HillBilly Bike BASH!!

Hey all! Well, this past weekend we here in SoCal celebrated in true Hillybilly fashion with Eric Carter's "Hillbilly Bash". The bash went down just north of where I live at the Vail Lake resort in Temecula, CA. There were plenty of vendors and even more people out for this first-annual event. It has been "EC" Eric Carter's dream to give back to the sport that has given him so much over the years and this event was the start of making that dream a reality. It was a very good showing for a first race!!! A large amount of vendors (including: FOX shox, Fox clothing, Mongoose, NEMA, Decline, Turner, Intense, GT) showed up to support this race as well as many industry people (Dave Weagle made an appearance and hung out with all of us on Sat. night). For me, it was an opportunity to get back on my bike and hang out, ride and race with all my friends. Practice was cool. The course was pretty steep at the top with many off-camber sections and loose (did I say loose?) and sandy soil conditions (welcome to SoCal). The shuttle ride was almost as adrenaline pumping as riding the course itself. I had a pretty good race run with a bit of a dab at the top of the course, my excuse is the extremely high winds that had blown in just as I climbed into the start gate! haha. When I came down everyone congratulated me on my 3d place finish, I was excited beyond words considering the deep level of talent in the PRO Field that day. It turns out that the timing was a bit off and as of now nobody has sen the FINAL results. They had a preliminary result print-out and they based the podium on that, I was in 8th place. The results were no big deal, the weekend was one of the most fun times I have had all season...the race results were not a factor.This was the first race in what I see is a resurgence of gravity racing in SoCal...even though we have lost the legendary Snow Summit venue in Big Bear, we still make due with the hills that we have out here. This is very evident in the names of the pro riders who raced this past Sunday (World Cup winners and podiumers (sp) National Champions, ect.). Pretty excited for the future of racing here in SoCal and in the United States. Oh yeah, on a side note...there was a Cannondale demo truck at the event but he packed up and left as soon as I showed up on Saturday afternoon...bummed about that.Check out the Progressive Cycling Association (PCA)site: http://www.pcamtb.com/ for more info. Photo credits go to: Wes Pracht (mtbphoto.com, mtbphoto@gmail.com)

PLACE
NAME
CLASS
TIME
PLATE
1

SWANEGEN,JD
PRO MEN
1.366
69
2
WARREN,CODY
PRO MEN
1.37
70
3
AIELLO,KEVIN
PRO MEN
1.379
66
4
JACKSON,ELIOT
PRO MEN
1.3812
16
5
OIEN,BRAD
PRO MEN
1.3817
61
6
SMITH,WAYLON
PRO MEN
1.395
12
7
BINGGELI,LOGAN
PRO MEN
1.399
198
8
GARCIA,ALFONSO
PRO MEN
1.406
77
9
CLEMENS,MARK
PRO MEN
1.416
142
10
HOUSEMAN,RICH
PRO MEN
1.42
10
11
ATKINS,KRISTIAN
PRO MEN
1.421
138
12
WILSON,TYLER
PRO MEN
1.433
98
13
STAYSKAL,RYAN
PRO MEN
1.444
105
14
SPAULDING,QUINTON
PRO MEN
1.448
199
15
VAN ZUYEN,ANDREW
PRO MEN
1.449
15
16
BUCKELL,JON
PRO MEN
1.451
171
17
HOUSEMAN,GARY
PRO MEN
1.455
13
18
MCCLENDON,SEAN
PRO MEN
1.461
119
19
GOLDRUP,RICK
PRO MEN
1.544
163

Northwest tour 2008

Seems like it all went by like a flash but here I am, back home from one of the more fun road trips I have done in my life. Although several plans were put on hold and many improvisations were put into place, it still ended up being good times. It started off on Wednesday the 31st in Orange County where we packed Wes' dad's Honda Civic up (I mean PACKED) and prepared our passports, bikes, snowboards and luggage for a 1.5 week journey that would take us up California, through Oregon, Washington and finally into British Colombia, Canada. We left Orange County at around 8pm, Wes forgot his cell phone so we turned back to get it...luckily we were only a few exits up the freeway when he realized this! Anyway, we drove up the 5 with little delay, avoiding LA traffic and getting past Sacramento and into the northern part of the state by 2am. We stopped somewhere south of Redding, CA where Wes met his dream girl at the local McDonalds. We took the usual 2-hour power nap and proceeded into the lovely state of Oregon. Upon crossing the border Wes got a little love letter from the local OHP We headed up to Portland where we checked into the Holiday Inn (seriously). What was cool is that we could see the towering image of Mt. Hood where we were to snowboard later in the trip. We decided to head into the city via the "MAX" which is their version of the metro or trolley.
The city was pretty nice, clean and there were really no homeless people...a bit different from San Diego and Los Angeles. We walked around for hours checking out all the stuff, spreading the word about CON clothing and looking for a place to eat. We hopped on the MAX again and headed to our one-star accommodations on the North end of town. In the morning we got on the road again and headed North towards Seattle. It was real cloudy and almost raining, a huge contrast from the previous day which seemed like the temps were in the high 80's!! We hung around Seattle for some hours then realized that we had another 10 hours to Whistler since the main road had been closed due to a rock-slide!@ We got back into the Civic and headed to Canada!
From Seattle we went North to Bellingham where we veered east off the 5 onto rural highways which lead to Canada. The landscape was pretty flat up until we crossed into British Colombia where the coastal mountains rise up pretty impressively (gnar-like). But we had no idea what this alternate route to Whistler had in store for us. It was the gnarliest highway I had been on in awhile, and I have been on some pretty gnarly roads. Constant threat from rock slides, one-lane sections, one-lane wooden bridges (as in wooden planks) , 15% grades and thousand foot cliffs were only the half of it. We finally rolled into Whistler at around midnight and we could not be more stoked. We quickly found Dan & Steph's condo and settled into our Ski-shed (room). The next morning was prime for sleeping-in and we did so, I quickly got the urge to go check out the mountain, Wes the same so we headed over to the main area where the bike park was located (Whistler Village). This place was unreal, it was almost like a dream seeing the famous site of the Whistler bike park in real life...seriously. Anyway, I feel like I am straggling and I am getting tired of typing so I will cliff-note it a bit...
We scored free lift tickets thanks to Distilled Magazine and headed up the hill for the first time on Friday afternoon, awesome. A-line was everything I had dreamed except the lips were steeper and the gaps were smaller than I imagined. Second day, sweet. Up the lift 3 times, 3d run up on Garbanzo my frame decides to fail. Epic Fail. Now what? I had 2 more days planned of riding and this shit happens? great. Call a mountain patrol guy who takes me and my useless piece of aluminum down the hill. Call it a day and devise a plan for the next week and a half we have on the road. I decide to rent a bike the next day, a 50 something pound Rocky Mountain that needed some upgrades before it was enjoyable to ride. It was good, and I had a good time on it.

Whistler

I'm heading up to Whistler today for some riding. Yeah, no racing. Just riding. Should be good times indeed.

Mt Snow

The U.S National Championships went down this past weekend at Mt. Snow Vermont. I started off my Journey at 8am at Lindbergh field in beautiful sunny San Diego, about 9 hours later I was standing outside of Albany international in 90% humidity and 90* Fahrenheit wondering: "what the hell was I thinking?"

Mt. Snow is different. The mountain itself is unique, the terrain tends to be open, mossy, slippery and rocky. This year they changed up the course a bit and unfortunately added many pedaling sections which made the course stupid flat in sections and gave the peddler an advantage. Practice was going great Thursday and Friday, although I was getting flats at a steady pace I was digging the high-speed rough course (when not pedaling). Friday night the skies opened up and we got some rain. Saturday morning practice was good, surprisingly dry and tacky well, not really in the woods but it was ok. Saturday practice ended and I felt good, although I was unfortunately feeling a bit under the weather. As the day went on I could feel myself getting sick, this was not good. Sunday morning came along and I definitely was feeling under the weather, I tried to ignore it and focus on my riding but it was next to impossible. My body felt week and I was having a bit of trouble breathing and alot of trouble pedaling. I seeded mid-pack with a very conservative run, most of the guys played the rain card as heavy rain was forecasted for the afternoon. Race time came around and I found myself in the gate. I hit all my lines with good speed in the top section and found my way to the first pedaling section. Not bad I held my speed through the open sweeping turns pretty well. I hit the middle pedaling section and had no juice. The next couple of pedal sections I had absolutely no gas. I got to the lower tree section and caught up to the guy in front of me. I thought I could pass him but I had no power left and my concentration was less than good, the result was me missing some lines and slowing down...geez. I got to the bottom and unclipped and looked horrible for the finish. Result=mid-pack performance, not what I was looking for in this race. Overall I was pretty disappointed in this trip out to the East coast, I was looking for a top 10 finish as I thought I was in good physical shape. But my lack of health I think hindered me in achieving this. Bummed. Thanks To Eric once again for his support and thanks to JAK the Cannondale factory mechanic for being an Italian.

Cool video from the race, I'm in the intro pinning it! haha

http://www.kmtb.com/bbs/zboard.php?i...egory=1&no=217

Downtime

Pretty quiet right now. I have been riding a bit more throwing in a couple of XC rides during the week and riding my Judge whenever possible. Right now I am in preparation for the US National Championships that will go down in approximately 2 weeks at Mount Snow Vermont. My goal is to finish top 10 but of course I would like to think that I can get a top 5.

I am keeping my fingers crossed that the weather stays dry!!

Anglefire

Angelfire was great. Always one of my favorite events/venues of all time. I don't know if it is the relaxed atmosphere, the great terrain or the tacky dirt but something about Anglfire keeps bringing me back for more!

This season the promoters decided to get creative and cut a couple of new sections on the mountain. This added a bit of length to the course but unfortunately slowed the speeds down and also cut down the amount of turns on the course as the new section was pretty much straight down the mountain. No worries, there was a chairlift and life is good!

Eric Saletel showed up in the Sobe/Cannondale rig and set up shop in the pit area. This proved to be a critical part of my success this weekend as it provided a place for me to clean and work on my bike as well as store it when I was not riding.

Long story short...It snowed for all but the last two days of the event, unfortunately cutting our ride/practice time short. When the sun did show itself however, the course came alive and was fast and very fun. I seeded in the number 20 spot as I had a very mellow run and made some mistakes. I must admit that I was not happy at all with my result and was a bit uneasy about race day.

The morning of the race did not make things much better. I woke up early because practice was at 8am, I made my way to the lift and was in shock! The lift line seemed to stretch for miles! I only had an hour for practice and apparently people who were near the front had already been waiting for almost 30 minutes. It was clear that I was not going to have time to practice so I decided to scrap my practice plans. I went to the pit, dropped off my bike with the #1 mechanic on the circuit (Eric) and went to the condo. I hung out/slept/ate for about 5 hours. When the time came to get ready for my race run I was a bit uneasy. I made my way up the lift and tried to relax.

When the UCI official called my name I sort of cleared my mind, as I got positioned on the start gate I just thought of the course and felt a bit of confidence come over me. The race run was great. My aim (as it always is) was to be as smooth as possible and get to the bottom as fast as possible. I saved my energy and pedaled very little because the course was long and I did not want to make mistakes in the lower, faster portion of the course. I came down with a great time and I was happy to see some of my team mates and friends at the bottom just as excited about my time as I was. At the end of the day my time was goo enough for 8th place! My best pro finish at a National to date!

Angelfire 2008, the low-down.

This year was quite different than last; it snowed for 2 days straight! Although the snow made things very interesting the stoke was still high this weekend. The course was a bit different this year as well, I believe that the new course was not catered to my riding style but I still managed to make due. More updates to come very soon.

Angel Fire 2008

It's that time again. Time to break out the Downhill bike for some real downhill racing. And once again I am looking forward to boarding the chairlift and taking a few peadal strokes out of the gate then coasting. This is a very important race for 2008 as the top Americans will not only gain UCI points but will also have the ability to automatically qualify for Worlds team. Here we go, Angel Fire 2008.

Cal State Woodward

Dang! By far the most dusty and dry course I have ever ridden! The corners were loose, there was pedaling pretty much 90% of the time and the course was a little longer than a minute...It did not matter one bit because we were riding and racing bikes so it is all good! Not much of a story to tell, just peep the pics snapped by Westley.

Sea Otter

Well, here we are. At the beginning of yet another season, and even though there was a major race before this year's Otter...it still feels like the unofficial start of the season. I can't stress enough how absolutely great it is having a pit when racing. It makes a huge difference.

Wes, Brad and I pulled an all night driving mission as we did the previous year and arrived at the Laguna Seca raceway in the wee hours of the morning. A quick nap in the parking lot and it was off to the registration tent for our packet pick-up. I was of course extremely tired so getting all of this done was a bit of a challenge given my tired state. While in the tent I met up with most of my Cannondale team mates including Heath, George, Cody, Derek and Jon Clark. Before I knew it I was chillin in the Sobe/Cannondale pits with the wrenchman himself Eric Saletel. We did a quick tire swap and it was off to the DH course for some practice. The course was a bit different than years past, they built a couple of larger jumps up top which made clearing the step-down into the first major burm alot easier.

It would be impossible to describe all the happenings of this past weekend, too much happened. From the shenanigans at the house to Joey pitting the golf course with his "sub-par" golfing skills, to brad's never ending hyperness, Josh's hilarious jokes, Erics non-stop sarcasm...it was just a overall sick weekend.

Of course I could have asked for a better result in the DH but you all know that it is my fault that I am not in good shape. I did feel however that I was able to give it a little more than last year and that I rode better because of it, regardless of what my time was.

Mountainbike racing is a fricken awesome thing.

Weekend of thrash!

Yes, I did get my new DH steed, I named her "Roxanne" because that's the song that was playin on the radio when I took the bike out of the box:

Specs:

Frame: Large Cannondale Judge DH

Shock: Fox DHX 5.0 with Ti spring

Fork: Fox 40 Rc2

Wheels: Mavic Dee-Max/Mavic 823 on Industry nine hubs.

Drive: Shimano SAINT cranks, Shifter, Brakeset and Shimano SHADOW XT derailer, Shimano DX pedals

Guide: E-13 LG1

Post: Thomson Masterpiece

Seat: Selle San Marco Aspide Ti

Bars: Sunline V2

Stem: Sunline V1 50mm

Thanks to Zumwalts for letting me assemble the bike at the shop.

It was over 90*F all over Southern California this weekend, so what do I decide to do? Ride my bike of course!! I drove up to the OC on Friday night to meet up with Hank Cadle and Bradical Oien for some Shuttles on the ultra-secret Monster/Iron Horse DH trail in Lake Elsinore. It was over 100*F easy and we hammered out as many runs as we could...Alongside Mr. Sam Hill and Brendog, they of course could not keep up with us so we didn't really ride too much with them (just kidding).

Sunday was a Dirtjam at the Clairmont jumps (miracle) where we sessioned the jumps from 11am till dark@@@#$!@!!! All kinds of people were down there having a great time and flowing the sick jumps. Lots of pros in SoCal preppin' for Sea Badger.

Fontana?

Well, the fontana "national" wend down this past weekend. Good news! I didn't get hurt there as I have for the past 2 years!! Stoked on that. Also, immensely stoked on the team set-up (as in the trailer, wrench ((eric)), and stuff). Nothing much to write about for this race; it was dusty, loose, and surprisingly rough. Unfortunately for me I only had my Perp with a single-crown fox 36 which made the rough sections a hand full. I felt good on the little guy by race day but unfortunately my legs didn't follow suit. Yeah, Fontana requires that you pedal most of the time including the flat, tedious, infamous wall section.

Pretty stoked on the team members too, a bunch of cool cats. Have not been able to snatch photos of me riding (although it must have been pretty easy to photo me this past weekend, aha) mainly 'cuz Wes went snowboarding instead of the Fontana race (good choice)...but I was able to get a shot of the team set-up which is again, SWEET. Just a couple more fo-DH races and on to the chairlifts, I can't wait.

Photo by Eric Saletel

Baja 250, Check.

Wow. Baja, what can I say? It's like a whole different world. Now, I have been going down there my whole life mind you, but it seems everytime I go it is a whole new thing, a whole new adventure, like nothing else in this world. The second you cross the border your heart rate goes up (well at least mine does) and you get into baja mode.

So my dad and I got up extra early and met up with Joe who was gonna finish the race when I got off the bike at race mile 192. We crossed the border and in no time we were going past the arches at San Felipe, a "small" fishing town with more Off-Road racing history than dirt itself!! I was so stoked to be back in "San Felo" after a one year hiatus of the host city for the annual "Baja 250". We rolled into contingency and as always the street was bustling with locals, racers, cars, vendors, the works. After awhile I was able to get ahold of my team and check out the new bike. Dang, she was a beuty...top notch bike all prepped and ready to go, this gave me some serious motivation. After continjency it was time to get down to business, we packed everything and headed out of town to where I was to get on the bike at about race mile 120. Well, that just happened to be at the farthest end of the course and it took my dad and I a good 2 hours of off-road driving to get to the spot. regardless of the long drive, the desert was epic. huge mountains to the West and green, rugged desert for as far as the eye can see, Baja at it's best.

So morning came and I took my time getting up. By this time we had fired up the radio and were listening to the injury reports coming in...two code reds within the first 15 miles of the race, one guy was already getting life-flighted to San Diego. Not what you want to hear before you get on the bike. Next thing I knew the 1x bike of Robby Bell comes SCREAMING by and the helicopter buzzes us overhead, It occurs to me that the field is coming and I REALLY need to get ready. I get all my gear on, make sure the radio works and wait for the bike to arrive.

The next 2.5 hours or so were like a blur. All I remember is getting on the bike and my dad telling me over the radio to be safe, don't get crazy and the one I remember best; The trophy trucks have not even started yet. After hearing that I relaxed...well kinda. Through my 7o-something mile section however, I lost a foot peg guard, the rear brakes and I got a flat, add to that my pit crew was nowhere to be found (they got stuck in the sand on their way to me) when I needed a tire change/gas.

At the end of the day we finished, bike and bodies battered with a 5th place in the pro 450cc class...awesome.

Adventure no doubt, baja is unique and I love the thrill of being down there.

Baja

I leave for Baja tomorrow morning. I will be racing in class 25, pro ATV. As luck would have it I got selected to do the longest, most desolate and roughest part on the course. Wish me luck as this is gonna be a tough ride.

-Alf

Riding again

Well, it's been a long winter. Unfortunately it has not been a long winter of riding. This riding season is looking good however, and I look forward to getting back out on the race scene. Here are a couple of pics of me at the final round of the Fontana Winter series.