about getting up early and driving all the way up there the day of the race. It was a nice night, chilly; but not freezing.

The next morning we got up and brushed our teeth (Kendra came with me of course) and ate some breakfast. Then I started warming up by riding up the road to where the race would be on it and checked out the Vasquez Creek water crossing to scope out what the best strategy would be to get across it. Then I rode to the start line and prepared to start. I saw the regulars in my category and made some small talk before the race. Here's a picture right after the gun went off. I tried not to go out too hard at the beginning.This race was pretty tough for me because I am better at going uphill than I am at downhill. At least it started out going uphill so that I could get into good position before the downhill. I think I was in 2nd place by the time that we started going down. I held my place pretty well on the first serious downhill. I think I might have gotten passed by one person. Then we had another tough uphill where I was able to pass him back. Then a little downhill and the water crossing.

I was actually able to make it all the way across the water without stopping. Putting it in a really low gear was key. Then we rode down Vasquez Rd. for a little before turning off and heading up a challenging climb. Before we got to the climb I noticed that my seat was slowly sliding down lower and lower. This wasn't going to do, so I decided to stop on the uphill to raise my seat and tighten it and I was passed by two or three riders in my category! After this uphill the rest of the race was mostly downhill and I continued to get passed. The final stretch was really rocky and really beat me up. I don't think my suspension was ideally tuned. Eventually the finish line actually showed up though.


I ended up finishing in 7th place in my category, 207th overall. The race took me 1:35:04.7 which was a pace of about 5 minutes per mile. The complete results are here. This wasn't my best race ever, but I survived and I learned a lot. I'm glad that my loose seat post was the worst of my mechanical issues for the year. I got to talk to Brian Kleinman after the race and met his wife as well. He is a pretty cool guy and I would get to talk to him at other races this year, too. I enjoyed racing against him.