Update from Oz: The gods have chosen Graeme’s trip to end a long drought in Oz, and it has been pouring continuously. If anyone thought it was pouring badly for practice, seeding was worse. Race day is predicted to have double the rain of seeding.

So, on a course where race times are usually in the 6 minute range, Pitts pulled close to 8, with one crash, feet blowing off the pedals, and his wheels actually stopped from caked mud. He did manage to get in some pedaling, though. He is thinking he may run platforms tomorrow because he’s so sick of feet slipping. So with all that trouble, he managed 30th out of 64 riders. Good work!!!

There are no bike lifts at this venue – you hook the pedal onto the seat, and hope for the best. Also – only one run on the mountain – the race run, and lift tickets run about $70/day! Crazy!

Thursday – Jan. 21
In order to get the trip going right, Cody and I woke up a 4:45 in the morning so we could leave by 5:00.  Happy times, I am such a morning person.  So we arrived at a gas station to meet up with some of Cody’s friends to drive out to Shepparton.  After a bit of waiting, we got on the road and drove for a few hours and stopped at a truck stop called “Dog on the tucker box”, story goes “some f*(#!ng old timer died and his dog sat on his tucker box (lunch box) and never ate the food and waited for ages”.  End of story according to Codes, and loving all the details!!!  Had breakfast there and carried on.  Eventually we stopped at a Kennworth dealer to pick up some stickers for Harley (Cody’s brother).  After about 7 hours of driving we made it to Shepparton Victoria, and after debate and searching on Google, found out where the DH and 4x courses were.  Two separate locations on opposite sides of the county!  The DH was 30km (haven’t gotten used to the imperial system yet) out of town in a small township called, and I kid you not, Dookie.  The course resembled a few races I have done in years past.  It was like Fontana with the rocks and awkward moves, Cougar Mountain Classic in Sonoma with camber dead grass and weird corners and finally, Northstar for the looseness.  So, after getting hot, dusty and dirty walking the DH we drove back into town, then out the other side over to the 4x track.  From what all I was told, over $100,000 had been put into the area where the 4x track was to make it an official park!!!  The layout of the track was very creative and well done.  Plenty long and on par with a WC track.  After the boys and I got done with hanging out there we went back to the apartment for dinner. Read the rest of this entry »

Jan. 21 in USA/22 in Oz – practice today for Graeme at Shepparton. He describes the course as similar to Sol Vista – technical, dry, dusty, a lot of off camber stuff, short (2 minutes or under) and FUN! It was the equivalent of 108 degrees there with hot winds!

Today was seeding – Graeme got 15th out of over 50 riders. He totally enjoyed riding his new bike. Took 3 runs to be dialed on it. “It’s awesome!! I love it!” were his comments via Skype.
Race day tomorrow, supposed to be less windy, so expecting faster times.

Mountain States Cup – Crested Butte, CO – June 17-21, 2009

Day 1:  (Wednesday before race weekend)
Went up the hill in the late morning to ride the mountain and found out that the race course was already taped!  Awesome!  I can practice the race run all week long!  First run down the hill and, to my astonishment, I realize that I’m way up in elevation (10,500’).  Even a relaxed inspection run was a workout.  Same elevation as Angel Fire and Mammoth Mountain, but my lungs were complaining.
On to a steak dinner and a good night’s rest and lots of hydration.

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US Open – Diablo Freeride Park, Vernon, NJ – May 22-24, 2009

Arrived in NJ a full week before the US Open so I could ride Lars Tribus’ awesome private mountain bike park.  I met Lars when I was in La Parva, Chile for the Pan Am Continental MTB Championships.  Lars is an old-school Pro DH racer who could have his way with anybody anywhere for years, including consistent podiums and a first at Worlds Masters.   He has a pretty rad setup – huge pump track, mobile starting gate (which I helped build on the back of his truck aptly named “The Death Mobile”), huge doubles, a moto track and DH trails.  I got to stay in his pool house for the whole week, which was pretty sweet, and Ethan Quehl (Jr. Ex National Champ 2008) joined me mid-week.  I spent some time doing trail maintenance after an east coast winter, and then did some rad riding with Lars, Ethan, Sean McClendon, Cody Warren and Kyle Strait.  It was the highlight of the trip.

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Fluidride Cup #2, PGRT #1 May 1-3 2009

Sometime the week before the race:  Arrived in PA ready to get the track figured out and just get used to the scenic Pacific Northwest.  Connected with Olympic Dirt Society guys Lars Sternberg and Scott and managed to get in four runs on Tuesday.  Walked the course on Wednesday and helped ODS set up.  My first impression riding there was “Incredible!!  This is awesome!!!  Exactly the same as the trails at UCSC but rougher.  With super-hammered old tires that I had lying around, I still had traction.”
Thursday:  First day of practice.  Track was incredible; it had dried out since the first time I rode it, so it was even faster.  Felt good, Kirt and Lindsey Voreis arrived with the Santa Cruz AllRide trailer, and most importantly – Travis Lucas, team mechanic!!!

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Sea Otter Classic,4/13-20

Arrived at SO our usual Monday evening, ready to practice on Tuesday.  Not happening – the wind was so brutal that if I tried to hit any of the jumps, corners, or ANYTHING, I would just get blown over!  So after a couple of runs of trying to practice the top section, I decided my life was worth more than that and headed back for some trials fun at the campground.

Wednesday – registration, move into the paddock and help Jeff Lenosky and Kyle Ebbet test some sections on the Dual Stunt course.  After testing one of the sections, Kyle asked me “So how do you think it would feel riding this for the first time as a 13 year old girl?”  to which I replied “Dude!!!  Be nice!”  They were having an amateur girls’ race…..

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Pan Am Continental Mountain Bike Championships 3/17-22

Tuesday – arrived in Chile at Hotel La Posada late morning and, lo and behold, look who walks in the door – Lars Tribus! It was cool meeting him for the first time and talking with him about – what else? – biking!! (Lars is 5X Masters World Podium, ’03 Masters World Champion). Two local dudes pulled in as we were building our bikes up and said they and Chris VanDine were going to do some runs – did we want to go with them? So we ended up doing 6 practice runs cold turkey. VanDine said that the first run “you are going to be hating life, but every run after that is going to be sweet!” I missed that run and just went straight into having a sweet time.
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Keyesville DH & Trials – March 14 & 15

Boy is trials different from DH! It’s like golf on a bike except it doesn’t require just one ball! It is the tactition’s event -being able to analyze the course and then perform with lots of distractions- like someone standing right next to you talking to you. I haven’t figured out the nutrition yet, either. Everyone in the sport class tanked after even a small lunch. You need a lot of patience and focus. It was really fun though, and I can’t wait to do it again.
8th out of 15.

The Keyesville downhill was a fun relaxed event. Small bikes, good friends, and number plates. In the end it’s a good thing the pro-line (over the grass that wasn’t taped off) wasn’t penalized they thought they’d do at the last minute. Off to Chile!
Results TBA.

-GP

Mob in Mojave – Feb. 14 & 15

To set the stage, I was on a bike I borrowed from friend Asa Salas – a V10 medium frame. My bike wasn’t in yet. Asa’s a mechanic – the bike was in perfect condition when I got it. First few runs I did on Thursday were just to get comfortable on the bike and learn the course, so I wasn’t expecting to go hard and was still testing to see what tires I was going to use. But I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that Asa’s brand new tires hooked up better than anyone (myself included) could have imagined or believed! It was a fun, laid back event and furthermore, everything was going as planned so I could stick to my routine.
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