Midwest MTB Racing Recap
This weeks report takes a look at the season opener for the Minnesota Mountain Bike Series with a special recap from junior sensation Jordan Cullen who raced in his first ever mountain bike race, a recap from the seasoned Wallace Alexander who raced in the Chequamegon 100 and a exclusive report from second place Elite finish Nathan Guerra racing at Crystal Lake Classic in WORS. The look ahead is pretty light but always something to keep the wheels moving in the dirt.
Freewheel Frolic Benefiting MORC
With the majority of recent Minnesota series races held under "mudder" conditions, riders were hoping for a dry and "nice" day. Mother Nature had her way, however, and dropped some serious precip on the the twisty and turny at Salem. Back home waving the flag for the home team, I missed out on the action but got the run down from son Jake who made the trek south and twitter feeds and texts, including Bruce of Skinnyski who was shooting pics of the Citizen and Sport riders, kept me inform what was going down.
Racing his first mountain bike race ever, Midwest road, cross, and track junior sensation Jordan Cullen made a appearance at Salem Hills racing in the Comp class. I touched base with Jordan after the race to get a report and asked a few questions on why he decided to try mountain biking and plans for the future:
When did you decide you would try out mountain bike racing?
Earlier this winter I decided that I would try to do some mountain bike races so I could tune up my technical abilities for the upcoming cross season. I was pretty pumped to do my first mountain bike race at Salem Hills this past Friday, as the previous week I had spent a little time riding the course to check it out. I did not think the course was very technical but I knew it was going to rain the day of the race so the course would be totally different.
How did the race go?
When I showed up at the course on the day of the race I noticed that it was already pretty muddy and wet. I was pretty happy with this because I usually do well in adverse conditions such as mud or snow. On the start line I knew that I would have to try to get a gap before we went into the single track. I made my move right after we went around the water tower and attacked pretty hard and then just rode a steady tempo to try and get as big a gap as I could. After the first two laps I had a pretty size able gap but my bike, clothes, and sunglasses were absolutely covered in mud so the next time through the feed zone I tossed my glasses to my dad. I continued to ride tempo through the single track but about halfway into the third lap I slid out right into a barbed wire fence and caught my left leg in it and got cut up pretty bad. I decided that since there was only a lap left I would keep going and just worry about it later. I continued to catch the racers from the first wave in the Comp race and about midway through the race I decided I would try to catch all of the Comp racers. With this new goal in mind I started riding a faster tempo. I did not catch the last Comp person until one of the last single track sections.
How did the race compare to racing on the road or cyclocross course?
This race was pretty cool but it felt way different than any of the road or cross races I have done. The major difference was that there were not any tactics involved such as sitting in or having to worry about the wind, like what I am used to from racing cross and road. This was still pretty fun because it more or less felt like an off-road time trial.
Plans to race off road more this year?
I really enjoyed my first mountain bike race and I plan on doing several more including the Short and Fat at the end of the summer.
Chequamegon 100
Wallace Alexander is a rider I have gotten to know over the years. Plain and simple, Wallace loves to ride his bike. I talked to Wallace at the Cable Classic and he told me he was riding the Chequamegon 100 and he was like a kid that scored a golden ticket to the Willy Wonka chocolate factory. Wallace sent a nice report from the day adventuring in the Chequamegon forest and CAMBA trails:
The alarm finally rang at 5:00 a.m. Enough talk - now it was finally tiime for for action!
I rode the Chequamegon 100 with my Kenwood Racing mates Thornquest, Stone and MacDonald. We'd talked about this ride quite a bit, planned quite a bit, ridden quite a bit and now it was finally time to race. Time to link all the little bits of trail together into the full enchilada. (Tech note: we had a carbon FS 29er, carbon FS 26er, titanium 29er hardtail with Lefty and steel 29er hardtail. We had one minor mechanical early and other than that the bikes worked perfectly through 100 miles of rocks, roots, sand and gravel.)
Driving through Cable at 6:15 the bank clock read 62F. Dry, overcast skies. Perfect! We pulled into Lakewoods and saw the usual suspects. Tim and Joe quickly got things organized, we rode to Rock Lake road to the start and we rolled off at 7:00 a.m.
The course was going loosely counterclockwise beginning in Rock Lake, then on to the Esker Trail, Telemark, Ojibwa, Fire Tower Climb, 00, Makwa Trail, Mosquito Brook, Fish Hatchery, back north to 00, Janet Road, back to Rock Lake Road, Rock Lake trail, Patsy Lake trail, Namekagon Town Hall and finally back to Rock Lake. We were expecting 10-11 hours of sweet singletrack riding.
The four of us had planned to ride this together. We do enough racing all summer, this would be the time to ride together, enjoy the trail and treat it like the Mack Daddy of Enduros. Others were obviously racing and others beat us by hours. I have a lot of respect for the riders who were going all out all day. That would have been very, very hard for me.
The CAMBA trails were in perfect condition. The section of continuous singletrack from 00 heading south to Fish Hatchery was sublime. Whoever planned and cut the Makwa trail is a genius. Hats off to the guys and gals of CAMBA who continue to up the ante.
Obviously, a day long ride had many highs and lows. Riding down Rock Lake road (which seems to take forever) in the pouring rain at 3 p.m. got kind of grim. But riding through Patsy Lake singletrack in the post-rain sunshine was fantastic. Riding up Fire Tower at mile 40 seemed easy! We floated up it. Riding along the Birke Trail at mile 65 heading up toward 00 made us remember the relentless grind of the Birkie Trail. So many sections and each with its own character. And the Chequamegon Forest was beautiful with trillium flowers blooming everywhere.
We finished at 6:19 p.m. Maybe a little slower than we expected but what the hell -- it was an awesome day. We jumped in Lake Namekagon behinds Lakewoods and felt like new men. Then we realized that we had no food, cold drinks or cold beer in the Blue Team Van. What?!!!
Luckily, we finished the day dining like kings at the Turk's Inn with steaks that would make a grown man weep. You know you've seen it, you know you've driven past it but make your way to the Turk's Inn. And make it sooner than later. Because there is not much better than riding sweet CAMBA trails all day long and then dining at the Turk's Inn!
Results and photos
More Photos from Scott Brown
Crystal Lake Classic
WORS #2 went north to Rhinelander for the Crystal Lake Classic. Second place Elite male finisher contributes exclusively:
The lead out at Rhinelander is a sandy road for about a mile into a holeshot of singletrack. With a call up I just made sure to stay up front and save everything for the hole shot. I jumped for the holeshot a bit early but the pace was so chill I figured if I ramped up the speed enough no one would come through. I hit it pretty hard I guess because everyone I read and talked to said the pace went crazy right there. Leading a WORS race is a bit intimidating at times, especially early in the year with as much talent as had showed up in Rhinelander, so I didn't work too hard as to go into the red and be counter attacked by someone. After a few sections of single-track I looked back and seven had made the initial break including Brian Matter, Tristan Schouten, Brian Eppen, Mike Anderson, Tyler Gauthier, and Ben Koenig. I punched it up every climb to keep anyone from just sitting on and made sure to use the single track skills to make 'em work. By the end of the lap it was just myself, Matter, and Tristan. On the flat road sections we fed and took it somewhat easy, knowing this course is hard on ya and a race of attrition in many ways.
Second lap we started trading the lead a bit, but I did a lot of work. The third lap Matter went to the front going into the single track with a blazing pace. I held on and Tristan slowly disappeared. Brian gave a nudge of the elbow to come through in between some single-track sections and I was like "no way man, your killing me". He got me to work the road section on the last lap though and we started seeing a lot of lap traffic. Going into the single-track Matter took over and did almost the exact thing as lap 3. I was fine till a bobble and a lapped rider formed a very small gap going into a climb about half-way through the lap. Matter gunned the climb and I could not close it. His advantage grew to about 50 seconds at the finish, so he was flying! Second place on the day is an awesome result though, and shows that my goal of contending for the overall is not out of reach. Maybe next time I will play it a bit smarter on workload and be more aggressive when I am feeling good. This is a good confidence builder for that kind of stuff.
Looking ahead
With Memorial Day this weekend, race organizers are keeping low on any major event. I am sure there is some unpublished gravel grind or a chase through the woods looking for Sasquatch (stay tuned for details on the Sasquatch 101!!). Anyway, maybe a good weekend, weather cooperating, to hit some new trails or burn up the favs.
The new Cuyuna trail is not open but hearing reports of riders getting a sneak peak in exchange for some trail work -- might be something to check out.
Plus, the Thursday night races at Buck Hill would be a nice way to fine tune fitness or just go out and meet fellow lovers of dirt. (74 advanced men last weekend!)
The Woolly Race organizers always have the wheels moving to improve this event and were recently awarded a $500 trail preservation grant from CLIF Bar for trails signs and a trail head kiosk. The event is not until June 11th but get it on the calendar and preview the trail, which is open for riding, before then.
Keep the wheels moving!
 | About the author... Jay Richards maintains a very active lifestyle. He somehow finds time between managing a full-time resort (Maplelag) and bringing up a family of four boys with his wife Jonell, to compete in both mountain bike and a few cross-country ski races. Jay rides for Maplelag Resort, manages the Maplelag/Paramount mountain bike team and enters his 21st year of racing and promoting mountain bike races. |