Well its been a week since I put out the vibe and and spread the good word of Germany. Our team of six is now down to five after Kay Sherwood crashed riding the race course in Bern, Switzerland and took a plane ride home with a broken arm.
The race on Saturday, Swiss Trophy Cup, is a high UCI ranked race. all the big guns showed up and rainbow stripes were everywhere. The field was about 60 and my wonderful call up was #50 so that made some extra work for me in the start loops. After the start loops I was going into the race sitting right about where I got called up and proceeded to pass about 20 euro weight weenies on the first down hill and cut a few more off in the first cork screw turn. Ahhh the pleasure. This was by far the gnarliest XC race I've ever done it was a 4.5k loop with drop, chutes, stairs, and roots for a proper white knuckle experience.
A few laps in feeling good we hit a super steep climb that was almost too steep to clear and it had me reaching for my front shifter where my chain flew off and got wedged under my linkage with no wiggle room at all. The spectators were going crazy and trying to run onto the course but nothing could get it out until a guy from South Africa came to rescue after we pulled the wheel off and repeatedly compressed the suspension.
I got pulled shortly after my little dilemma but still manged to place in the 40's. Very disappointed to mechanical but it was an awesome experience. I am definitely going for it this weekend if Flims, Switzerland. The loops are under 4k and hopefully with the same amount of sketchy descents I can sneak my way up the finish list.

GERMANY

It's really cool here! We did a pretty hard ride today up a big mountain and through what seemed like 20 towns that lead to a look out over Freiburg. Went real fast on real steep trails infested with rocks on wet roots. We are in a big farm house just outside of Kirtzarten.
We live in two apartments on the top floor and the family lives downstairs but we rarely see each other. Dinner is catered every night at seven with whatever they decide to make us. Tonight we had some salad, pork, and spetzel (egg noodles).
We have a full time mechanic that completely takes care of us. We don't even have to think about it. He thoroughly washes our bikes, addresses any problems and lubes the chain before we ride in the morn. Everyone in town knows USA is here and they know the name of the house where we live. We are wearing USA kits on our rides and I feel like I have a big target on my back. People riding stop and ask us questions then ride away with a big smile. One kid followed us and said, "USA, USA, BOOO". Pretty funny in my book but most people are nice and welcoming.
It's Thursday night here and we have a big Swiss Trophy race on sunday. It's only a couple hours away so we will leave in the morning. I'll go for an easy ride tomorrow and then maybe go explore town some more. Things have been real good so far. You can check out all my pictures on Facebook and I have attached a couple.

Downieville and Nationals

Downieville Classic, the most amazing race ever, I mean it is the All Mountain World Championships after all. This year we had some big shooters like Jason Moeschler, Adam Craig, Sid Taberlay, Chris Sheppard, Brian Lopes, Nathan Riddle, Thomas Frischknecht, Myles Rockwell, Kenny Burt, as well as a stacked women’s field.
Well I won juniors last year and in Downieville rules I could race juniors again but I decided to give the pro class a go. The race weekend snuck up on me quick but I still got to be up there the whole week before in our camper. That area is my favorite because of the epic riding, sweet swimming spots in the Yuba River and local lakes, fishing, spectacular views, and wild animals….except for the rodents, they have the plague.
Our RV site was about 200 yards from the XC start so it was a smooth and easy morning with high temps only in the 80’s on a perfect race day. I had my mind set following someone really fast up the hill and not letting go, but about the third mile of climbing behind Jason I decided to give him a break and I let him go. I got to the top of the 8 mile climb in the mid 50 minute range and now have about 20 miles of high speed rock infested trails to catch anyone riding hard tails and 2.0 tires. I finished 10th in the all mountain pro XC with a 2:05, eight minutes faster than last year. Pretty stoked on the day.
Day two we start at the top and ride down with the same exact bike setup as yesterday, bikes are weighed and photographed each day to ensure this. My setup was the ‘09 Giant Reign with a Fox 36 Talas and some shock absorbing WTB Wierwolf LT 2.55 tires. I had smooth DH run with no huge risk taking and caught 6 people in front of me. I pulled a 46:01, just under four minutes faster than last year and two seconds off Brian Lopes. Good enough for sixth place on the day which put me eighth in the All Mountain, I mean “world”. Not too shabby.

Tuesday after Downieville we loaded up the car for our 19 hour trek to Granby, Colorado for National Championships. I got to do some sweet riding at 9,000 feet but I didn’t get to do much breathing on the other hand. The XC course was the longest four mile lap I’ve ever done and was fairly technical and mostly single track. The uphill was a perfectly graded singling track climb with lots of switchbacks and some descent rocks. The down was a brand new trail with a steep “chute” section that was quite fun. I spent the first few laps battling for a top 10 in the U23 pro and was feeling pretty solid and sure enough the cramps were chasing me up the 15 minute climb each lap and I dropped a few spots. Finished 18th on the day out of 50ish, not as good as I was hoping but I got a few more years to win.
I had Saturday off for some early morning Super D runs, a nice nap, and then went to go heckle the big boy pro’s at the “chute”. They go really fast. Then headed to the 4X track to see some racing under the stadium lights.
Sunday was a Super D race in the morning that was just mass chaos and danger. Nothing like 50 pro’s running through an un-groomed field and gravel in their carbon soled shoes and then funneling down to single track in about 100 yards with no room to pass. What place you ran is what place you got, I really wish these were a time trial start like Deer Valley and San Ynez last year. Managed 16th, I guess I have to work on running.
So here is my chance to redeem myself in the Short Track race. I retreated to my car for some heavy metal and a quick shut eye. Grabbed my Giant Anthem X with WTB Vulpine tires that work surprisingly well at low pressure. I snuck up for a 3rd row start and then let the elbows do the work and pulled my way up to about 12th and was feeling really good. A couple laps down and I was holding my position then a metal fence jumped out and grabbed me and set me flinging through the air and sliding down the gravel road. There it went, my chance at redemption and I was feeling pretty good. Well that’s bike racing, win some and lose some. I’ll be back.

1. Swimming Hole
2.DH Start
3.DH run photo by Bob Lowe
4.Stealing Some Shade
5.The Top
6.Carl and I got stuck in some traffic
7.Sending it in the STXC

12 Mile Super-D!!!!

What an awesome week!
I headed to Ashland on Tuesday morning with my buddy Casey Sanchez and Mark Jordan from Decline Magazine. We rolled out about noon in just enough time to park at the top of Mt. Ashland to do a run and I managed to get two flats on the fire road on the way down. Then we had Matt Wittler take us back to the top and we checked into a hotel in downtown Ashland for the night.
The next morning I put on some WTB Weirwolf LT 2.55's on a brand new Giant Reign and we had Wild Bill from Ashland Mountain Adventures shuttle us a few times.
The course is about 12.06 miles with about 5000 feet of descending and 800 feet of climbing to keep it real. It was a real high speed course with only a couple rock gardens, allot of switchbacks, and a few doubles. Every time I rode the course the weather at one end was completely different than the weather at the other. It was raining most of the week at the top but by the bottom it was dusty. It wasn't cold rain, except for Saturday, so it was kind of fun to ride in.
For the rest of the week WTB posted us up in a sick house in the middle of nowhere then five miles down a gravel road....you know the one right next to the Buddhist Temple. We stashed 10 people in this thing!
The race rolled around and I seriously had no idea what I was going to do. There were over 40 pro's and allot of big names. I got decked in my long sleeve Northstar-At-Tahoe skin suit and let her rip. It was about 45 degrees at the top and about 70 in town. The whole week I have been wearing baggies and jackets and to put on a skin suit it was insanely fast. I passed my minute man about five minutes in so I figured I was off to a good start. The climb SUCKED, just pinning it, but it was over in no time. Then it got so foggy I had to go granny style with my glasses just to see 10ft in front of me. Besides thinking I can take a fire road turn with no brakes after spinning out in a 44-11 and having my life flash in front of me the run went pretty smooth. It didn't seem as fast as some times I went but I never went this hard the whole run, just parts a time.
Got to the bottom and changed and headed back up to the top and riders were still going off. Then they announced the top 5, no Nate, Adam Craig beat Jason by 2 seconds. I ran inside to see the results and I got 6th, only 15 seconds behind 5th. I was pretty stoked with that result because it's three minutes faster than my time two years ago and considering who showed up to race it was a solid result.
I packed up and headed back that night and got home around 9:30pm. Took Monday off and did absolutely nothing. It was an awesome week with allot of fun and a solid result, next time I'm getting in on the money though. Next race is All Mountain World Championships in Downieville.

pics:
1.secret bike shop
2.results
3.mark didn't like the bunny we found
4.the top
5.Casey and the Buddist Temple
6. YEAH
7.Casey's truck
8.Ice river
9.Pink Bike Pic
10.It's legal to ride in the back of trucks in Oregon. Thanks Ahland Mountain Adventures!!!!

Sea Otter

Sea Otter Classic
AKA Sea Slaughter lived it to its name this year for me. I had a happy gung-ho time then slaughtered in the end.
The setup was the 09 Giant Anthem X tricked with the brand new WTB Wolverine 1.95 rubber. Thanks to the guys at Northstar-at-Tahoe I was able to ride this tricked rig.
The super d went real well. Basically the same course as the last few year except even smoother and a more ridiculous start. For some reason I have real good luck with the goofy starts. Bikes turned around and upside down with us 30 yards away with our heads on the start line paint and shiny spandex butts in the air. Got on the bike and got off to 5th. Then there was a group of seven up the first climb where I grabbed Carl Decker's wheel and got a little gap on everyone else. Carl started pulling away and the guys behind me started catchin up. Battled it out to a 3rd! Eight seconds behind first and half second behind second place.
Short Track was pretty sick. Lining up with the world champion, world cup champion, like 5 national champions, and three Olympians was a real shocker. It was the guys I read about and dream about that I'm racing.....crap, this is going to hurt. Seventy-four racers on a tiny congested 1/2 mile loop only brings insanity, in a good way. I got a mid pack start and from the start just went all out for as long as I could, the race is only 20 minutes, or so anyway. After several laps all I could do is hold on with everything I had and got pulled somewhat near the end. I wrangled a 28th and was pretty stoked with that. The race went pretty smooth except pro's don't move....for anything. I was known as the aggressive short track racer now I'm the grunt being pushed into fence poles at high speeds.
And the slaughter. Cross country with somewhere near 120 racers aiming for a 2 foot wide piece of trail. So after the start on Laguna Secca Raceway where everyone rode like toddlers making careless moves and taking people out, seriously pile up after pile up, we filed down to the trail. Probably in there around 50th. Did I mention it hot?...real hot. They shortened the race from 38 miles to 27 due to the heat and people were still dropping out like flies, unfortunately I was the fly hit by the windshield of a big rig clinging to life. Then I crashed on some loose sand and kept on going then went to clean the beach out of my mouth and to my pleasure my bottle was gone....awesome. So continuing on without enough saliva to spit I soon faded away to see John Bennet robbing the aid station for water after his crash. So we rode together to the venue and called it a day.
All in all it was a good week with a lot of learning and some descent results with my first big pro podium. Now to do some well needed rest and some high school racing till I decide what I want to do next.

http://www.cyclingnews.com/mtb/2009/apr09/seaotter09/?id=results/seaotter092

Photos:
1. Skinsuit's are rad!!!!
2. Super D podium
3. Super D start